In every interview I've got to explain something about being white but still being into hip hop. It's gone way beyond the musical aspect of the business. And I'm as critical about music as everybody else is.
The '80s was brand new. It was AIDS. It was gangbanging. It was starting to become big dope-dealing, and crack was starting to flood the neighborhoods. And then you had hip hop, which was something new, other than what we were doing, which was sports, playing football, basketball, baseball. And I was excited.
It's either hip or it ain't.
Boys are just boys after all, but sometimes girls really seem to be the turn of a pale wrist, or the sudden jut of a hip, or a clutch of very dark hair falling across a freckled forehead. I'm not saying that's what they really are. I'm just saying sometimes it seems that way, and that those details (a thigh mole, a full face flush, a scar the precise shape and size of a cashew nut) are so many hooks waiting to land you.
Well, you know what? The same people that get driven crazy by hip hop are the same people that probably listen to the type of music that drives me crazy. Like, Journey covers.
God knows I am not too hippy. Perhaps because I am too much around the hip and I fear fads for, like anybody else, I like something that tends to last.
In one way, I was always hip. I was hip in kindergarten. I was different from the others. There was something wrong with me, I thought, because I seemed to see things people didn't see. I always saw things in a hallucinatory way.
There are no natural barriers. It's all music. It's either hip or it ain't.
I grew up with my older brother listening to hip hop, and Jay-Z was the main person I listened to. When it comes to his word play, he's just out of this world. That's my biggest inspiration when it comes to writing lyrics.
Big bad merc, down with a basic hip toss. In your place I'd be blushing.
I also think that there's a little peer pressure. They probably think that a majority of people their age think the same things and they want to be considered - I don't know what the word is - in, hip, whatever, with that bunch. I think time will take care of some of this as it is revealed that [Donald] Trump is not what they think.
I am proud of the hip hop generation. They are good business people and, actually, good people.
If you just want a comfortable life, the awards, and pats on the back then you play Christian Hip Hop safe. Because playing it safe will give you consistency, but if you're really in this to see peoples lives transform then you're gonna have to do some risk assessment - it is costly to rally try to impact people.
I spend a lot of time parenting because I'm home. A friend of mine told me that the average father sees each kid an average of twenty-two minutes a week, which I found almost unbelievable. Mine are in my hip pocket all the time. And I like it that way.
There's a lathered sorrel stallion running through the Joshua trees and a young man in the saddle with his coat tails in the breeze. He's got a six gun on his right hip and a rifle at his knees and he's dealing in a game that he can't win.
I always go into listening to a new record by Gord Downie solo or The Tragically Hip and think, "Well, I know what this is going to be, lyrically. " Every song starts and then I think, "Oh, I have no idea where that comes from. " He has this entirely original voice, both literal and metaphorical.
Hip Hop was supposed to be this new thing that had no boundaries and was so different to everyday music. As long as it has soul to it, hip hop can live on.
I definitely want to work with Thom Yorke. I want to work with Damien Marley; there's a few international artists I wouldn't mind working with - like Massacre Children would be ill, and I still have an affinity for the UK hip hop scene.
I said, ‘There’s one idea I’ve been carrying in my hip pocket for 35 years. It’s Woodrow Wilson. ’
Skating is now retro and hip.