People forget that, for example, Adele wasn't always the Adele we know. Sam Smith wasn't always the Sam Smith that we know.
I did country way back when I was, like, 13-14 years old, and then I kind of fell into the pop genre.
Over the years, El Perro del Mar became this artist that, every record that came out, I just loved it.
I was kind of a sideman. Then I became kind of a singer-songwriter.
What happened with reggaeton is that many artists kept recycling the same sound. But there are a lot of reggaeton artists that are still in their prime - like Daddy Yankee - because they've chosen to continue growing, to offer people more than just reggaeton. That's where I learned to always be able to try something new and not be afraid.
I look at my career and I feel I have the potential to maybe mature into a Samuel Jackson-type older cat, and people will still respect me and say 'Yo, Ice-T was wild', into my old age. And why not? I don't necessarily think I'll be rapping in 10 years.
I love Hootie & the Blowfish and what we do, but that's not my main focus anymore.
I think you could go back to any filmmaker or musician or artist, and look at what their input was in their formative years, and you could trace all the lines.
I started out as a musician, and I ended up as a cartoon.
'The Outsider' is a culmination of a lot of things I've been working diligently toward as a recording artist. Hopefully it will render my past pigeonholing obsolete while positioning me more solidly as a socially conscious American singer/songwriter. Wouldn't that be entertaining?
My fans can see me grow up.
I am not less poet; I am more conscious of all that I am, am not, and might become.
Reggaeton is what opened the doors for me, and I'm always grateful for that. I'll do reggaeton for life, but I want to show that I'm an artist who can do everything.
It's definitely been a long, long... long, long, long, long, long journey since I was selling burnt CD's out of my backpack in downtown Oakland.
I think that as an artist, the more that you can do to diversify, and kind of challenge yourself, the more you grow.
You can't stay the same. If you're a musician and a singer, you have to change, that's the way it works.
I was an underground artist, but the underground status was successful. Coming from where I came from to see where rap is now, now artists are selling from a million to eight million copies.
'Shell Shocked' is so different from what people are used to hearing from Ty Dolla Sign.
Back in the day it was like, I got a great record from a great producer and writer and it's a hit single, so let's sing it. But it's different when you're really living out your lyrics.
I feel like I have way more resources, way more experience. I'm better. But my fans romanticize the earlier stuff, and I don't think it's just like a nostalgia thing of "He's not as good" - I think it's because that earlier stuff was aggressively marketed as a lifestyle to them.
By the time my first solo record came out, I was making a handsome living as a record producer. I had worked with the Band, Janis Joplin and all of these other artists in the Albert Grossman organization. So as my so-called solo career evolved, I never felt pressure that I had to come back and top when I might've done before.
With my first single, 'AM to PM,' I was just this cute 18-year-old. But 'cute' didn't get me older roles, and 'cute' wasn't selling records. I wanted people to see that I'd grown up, so I did 'Dip It Low.'
I think every artist's next work will reflect a new chapter in their autobiography. Each album tells a story about where they were at during a particular period and how they have evolved.
In the past, I never wrote any love songs. That was not my thing.
I like being a rapper and cursing and getting paid. But at some point I feel like I'm going to be an old angry ass man, who is going to run the school board or city council.
