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I think its man's nature to go to war and fight.

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
War
Nature
Men
Think
Thinking
Fight
Fighting

More quotes by Talib Kweli

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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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But you have to be creative on how you sell yourself and market yourself.
Talib Kweli
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Hip-hop isn't as complex as a woman is.
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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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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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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Harry Belafonte hit me to the Dream Defenders and I liked what they were about. When I asked them how I could help their movement, they said, You can help by coming down here you can tweet.
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.
Talib Kweli
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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
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God gave us music, so we play with our words.
Talib Kweli
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Skip the religion and politics, head straight to the compassion. Everything else is a distraction.
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 met Mos Def around that time but I didn't hook up with him until I was about 17 or 18.
Talib Kweli
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Jazz is the greatest American art form and our greatest export. We don't pay attention to the youth of jazz, don't stoke the fires creatively for the youth coming up. I feel like jazz musicians became too much of purists - with Donald Byrd doing funk jazz in the '70s.
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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Why give you the cure when the disease makes money?
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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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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I like the fact that I can rep New York, but my style does not - I'm not trapped in a New York thing. I can do art songs with other artists and it's seamless.
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