Rakim Quotes

I think that all my albums are different enough where I don't feel like I did this the last time.

I constantly want to do something new and surprise the audience.

The real artist's work is a surprise to himself.

The secret of fashion is to surprise and never to disappoint.

In a painting, what counts is the unexpected.

It's really hard to find stuff that is original. You pick up scripts and in four pages you know where it's going and the same thing when you are sitting in a theatre, I just rejoice when something unfolds in a way that I'm not conducive.

I might say that what amateurs call a style is usually only the unavoidable awkwardnesses in first trying to make something that has not heretofore been made. Almost no new classics resemble other previous classics. At first people see only the awkwardness. Then they are not so perceptible. When they show so very awkwardly people think these awkwardnesses are the style and many copy them. This is regrettable.

Close to the Edge, Red, One of a kind, Discipline, Earthworks, The Sound of Surprise, all seem to me to be albums that captured the essence of the intention.

There is nothing new in art except talent.

Every once in a while, when the audience is expecting to see one thing, you have to show them something else.

It's true with fashion, acting, anything: Make sure it's timeless, but at the same time, there's got to be a little hint of risk.

I really like it when you can step outside of what's come before and find a surprise for the reader and find a surprise for yourself.

The biggest lesson that I've learned is that fashion is this tightrope where you have to be consistent but inconsistent. You need the connective thread but at the same time you need a sense of surprise.

That element of surprise is what I look for when I am writing. It is my way of judging what I am doing - which is never an easy thing to do.

No age is compelled to take its beauty from preceding epochs.

The thing I have always tried to do is surprise people: to present them with something they didn't expect.

I love to work with artists that were able to find a brand new name and create something really exciting and fresh.

I don't repeat that many styles if I can help, although some have become classics. I try not to repeat. I'd rather surprise people.

I search for surprise in my architecture. A work of art should cause the emotion of newness.

Never try to make the same record twice, even when people are screaming for the same sound.

For me, what is most important is the element of surprise. If I can surprise you with every film of mine, that is exactly what I am trying to do.

When I finish a film, I want to forget it. I never like to repeat myself. Maybe, when I am dead, they will find certain consistencies in the style of my films, but I never want one film to look like another.

When I finish a painting, it usually looks as surprising to me as to anyone else.

In the beginning of rock n' roll, there was always innovation. Artists were always trying to do something new and something different.

To keep creating something with this type of music, you have to take it out of the box.