Interviews

In celebration of 'The Warm Up,' the mixtape that launched a career.

"I just wanna give everything I have."

“I don’t remember the hard times. I just remember I had to do it, and you appreciate everything a little more. It’s a lesson in gratitude.”

“Every part-time job I’ve had was a step in itself, towards being full-time in music.”

“Everybody’s always together. It just adds that extra layer of it being organic.”

“It sucks talking about him in the past tense, but I absolutely loved him.”

“You gotta swallow your pride, every now and then, to be able to keep the lights on.”

“I wanted to find a place where I could make R&B-meets-grunge, and then spit a verse in the middle of it.”

“We have a very organic connection to what’s going on culturally right now.”

“In my view, the shit that makes people love him, is the same shit that makes people mad.”

"A world without Mac is a different world.”

“Offer anything you can of your value without any expectation of getting something in return.”

“At the end of the day it’s all about having creative ideas, innovative ideas. It’s not all about the money.”

“Rap ain’t dead, it just lives in Buffalo, New York.

"That’s when I really started taking rap seriously, seriously, when I was introduced to J. Cole."

“Time away from my children. That’s the biggest sacrifice in this business.”

“He defined himself with everything he stood for.”

“I wanna show people that there’s a light at the end of the tunnel. On top of that, I want to hold the light.”

We asked Jamila Woods, Nolan The Ninja, LATASHÁ, and Phonte to weigh in.

"We’ve figured out really well how to make video content that works for the YouTube audience."

“I want them to say: ‘I’m proud of my Blackness.’”

Touring performers should treat their voices the way professional athletes treat their bodies, but many of them don't until it's too late.

"We gotta realize we are inspiration’s inspiration."

“If you wanna stay independent, you have to create a narrative that people wanna be a part of.”

"The game changed my life."

Franky Hill: “Very early on, I was living paycheck-to-paycheck-to-paycheck.”

"Shit gon’ hurt, but shit gon’ get better as well."

“I remember working a job I hated walking home like, ‘Man what’s going on with my life?’”

For Jarrod Milton, Wiley from Atlanta sang his blues.

We spoke with seven highly respected individuals in the music journalism space to hear their first impressions of 'Illmatic.'

“He was honest and he’s just a person, you know?”

“There’s no free rides. Everybody pays for all the things that they do, sooner or later.”

“I don’t know if you ever find your sound, until you’re done making music and you look back on the whole thing.”

"It's not about me anymore."