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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

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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

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I look at the deejay thing as something - I'm good at it because I have my own music. I have enough rhythm to blend at this point.
Talib Kweli
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I tour whether I have album out or not. I tour more than any other hip-hop artist.
Talib Kweli
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What is Norah Jones' style? Is it just the albums that we've heard? She has a rock group where she plays guitar in, downtown in New York, so do we really know her style?
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Everybody could write, deejay, rap. Everybody could do it all.
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Truthfully I wanna rhyme like common senseNext best thing I do a record with common sense
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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.
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Why give you the cure when the disease makes money?
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When I look at the arc of my career, my focus is on lyricism, right? I own that.
Talib Kweli
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By the time you get into other kinds of music - R&B, country, or whatever - it becomes something that's romantic. It becomes something unattainable. Never-ending undying love. And in hip hop, we're still taking direct inspiration.
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I will never do a record without some sense of responsibility.
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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.
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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.
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And you know, art as commerce, doesn't really make too much sense, they don't go together.
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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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
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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
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I'm at a loss for words. But even my loss is amplified.
Talib Kweli
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Artists look at the environment, and the best artists correctly diagnose the problem. I'm not saying artists can't be leaders, but that's not the job of art, to lead. Bob Marley, Nina Simone, Harry Belafonte - there are artists all through history who have become leaders, but that was already in them, nothing to do with their art.
Talib Kweli
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Love is blind, you just see bright light
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I'm not an artist that has a big, huge radio record that's going to be on BET. I'm not, at this point, gunning for like, Oh, I'm gonna kill them in the first week. But as people slowly discover the album they realize it's better than a lot of what they've been listening to all year.
Talib Kweli