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I listen to everything – from Sarah McLachlan and Alanis Morissette all the way down to rap like Scarface, UGK and Lauryn Hill.

Jay-Z

I’ve got a nice collection of paintings – a Basquiat, a black-and-white Warhol that’s like a Rorschach test, and I commissioned Takashi Murakami to do a ten-foot joint for me. It’s almost like the explosion in Hiroshima with his famous skeleton head. There’s a wall above my fireplace reserved for it.
JAY-Z

Collection Commission Country Nice Painting Person Test White
When you have a reputation for making not only good songs but great albums, that in itself creates added artistic pressure. But, at the end of the day, I guess that pressure is something I welcome.
JAY-Z

Album Artistic Create End Good Great Guess Make Only Pressure Reputation Something Song
I’m going to make a very bold statement: Hip-hop has done more than any leader, politician, or anyone to improve race relations.
JAY-Z

Anyone Bold Hip Hop Improve Leader Make Politician Race Relation Statement Very
I’m just saying the producers and people who work on music are getting left out – that’s when it starts getting criminal. It’s like you’re working hard, and you’re not receiving. In any other business, people would be standing before Congress. They have antitrust laws against this kind of behavior.
JAY-Z

Accomplish Criminal Get Left Lost Out People Produce Say Start Transition When Work
They say a midget standing on a giant’s shoulders can see much further than the giant. So I got the whole rap world on my shoulders, they trying to see further than I am.
JAY-Z

Further Giant Glant Midget Shoulder Stand
It’s hilarious a lot of times. You have a conversation with someone, and he’s like, ‘You speak so well!’ I’m like, ‘What do you mean? Do you understand that’s an insult?
JAY-Z

Conversation Hilarious Like Lot Somehow Speak Time Well
When Basquiat was hanging out with Madonna and Fab Five Freddy, and all those worlds were colliding, people have to realize hip-hop and the arts were like this ’cause we both were outcasts.
JAY-Z

Basquait Celebrity Collide Country Hand Out People Person Those Word
By the time I got to record my first album, I was 26, I didn’t need pen or paper – my memory had been trained just to listen to a song, think of the words, and lay them to tape.
JAY-Z

Album First Listen Memory Need Paper Pen Record Song Time Trained Twentymsix
Religion is like a personal computer. You let people in if you want to… We’re all gods.
JAY-Z

All Computer God Let People Personal Religion
When I listen to Amy Winehouse, I believe that her heart and soul is in the music, or if I listen to other British artists like Duffy or Estelle. The aesthetic of it is different, and it’s my point of view. It’s not anything formulaic.
JAY-Z

Artist Believe Celebrity Country Heart Listen Music Other People Person Soul
It was a very intense and stressful situation. There was playing in the Johnny-pump (an opened fire hydrant) and the ice-cream man coming around and all of these games that we’d play, and suddenly it would turn just violent and there would be shootings at 12 in the afternoon on any given day.
JAY-Z

Come Country Cream Fire Hydrant Ice Intense Man Open People Play Pump Situation Stressful Very
When I came into the music, I was forced to be a CEO. I was forced to be an entrepreneur; I was forced to… because I was looking for a deal. I didn’t have this grand scheme of starting a record company and then morphing into a clothing empire.
JAY-Z

CEO Clothing Company Empire Entrepreneur Force Grand Look Morphing Music Record Scheme Starting
I’ve never looked at myself and said that I need to be a certain way to be around a certain sort of people.
JAY-Z

Around Certain Look Myself Need never People Said Sort Way
The experiences that I’ve had growing up with music, you know, I couldn’t trade them for any money in the world. Dancing in the living room to enjoy myself. ‘Enjoy Yourself,’ Michael Jackson.
JAY-Z

Experience Grow Know Money Music Trade World
It wasn’t until sixth grade, at P.S. 168, when my teacher took us on a field trip to her house that I realized we were poor.
JAY-Z

Field Grade House Look Poor Realize Teacher Until
Hip-hop has done more for race relations than most cultural icons; and I say save Martin Luther King, because his ‘I Have A Dream’ speech was realized when Obama was elected into office.
JAY-Z

Culture Done Dream Hip Hop Icon More Most President Relation Say Speech

I listen to everything – from Sarah McLachlan and Alanis Morissette all the way down to rap like Scarface, UGK and Lauryn Hill.

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I listen to everything – from Sarah McLachlan and Alanis Morissette all the way down to rap like Scarface, UGK and Lauryn Hill.

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Popular Authors

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