Quotes from Dizzee Rascal

I take risks.

In Miami, there's a buzz there, everyone out there's partying - it's crazy.

No one can establish what selling out is.

Barack Obama embraced hip-hop, man. That's the way he got through to kids.

I learned to MC over drum 'n' bass music.

There's things that I say that people wouldn't say. And just putting across my vulnerability as a person in my music as well. A lot of people wouldn't do that, everyone wants to be hard.

I'm not gonna lie; I don't always like everything about Bow and I don't always like everyone in Bow and they don't always like me but on the whole I love where I come from. I'm proud of where I come from and I'm proud to represent that area.

Everything kind of happened like: 'Bam!' for me. One minute I was living on a council estate somewhere, then I won the Mercurys, then all of a sudden press and people were in my face.

I'm not that guy in the suit, speaking the Queen's English. I don't need to be. I've done enough. I can go on 'Newsnight' as me.

That's what the world's about - different perspectives.

I don't like to be picked on. Growing up where I did you learn to fight.

My fans are lunatics. I encourage mosh pits, I encourage lunacy, I make music to let go to.

Life is hard enough. Life is always going to be hard, so you need to push for what you want.

Sometimes people chat loosely. Sometimes people just speak their minds and what's on their mind ain't necessarily real or facts, so I don't take it too serious. I'm more interested in making the music, I don't really play that.

I'm trying to give people the chance to put out their music without the bullshit pressures of other labels.

I'd done plenty of dark stuff and edgy stuff and hardcore stuff, and I kind of found that stuff easy.

People classify things and that's fair enough. But if somebody wants to make something different, that doesn't make them any less of an artist.

I swear too much.

The name Dirtee Stank came from a lyric I had when I was 17 or 16. Lyrical tank, like my name was Frank, going on dirty, going on stank. It sounded like a good name!

The world's a jungle in my eyes, innit? Everything's tribal. If you see someone who don't look like you - especially the colour of your skin - you're going to be suspicious, or not as welcoming or warming, innit? I've learned not to take it too personal.

I'm definitely not proud of some of the stuff I did as a youth, but that's where my mind-frame was at one point in my life, and I can't pretend those things didn't happen. I'm not glorifying them, I'm trying to make them into art.

I'm not really going to defend anyone's lyrics.

There's so much to London, so many different kinds of people and people are the key to life, but my favourite part? It's got to be Bow, where I come from.

America is the land of the hustler: it's bigger, bolder, flasher, more in your face, whereas England's more about attention to detail - trying to be refined and classy, and I think a lot of people in the urban scene in this country have had trouble accepting that.