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I support the idea that artists have to make a stand. I'm with that - you're putting the discussion on the table and you're letting people know. You're being brave as an artist and responsible to the community.

Talib Kweli

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Talib Kweli
Age: 49
Born: 1975
Born: October 3
Musician
Poet
Rapper
Singer
Songwriter
Brooklyn
New York
Talib Kweli Greene
Stand
Letting
Support
Discussion
Community
Table
Idea
Tables
Artist
Putting
Ideas
Brave
Make
Artists
People
Responsible

More quotes by Talib Kweli

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I have a luxury of people coming to see me whether I play for the crowd or not. I don't take that lightly.
Talib Kweli
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Young kids should be doing music that has shock value. They'll grow out of it.
Talib Kweli
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With Prisoner of Conscience, the focus was - I've worked with Madlib, High Tech, Kanye West, J Dilla. I feel like I've worked with some of the greatest of all time. That's been overlooked. That's been overshadowed by the weight of the lyrics.
Talib Kweli
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Fortunately, artists can live off their works, if you're creative at how you do it. If you just depend on the videos and the radio, you're at a loss.
Talib Kweli
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I will never do a record without some sense of responsibility.
Talib Kweli
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War is not civilized.
Talib Kweli
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Consider me the entity within the industry without a history of spitting the epitome of stupidity.
Talib Kweli
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If I focus on being an activist and my job is to be a rapper, I'm not going to be as good of a rapper. I need to focus on hip-hop and focus on making the music, so that when the activists come to me and they need my voice to create a platform, then I've got enough people listening to me. Not because I'm conscious, but because I'm dope.
Talib Kweli
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My musical influence is really from my father. He was a DJ in college. My parents met at New York University. So he listened to, you know, Motown, and he listened to Bob Dylan. He listened to Grateful Dead and Rolling Stones, but he also listened to reggae music. And he collected vinyl.
Talib Kweli
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Hip-hop is a vehicle.
Talib Kweli
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To be honest, that whole exchange with Crunk Feminist actually made me write the song because I realize there's a lot of young women out there so hurt by the misogynistic images in hip-hop they paint it with such a broad brush stroke that they think anybody that defends hip-hop is defending misogyny.
Talib Kweli
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The beautiful thing about hip-hop is it's like an audio collage. You can take any form of music and do it in a hip-hop way and it'll be a hip-hop song. That's the only music you can do that with.
Talib Kweli
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There just needs to be a gay rapper who's better than everybody. That's when that question will no longer be able to be asked.
Talib Kweli
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Hip hop has always been, for us, for artists who are pure to the craft - any place overseas, whether it's Australia, any place in Asia, Germany, Africa, it becomes something where you can still go and work. Hip hop is an import culture. We're spoiled by it here. It's homegrown.
Talib Kweli
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As far as being on a major label, some labels get it and get what they have to do, and some labels don't. I don't think the label I'm on necessarily gets it, but I think over time they're gonna have to.
Talib Kweli
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I think people are into me because of my music choices and my musicality.
Talib Kweli
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No one likes to be treated like people in minority communities. What it's saying is that because you're poor, because you live in a neighborhood that deals with oppressed conditions, you deserve to be treated like a criminal. In our Constitution it says you have the right to live without illegal search and seizure.
Talib Kweli
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Art Imitates life, of course, is that phrase by Oscar Wilde. I called that song Art Imitates Life because Oh No was in the studio and he actually came up with that hook. When I was trying to figure out a name for the record, it just kind of made sense.
Talib Kweli
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I'm at a loss for words. But even my loss is amplified.
Talib Kweli
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Love is blind, you just see bright light
Talib Kweli