Home
Authors
Tags
App
Get QuoteDark Inspirational Quotes App
" I think hip hop is a dance music that's rebellious by nature. "
Talib Kweli
Think
Rebellious
Nature
Related Quotes:
" Hip-hop isn't as complex as a woman is. "
Talib Kweli
Complex
Hip-Hop
Woman
" 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. "
Talib Kweli
Technology
Work
I Am
" Woman are complex creatures. "
Talib Kweli
Creatures
Complex
Woman
" Being called a conscious rapper is quite a compliment. It's a great thing to be. But as an artist, my nature is to not be in a box. "
Talib Kweli
Great
Rapper
Artist
" The problem with our role is Americans live in a world of illusion. "
Talib Kweli
Live
Role
Problem
" Once you're signed to a label you compromise. "
Talib Kweli
Label
Signed
You
" There's consciousness in my music, and my music comes from a conscious place. And when people say that, I certainly take it as a compliment. But my job, in terms of selling my music, is to be universal and to try to get it to everybody. "
Talib Kweli
Music
Job
Compliment
" I am not a prisoner of conscious, but people try to make me one sometimes. It is both a gift and a curse. It's a high honour but can create limitations - I have to be fluid. "
Talib Kweli
Create
I Am
Me
" 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. "
Talib Kweli
Come
Buying
Audience
" Ain't nobody making music to not be heard and the easiest way to be heard is to be on the radio, but you should never compromise who you are, your values or your morals. "
Talib Kweli
Compromise
Music
You
" 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. "
Talib Kweli
You
Artist
Think
" War is not civilized. "
Talib Kweli
Civilized
War
" When I look at the arc of my career, my focus is on lyricism, right? I own that. "
Talib Kweli
Right
Arc
Focus
" I don't think that early hip hop stood out to be a social critique. A lot of fans of mine think that hip hop's ultimate responsibility is to critique social structures. "
Talib Kweli
Fans
Early
Think
" I'm not an artist that has a big, huge radio record that's going to be on BET. "
Talib Kweli
Big
Bet
Record
" And you know, art as commerce, doesn't really make too much sense, they don't go together. "
Talib Kweli
Too Much
You
Go
" The only way for me to be an artist is to be honest in my craft. If I veer from that, I'm not giving the investors what they want. Sometimes it's my job as an artist to know what I want to do, even when the fans tell me different. "
Talib Kweli
Giving
Sometimes
Me
" You know, there's a lot of activism that doesn't deal with empowerment, and you have to empower yourself in order to be relevant to any type of struggle. "
Talib Kweli
Know
Empower
Struggle
" There's a lot of activism that doesn't deal with empowerment, and you have to empower yourself in order to be relevant to any type of struggle. "
Talib Kweli
Order
Empower
Yourself
" My fondest memories were watching the Beastie Boys get prepped to come on stage. They had a lot of antics and they play a lot of basketball... then they were giving out cameras to the crowd, and performing from the bleachers. The most important thing I learned was that you control your crowd, not the other way around. "
Talib Kweli
Memories
Giving
Control
" But it becomes disrespectful when the artist's process is not respected. "
Talib Kweli
Becomes
Artist
Process
" I don't go into any album with pressing issues. I just try to write songs. "
Talib Kweli
Try
Write
Just
" I like collaboration because, first of all, I'm good at writing lyrics. I don't know how to make beats. I don't play instruments. I'm not a good singer. So even when you see a solo album of mine, it's still a collaboration. "
Talib Kweli
Good
Collaboration
You
" You gotta eat right, you gotta have healthy habits, you know, and balance out your decadence with a healthy lifestyle during the day. "
Talib Kweli
You
Right
Know
" I don't feel comfortable making empty music. "
Talib Kweli
Making
Comfortable
Feel
" 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. "
Talib Kweli
Learn
Children
Life
" I remember looking back on a photo of me... wearing a suit that was, like, two sizes too big for me. I think a lot of guys don't know what fits. "
Talib Kweli
Know
Think
Me
" Well if somebody's giving me a script, I'll consider it. But it's not something I'm chasing. "
Talib Kweli
Somebody
Well
Me
" 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. "
Talib Kweli
Song
You
Beautiful
" I think music sharing of any kind is great. "
Talib Kweli
Sharing
Kind
Music