Share
×
Inspirational Quotes
Authors
Professions
Topics
Tags
Quote
My parents are my biggest influences. My parents and my city. Brooklyn, New York, New York City, the community I grew up. I don't feel like I'm special in that. I feel like that's everybody.
Talib Kweli
Share
Change background
T
T
T
Change font
Original
TAGS & TOPICS
Talib Kweli
Age: 49
Born: 1975
Born: October 3
Musician
Poet
Rapper
Singer
Songwriter
Brooklyn
New York
Talib Kweli Greene
Feel
Parents
Feels
Influence
Like
Grew
Cities
Brooklyn
Special
Influences
Parent
Biggest
Everybody
York
Community
City
More quotes by Talib Kweli
Unfortunately hip-hop is so competitive that in order for fringe groups to get in, you gotta be better than whoever's the best. So before Eminem, the idea that there would be a white rapper that anybody would really check for was fantastic or amazing or impossible.
Talib Kweli
Ain't nobody making music to not be heard and the easiest way to be heard is to be on the radio, but you should never compromise who you are, your values or your morals.
Talib Kweli
War is not civilized.
Talib Kweli
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
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
Let me finish my music, and let me present it the way I want to present it. And then share it, put it online, do whatever you want to do after that.
Talib Kweli
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
As far as my New York influence, one thing I'm proud of in my career is, I rep Brooklyn, New York all day. But people don't look at my music as New York music. People consider my music underground music.
Talib Kweli
Young kids should be doing music that has shock value. They'll grow out of it.
Talib Kweli
A flower that grow in the ghetto know more about survival than the one from fresh meadows.
Talib Kweli
Artists make art for themselves. Art is an honest expression. Artists who pander to their fans by trying to make music for their fans make empty, transparent art. The true fan does not want you to make music for them, they want you to make music for you, because that's the whole reason they fell in love with you in the first place.
Talib Kweli
A true artist does not depend on radio for success. A true fan does not let radio determine what they support
Talib Kweli
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
But Rawkus is integral to what I do, because the cats who started Rawkus are the first ones who really saw my vision, and gave me a platform to get it out there, so I'm definitely totally grateful for that.
Talib Kweli
Love is blind, you just see bright light
Talib Kweli
When I met you it was magic... We polar opposites, but attracted like we was magnets.
Talib Kweli
I ignored your aura but it grabbed me by the hand, like the moon pulled the tide, and the tide pulled the sand.
Talib Kweli
I'm at a loss for words. But even my loss is amplified.
Talib Kweli
I met Mos Def around that time but I didn't hook up with him until I was about 17 or 18.
Talib Kweli
It’s very seductive to focus on what you don’t like as opposed to celebrating all that it is that you do.
Talib Kweli