rap industry Quotes

With rap music, because it's all so on the street, you get treated like a street cat: "All right, you've been eatin' enough, you're fat, get out of the way now and let somebody else come by."

Another thing about me dealing with the old school rappers, you see a lot of humility. When you're new, nothing is wrong. Everything is tight. Because you're trying to hype the world into believing in you.

I'm a different type of rapper. I work more than the average rapper.

When I first got into the rap game, I had an early dream of unifying rappers.

Why isn't there any 50-year-old MCs killing it? I'm 46. Am I the only one? I can't wait to get to 50. I'm going to let everybody know it! I'm going to wear a shirt that says 'I'm 50.'

I struggled with working with producers because no one openly wanted to give me a chance to rap on their beats. That's just honest talk. No one really wanted to take that risk.

I've been compared to, like, five different people. Suga Free, Silkk The Shocker - I get that one a lot. Somebody named Freeway. I don't know who Freeway is.

I remember being told 'Someone's gonna make a fortune out of this rap thing' and thinking 'no way'.

I think its funny when people say a female rapper is too sexually charged, maybe the way I do it is a little more in your face but that's because I have to be aggressive and masculine to make it in the industry. If I talk about sex blatantly, when the mainstream media says it metaphorically every day, it's not okay? It's hypocritical.

As a conscious rap artist, you should not want to be in a gangster market. You should be trying to establish your own market, create a place where you can be yourself and make some money and feed your family.

This is the industry that wants [music], the rap industry.

When I started out rapping, I became very frightened by the idea that people were trying to pigeonhole me. That's usually what happens to most female rappers. They fit in a box and there's a prototype or person they're compared to.

When I get done playing basketball, I'm definitely not going to be a rapper. I'm not going to be an old person who is focused on being a rapper.

I don't take anything for granted. I know there are a million and one dudes who are rapping, wishing they were in my shoes.

I don't like the fact that there are so few women in rap.

If you think about rap and how it has become so much easier to record music and release it, and you think about everyone in the world being a 'rapper' these days, it's so much easier. But it's still as hard as ever to break through and truly be successful in this industry.

When I leave I always come right back here. The young spitter that everybody in rap fear.

Over the years I've met quite a few big rappers. Then it exploded with 50 Cent, and I did a book with him. It's always a strange meeting of two worlds, it's very exciting.

I've been around so long that I've seen rappers make it and plummet.

We used to have MTV and all these ways we can show our videos, and it was these rap shows, and it was everything. And then it became not cool to be conscious; it became cool to just hang out. Escapism rap became the norm. And, when I say "escapism rap", I mean getting high, get your cars, get your money, get your jewelry, go to the club, have your women, and it just became all about escaping your reality and not making your reality better on a real tip; not just on the have fun tip.

Me and Master P go way back.

I'm the most humble rapper in the industry.

I felt like for what I needed, Bad Boy got me... they got me covered. Especially Puff, man. He's going to be the first billionaire rap entertainer. At the end of the day, they need me. Other artists-labels don't need me, but Bad Boy and Puff needs me. And I need them. It goes both ways.

I'm a rapper but I'm a human being.

We came up with TDE. As competitive as rap is, and as much as we're trying to exceed the standards we set for ourselves, we take their wins as our wins, too.