Quotes About Authenticity

When I rap, it's just an extension of how I speak, and that's how I talk. If you don't like it, don't listen.

Reality does get a bad rap. But I'm not concerned about it 'cause I know who I am. They can edit it, but you are in charge of what you do.

Rap is supposed to be about keeping it real and not relinquishing your roots in the community. Without that, it's just posturing. Somebody who claims to speak for the 'hood don't need no private jet.

It's not only about the rap lyric. Today, people are buying you as a person.

Nobody's going to tell me to rap in an American accent.

The pleasure of hanging with Drake is that there isn't a question he won't try to answer openly and honestly, shifting easily and unselfconsciously between talk of the rap game, money, family, and love.

There's this thing about authenticity when you rap, right? Whether or not it's real, it has to feel real.

I hope people listen to the music. Don't write it off because there is a Christian doing it and it's been labeled that way, because if I'm honest with you, Christian rap for the most part has been corny.

It seems like music gets put in this hub where you have to rap about this, and the minute you do something else, it's like you changing. Nah, I'm being creative.

I don't feel pressure to act like other people or rap like other people, because I just can't.

I'm trying to bring gangster rap back to the forefront, like in the early '90s.

There just hasn't been a voice for that normal dude when it comes to rap.

I think the sound of 'The Infamous' came naturally from our lifestyle and some of the criminal things we were doing. We always rap about what we're living, and to put a beat to lyrics like those is hard.

I don't really want to rap about money.

The way I rap isn't about me boasting. Rarely will I do that.

I rap about life in general, particularly my life, unless telling a story.

I am getting all this fame, but I don't absolutely know what I should rap about.

Los Angeles gets a very bad rap, the perception, especially by us Brits, is 'Oh, it's so fake,' but it's the antithesis!

I'ma just rap and do me.

Everybody knows with rap artists, if you can't go to the hood, it's almost like you're not authentic, even if you're a dope artist that's respected.

Growing up people would tell me: 'Yo, you only can do one thing. If you're going to rap, just rap. If you're going to sing, just sing.' It boxed me in. But I just figured out a way to show everything. It's like if you have a job interview, you want to present as many skills as you have.

I would describe my music as very honest. I just rap about myself, and not in a narcissistic way. I feel like I have a story to tell.

I'm not a character, so how I rap is just an everyday thing.

In the Raphael Room, the secret turned out to be that only some of the paintings were made by the great master; the rest were made by students. I had liked the ones by Raphael. This was a big jab for my self-confidence in my ability to appreciate art.