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" I don't feel comfortable making empty music. "

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" What's more condescending and corny than someone telling you how much more money they have than you and telling you basically, 'I don't care about poor people,' which is a large part of what you hear of corporate hip-hop on the radio. "

" The beautiful thing about hip-hop is it's like an audio collage. You can take any form of music and do it in a hip-hop way and it'll be a hip-hop song. That's the only music you can do that with. "

" If I focus on being an activist and my job is to be a rapper, I'm not going to be as good of a rapper. I need to focus on hip-hop and focus on making the music, so that when the activists come to me and they need my voice to create a platform, then I've got enough people listening to me. Not because I'm conscious, but because I'm dope. "

" Before Eminem, the idea that there would be a white rapper that anybody would really check for was fantastic or amazing or impossible. "

" There are staples to my show. I have to be conscious about switching things up because I know people who saw me last year will say, 'He did that last time.' But if certain things work, they work. "

" Hip-hop is a vehicle. "

" Hip-hop isn't as complex as a woman is. "

" Things are fluid in this world, and if you don't remain fluid, you get lost in the sauce. "

" War is not civilized. "

" I will never do a record without some sense of responsibility. "

" My musical influence is really from my father. He was a DJ in college. My parents met at New York University. So he listened to, you know, Motown, and he listened to Bob Dylan. He listened to Grateful Dead and Rolling Stones, but he also listened to reggae music. And he collected vinyl. "

" Well if somebody's giving me a script, I'll consider it. But it's not something I'm chasing. "

" I take certain steps to make sure I'm relevant artistically. I always have new music and a reason to be on the road. I'm not just playing 'Get By' over and over. I have 12 albums. "

" You have to know when to be arrogant. You have to when to be humble. You have to know when to be hard and you have to know when to be soft. "

" If I'm performing with a DJ, it's all on me to draw the energy. I like the camaraderie of a band. "

" Skip the religion and politics, head straight to the compassion. Everything else is a distraction. "

" I'm at a loss for words. But even my loss is amplified. "

" As an artist, I have to be a leader of my fans, not, like, follow them. Because if I chose to follow them, you know, they could do it. You know, it's me who's doing it. "

" The problem with our role is Americans live in a world of illusion. "

" My personal take on politics is I deal with social situations and cultural situations in my music and in my life. I have said on record many times that I haven't voted. I'm not the type of person who says, 'I'm never going to vote.' I think it's clear to me that our system has failed us. "

" Young kids should be doing music that has shock value. They'll grow out of it. "

" I think hip hop is a dance music that's rebellious by nature. "

" I think the line is where you're in the studio, you're creating. That belongs to you as an artist. Nothing should taint that. I shouldn't be thinking about what the fans want, I shouldn't be thinking about what the radio wants, what the label wants, what your manager wants, a song for the chicks, a song for the street. "

" You know, I've learned a lot from every person I've collaborated with, from Madlib to Jean Grae and Hi-Tek, to Mos to DJ Quik, to even somebody like Jermaine Dupri. I've taken something important away from every experience. "

" What is Norah Jones' style? Is it just the albums that we've heard? She has a rock group where she plays guitar in, downtown in New York, so do we really know her style? "

" Hi-Tek is on three or four songs on the new record. "

" Being called 'conscious' is a great thing to be, but it's the connotations and preconceived notions that come with the buying audience about what conscious music can be. "

" I think that I am seeing the Internet and seeing technology take and seeing how the work I do through music directly affects people's lives better than any politician I've ever met. "

" You make knowledge relevant to life and you make it important for children to learn things that will really relate to things going on in their lives, and not abstract. "

" We're in an illusion about what our role is in world politics and foreign affairs, and our policies are killing and destroying and doing a lot of things that we are not aware of. "