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You get the beats. You write to them. You go in the studio and lay it down. Hopefully, a song comes out sounding good. If it comes out sounding good, you put it to the side with the rest of the other good ones, and you try to decide which ones you're gonna use on the album.
People planted seeds into me. Older cats gave me the game. My family, especially my mother, gave me the game and I pass it on. That's what it's about. If somebody gives you mental jewelry and you wear it for so long, you want to give it to somebody else for them pass it on.
People be saying, 'Watch - when she gets some money, she's going to get a Gucci purse.' But I don't think that's my style. I like finding random stuff and random brands. Maybe one day when I'm sophisticated and older I might settle down and invest in a nice leather handbag.
For a lot of people, groups, Christians included, issues are homogenized. And so to be a Christian, I'm either this staunch, conservative Republican, or I'm this tree-hugging liberal. You're stereotyped. It's almost assumed that people know what your issues are going to be.
Hip-hop is my girlfriend, hip-hop is my kid. Hip-Hop fills the void of the things that I don't have. I pay it 101% attention. I don't think I could be as good a father, or as good a husband or anything like that - the way I am as an artist - until I'm not an artist anymore.
When you look at hip-hop, I want to do that: to spit fire and take our best from the ashes to build our kingdom; to recognize all the regional styles, conscious lyrics, the tracks, underground, mainstream, the way we treat each other. Lose the garbage and rebuild our scene.
I learned how to take other people's mechanisms of promoting their stuff through me as opposed to promoting my own stuff, as far as getting Snoop DeVilles, SnoopDeGrills, Snoop Doggy Dogg biscuits, Snoop Dogg record label, Snoop Dogg bubble gum, Snoop Youth Football League.
I feel like your city - with hip hop in particular, because we're always beating our chest and shouting where we're from - your city is just as influential as your parents. Even the grimy, hardcore gangster rap from New York - KRS-One and Wu Tang, the stuff acknowledges it.
Black art is not some kind of a magic wand: there still has to be a humble heart attached that's listening to it. And I know it's not a wand because plenty of fans love to turn on us as soon as they realize we are actual black people, with black concerns in our black lives.
Corporations have steered the industry into what it wants, and a lot of times they will make artists record what it wants or to make songs talk to who they want to talk to. But sometimes the heart and the head have to be able to talk and deal with a situation that's evident.
When I introduce you to somebody, his name is Big Pun. When I introduce you to somebody, his name is DJ Khaled. When I introduce you to an artist, her name is Remy Ma. If I introduce you to somebody, it's Cool and Dre or Scott Storch - people who change the face of the game.
I think what's happenin' is that, with the overflow of music, it's been diluted. There was a time when people would go search out underground records. Now, underground means free, and people don't really care for it. So now artists tend to go more pop and look for the radio.
Leibniz mapped the principles concerning the conservation of energy, but nobody has yet scientifically diagrammed the conservation of emotion - have they? How is this subsumed pain vented? Is it released in my art? I hope so, but I also suspect that it's emitted in my sleep.
I still let myself be a fan of music and that motivates me to want to be better than certain people or just getting the same love. Nothing is new under the sun so you cant be afraid to take things from others and try to flip them and make them your own at the end of the day.
With 'Light,' I collaborated with a lot of different producers and musicians I respected, and we all wrote and worked on material which I then took to an old-school producer, David Kahne, and we put it all together. The lyrics came first - they were written before the music.
I had been through, of course, the divorce and I had been hit with some taxes that really showed me to be careful who's working with you and your money, and you have to be the one that is responsible for your money - you can't trust anyone and I did and I ran into a problem.
For me with art and all that stuff - I like abstraction. I like contortion. I mean, it's still truth. But it's truth through the center of the individual. It doesn't necessarily mean that it's fallacies or falsehoods. It just happens to be one perception of what's happening.
People got so many questions. Why you got so many questions when my whole life is on the Internet? If you wanna know about me, you can go on the Internet and look at my YouTube videos. I used to drop one every day. You can go on my YouTube channel, go on my Vine, my Twitter.
I feel like too many people on the West Coast, they're too needy. They feel they need Snoop or Game. I never did any tracks with any West Coast artists. Not because I didn't want to, but because I didn't feel like that's what I had to do in order to get on. I just did music.
This was totally influenced by me and the direction that I am writing about and the stuff that I am writing about. There is just no way that you can be as intense as what I have been through in my life over a drum beat machine, sample, or loop; it's just not going to happen.
The ruling quality of leaders adaptive capacity, is what allows true leaders to make the nimble decisions that bring success. Adaptive capacity is also what allows some people to transcend the setbacks and losses that come with age and to reinvent themselves again and again.
Trying your best not to get stressed out, the hardest part is not to get down, not to let the business get to you. I think the business is more mental than it is talent. I think you can have the talent, but if you don't have it up here, I think you can easily just break down.
I really embrace things that I think people who like music can relate to, they grew up with the same stuff and know the same references so when they hear it being used as a metaphor to something else they'll be like that's unique, or funny or something that's relatable to me.
We still haven't gotten the message; we still don't see that it's bad. And then we copy everything about their [Roman Empire] structure. I mean Paul Bremer was the proconsul of Iraq. We're still using ancient terminology, we still have Senators and we have an Emperor, almost.
I don't know where streaming will go in the future. The analytics that we're seeing tell us that streaming is the next thing, and downloads are going down. I feel like with the history of this platform, from vinyl to where we are now, it just seems like the next logical step.
I'm, like, a person who likes love. And I can find love in any type of person. I've dated girls, and I've liked girls. But they're usually straight girls, so it never works out. I mean, I'm not that gay, so I don't have the energy to convince someone else to be gay, you know?
I've been teaching myself the fundamentals and being around some good players, but also been learning to play team games, playing 3-on-3s, playing 1-on-1s, playing 5-on-5s, playing 21. There are guys bigger than me on the court, but I've had numerous comparisons to Ty Lawson.
Allah's blessings is like everyday. I can't do nothing without mentioning ALLAH or one of his words. I can't do nothing without coming across one of his blessings or doing something and be like that's Allah talking to me or something happen to me and I say Allah gave me that.
I ended up moving downtown with these three dudes that I didn't really know. I came into the house, and I didn't realize how things worked. From, like, 15-18, I was just fighting them. I fought, like, every day, and these were, like, older dudes. It was every man for himself.
God opened my eyes to see Jesus for who He really was. After I trusted Christ, the Lord changed my entire perspective on everything. I started thinking about how I should relate to my parents and how I should approach school and even what it meant for the music I was writing.
I know, when I was growing up, a lot of the views I was listening to, it was a worldview that was not helpful. The world even sold me a false idea of what the good life was, and I wish that people would have helped me to think better about how to interact with that worldview.
There's a lot of real unity - and a lot fake unity, sadly. I think a lot of people are going to get an opportunity to pursue greatness and pursue careers outside of D.C. Not everybody is going to make it. I think there's a connotation that there's a lack of rappers out there.
The Black Eyed Peas sell thousands of seats in every country on the planet. You can't get nervous. We're all succeeding in all different parts of our careers. Just because I produce Nas and John Legend and Justin Timberlake doesn't mean it will change the dynamic of the Peas.
I became tired of submitting my art to a panel of corporate strategists who decide if it meets their standard of what gets into stores or not. It was quite simple for me: they act like judge and jury of my art, and that is unacceptable. I wanted to give it right to the public.
I have a strong army I keep with me and we don't go out there looking for problems. A lot of people have this perception... but I don't have a superiority complex about me because I'm from New York or because I'm Peruvian/Black. I think some people get caught up in that stuff.
I'm not a pop rapper. That's nothing against pop music - I love pop music. I've jumped on pop records for people and still will, but I'm not a pop artist. I didn't start from there. I started in underground music. I consider myself an underground artist, as well as a producer.
Whats the biggest commercial for aggression, sexuality and materialism? What gets pumped into these kids heads? Taking someone elses girl, which is so laissez-faire in hip-hop, will get you killed in the streets, but it doesnt seem to be an issue when you hear it on the radio.
I think hip hop allows us to talk about everything, and Africa is what I choose to talk about now. If people are not talking about Africa, that's them, that's cool, there's nothing wrong with that. But this is who I am, this is what I have to say, this is what I have to offer.
Don't get yourself in certain circumstances or instances, because it's not a good feeling to be sitting in that chair where you've got 12 people that are in control of your life. You have an opportunity to be in control of your life for yourself by the decisions that you make.
I am responsible for what happened to me but if I was to stay there it is kind of a constant reminder and it is very easy.... You know the new song is called Mental.... I am not trying to hide from people that I have OCD, and I don't think that I am a completely normal person.
The more we make our lives about us, then the more we waste our time. When we get older, we devote our lives to ourselves, and then we wasted it. If we want to devote our lives to something significant, something that matters, then we should devote our lives to the Lord Jesus.
Music has changed a lot over the past few years so I believe it's necessary to adjust in order to make music the fans want to hear. If I need to release single after single instead of releasing the album, that is what I will do to reacquaint fans with who I am as an artist now.
You're not going to say anything about me that I'm not going to say about myself. There's so many things that I think about myself; if someone really wanted to get at me, they could say this and this and this. So I'm going to say it before they can. It's the best policy for me.
I have inherited two of the most important brands in hip-hop, Def Jam and Roc-A-Fella. Reid and Universal Music Group have given me the opportunity to manage the companies I have contributed to my whole career. I feel this is a giant step for me and the entire artist community.
I call you once...you never dialed back. Twice...you never dialed back. Saturday morning, live, I'm on Soul Train, talkin' to Don Cornelius. Saturday night, my phone rings... Saturday night, I won't answer. Saturday night, my phone rings again... Saturday night, I don't answer.
I don't think intimidated is the word. I definitely get excited by it. I don't want to let anybody down. I've always been the type of person to make everybody happy and get things done. I want everything to be 100% perfect. I do feel it when people hold me to high expectations.
There's always something going on, and people need that 45-minute-to-an-hour-and-15-minute break, where they just escape and not worry about bills, health care and God knows what. That, to me, is when you're making great music: when people can just forget about what's going on.
People believe those fairytales about falling in love at first sight at the bus, subway, or at the streets. But it doesn’t make sense how they’d laugh at the ones who fell in love at first sight through TV screens. Loving a celebrity IS a type of love. Love is fair to everyone.
Hip hop has always been, for us, for artists who are pure to the craft - any place overseas, whether it's Australia, any place in Asia, Germany, Africa, it becomes something where you can still go and work. Hip hop is an import culture. We're spoiled by it here. It's homegrown.
Bury me smilin' with G's in my pocket, Have a party at my funeral let every rapper rock it Let the hoes that I used to know, from way before Kiss me from my head to my toe, Gimme a paper and pen so I can write about my life of sin, Couple bottles of gin, in case I don't get in.