I was a super-duper Tupac fan, and I realized later, when I became a huge Nas fan and a huge Eminem fan, I was drawn to the storytellers. They all told stories in different ways, but they were all like the best storytellers.

No one tells me what to do with my music. Real. My mom doesn’t tell what to say, how is someone else going to?

Ninety percent of all music is always crap, and when too many people decide they’re going to have guitar bands, then ninety percent of them are going to be crap. It’s just a given law.

Songs are my diaries; they always have been. You have to put your trust in everyone because putting down those real, personal details and thoughts that make a song authentic also opens you right up. I am constantly misunderstood; a lot of people just don’t get me.

I kinda like the idea of having an album that’s all me.

I get so excited when a song I wrote that’s very personal to me goes No. 1 and I look down and see people singing the words back to me.

Doing music to pay bills is an uncomfortable situation. I never wanted to be in that situation.

My only scheme was to be a rapper.

Artists are notoriously snooty and suspicious of anything coming from the business community.

I was part of Jazzercise class. It was an aerobics routine accompanied by loud music, sounding quite awful to me. Jazzercise was popular in the ’80s and ’90s.

I taught myself to play the guitar by listening to Paul Simon records, working it out note by note. He is an incredibly intelligent musician. He’s not someone who has a natural outpouring of melody like McCartney or Dylan, who are just terribly prolific with musical ideas.

To all the musicians, to the Academy, with all due respect, reggaeton is part of our Latin culture. And its representing as much as any other genre at the worldwide level.

A musician must make music, an artist must paint, a poet must write, if he is to be ultimately at peace with himself.

Being an artist doesn’t just mean you have a song. That doesn’t make you an artist. The word ‚artist‘ means so many different things, and I feel like to be a real one, you really have to do it all. The people that I think of as artists – Tyler the Creator, Childish Gambino, Kanye West – are doing the most.

Music when healthy, is the teacher of perfect order, and when depraved, the teacher of perfect disorder.

I just try to write songs that people are going to have a dialogue about.

If you want to find the source of much of the music of modern day Russia, you will find it in the incredible compositions of that crazed lunatic Berlioz.

I’ve been asking myself: ‚Why put together these things – CDs, albums?‘ The answer I came up with is, well, sometimes it’s artistically viable. It’s not just a random collection of songs. Sometimes the songs have a common thread, even if it’s not obvious or even conscious on the artists‘ part.

It’s nice, I think, when people use your music for things you didn’t think of.

It’s not true I had nothing on, I had the radio on.

I used to sing songs and write with my uncle, Bill Owens.

I knew the second I finished the first record – ‚House Of Balloons‘ – and had all this material leftover that a trilogy would be best.

I hate talking about music, to tell you the truth.

A song has to take on character, shape, body and influence people to an extent that they use it for their own devices. It must affect them not just as a song, but as a lifestyle.

Some artists are working to buy the mansion or whatever the element of fame must bear, but I spend all my money on my show.

When I got to New York City when I was 18, I started playing in clubs in Brooklyn – I have good friends and devoted fans on the underground scene, but we were playing for each other at that point – and that was it.

‚Doo-wop‘ is a very special word for me. Because I grew up listening to my dad who, as a Fifties rock & roll head, loved doo-wop music.

Music from my fourth year began to be the first of my youthful occupations. Thus early acquainted with the gracious muse who tuned my soul to pure harmonies, I became fond of her, and, as it often seemed to me, she of me.

I do seem to like to combine the dramatic emotional warmth of strings with the grooves and body business of drums and bass.

I’ve been on tour since I was 16, and I always do meet-and-greets before and after shows, so you kind of build these friendships with people. I have girls come up to me and tell me exactly what’s going on in their love lives.

When I heard Little Richard, I mean, it just set my world on fire.

In high school I wanted to be a rock star and was in a lot of bands.

I’ve never thought about songwriting as a weapon. I’ve only thought about it as a way to help me get through love and loss and sadness and loneliness and growing up.

Music can change the world because it can change people.

Look at Pusha-T. He makes a certain type of rap music. ‚Daytona‘ is that on the highest level.

I love making music. That’s what I love to do. So I don’t feel like there’s any need to take a break unless I want to.

You listen to the radio and all the songs sound the same, from 8 in the morning to 12.

I like to work with artists from around the world. There are so many new inspiring filmmakers.

When I was growing up, there were no women in orchestras. Auditioners thought they could tell the difference between a woman playing and a man. Some intelligent person devised a simple solution: Drop a curtain between the auditioners and the people trying out. And, lo and behold, women began to get jobs in symphony orchestras.

I’ve started doing book reviews for Barnes & Noble! They saw that I did a lot of book reviews on the site, and they figured that it might not be a bad thing if they got me to do some for them as well. I gave them five categories I’d be interested in reviewing, from art to fiction to music.

I used to love Kurt Cobain, when he was telling people we’re a pop band. People would laugh, they thought of it as good old ironic Kurt. But he wasn’t being ironic.

I would say that jazz is my own language.

It’s an honor for me to represent urban music, reggaeton, trap and hip-hop.

People are used to music that justifies street culture but something that’s not touched on is why these kids act the way they act, live the way they live.

I used to consider the listener. But now I’m in a space where, if I’m not inspired, I can’t really do the music. I can’t feel it.

If it’s illegal to rock and roll, throw my ass in jail!

I don’t know how the rap game is, because I’m a fan of reality, and the rap game’s entertainment.

I want to thank my Eritrean fans for feeling connected to me and for supporting me. I feel extremely grateful.

Compton got such a legacy in hip-hop.

My whole family are hams. They’re storytellers and everyone outdoes the next one.

I would love to continue in music, with writing… but I am not the kind of person who will hang around if I start to become irrelevant. If that happens, I will bow down gracefully, raise my kids, and have a garden. And I am going to let my hair go gray when I am older. I don’t need to be blonde when I’m 60!

I think ‚Hail to the Chief‘ has a nice ring to it.

Music is the mediator between the spiritual and the sensual life.

If I was just a fan of music, I would think that I was the number one artist in the world.

I never intended for the Monster Ball to be a religious experience, it just became one.

I didn’t want to play it boring and safe. I also didn’t want to innovate too much. Second albums, man, they’re even scarier than first ones.

We moved into the back, made it into a little 50s sitting room and started to sell the records. We had an immediate success. For one thing, these Teddy Boys were thrilled to buy the records.

I guess you could say I devoted myself so strongly to my music that for awhile I forgot about my family. But I only get one set of parents, and I think I forgot about that for a little while.

Every day that is born into the world comes like a burst of music and rings the whole day through, and you make of it a dance, a dirge, or a life march, as you will.

I have never used Auto-Tune in a live television performance, and I have never used Auto-Tune in any of my concerts. That is a promise.

I think when people make a record with a goal in mind – like taking it to the next level or making them seem more mature – that gets in the way of writing great songs.