Jay-Z
If I don't show the world growth, how are we going to grow?Collection: Growth
[T]he truth is that drug addicts have a disease. It only takes a short time in the streets to realize that out-of-control addiction is a medical problem, not a form of recreational or criminal behavior. And the more society treats drug addiction as a crime, the more money drug dealers will make "relieving" the suffering of the addicts.Collection: Medical Problems
My life after childhood has two main stories: the story of the hustler and the story of the rapper, and the two overlap as much as they diverge. I was on the streets for more than half of my life from the time I was thirteen years old. People sometimes say that now I'm so far away from that life - now that I've got businesses and Grammys and magazine covers - that I have no right to rap about it. But how distant is the story of your own life ever going to be? The feelings I had during that part of my life were burned into me like a brand. It was life during wartime.Collection: Rap
Got some, dirt on my shoulder, could you brush it off for me?Collection: Hip Hop
No matter where you go you are what you are player and you can try to change but that's just the top layer man you was who you was before you got hereCollection: Player
I smoked some weed, and that's how I finished 'Izzo.'Collection: Weed
I thought I would be more inspired to have all these new feelings to talk about, but I really just want to hang out with my daughter.Collection: Daughter
People really feel like music is free, but will pay $6 for water. You can drink water free out of the tap and it's good water. But they're okay paying for it. It's just the mindset right now.Collection: People
Cough up a lung where I'm from marcy son, aint nothin niceCollection: Nice
Can I hit it in the morning with out giving you have of my dough?Collection: Morning
When people say stuff like, "Oh, that's soft rock. I don't listen to that," I find that elitist. It's music-racist.Collection: Rocks
Electing a black man named Barack Obama President in the same country that elected George W. Bush - twice! - is as far-fetched as a hustler from Marcy performing at that President's inauguration. But it happened.Collection: Country
The reason I've been groundedand able to make albums, is because I've allowed my friends to come with me and voice an opinion. That's who keeps you grounded, the people who have known you longest.Collection: Voice
I had success. I had a number one record. I had a number one album. I have to make this kind of record again or else I'm going to lose it all. That's how you end up making the same song over and over.Collection: Song
Little brothers ring fingers get cut up to show mothers they really got em.Collection: Mother
I noticed that difference early on, like if you were successful in rock 'n' roll, that was a really bad thing, you almost had to hide it. You had these guys selling 200 million records with dirty T-shirts on. I was like, 'Come on, man. Come on. We know you're successful.' Hip-hop is more about attaining wealth. People respect success. They respect big. They don't even have to like your music. If you're big enough, people are drawn to you.Collection: Dirty
Driving Benzes with no benefits, not bad huh, for some immigrants?Collection: Benefits
I love that because that's what I'm supposed to be doing - whether it's accepted b everybody or not. I'm supposed to be pushing that envelope and trying new things. And people are supposed to say, Hov, you might have went too far.Collection: People
I think the consumption of music is at an all-time high. But I think the ways that record companies are trying to monetize it is just all over the place. At the end of the day, music is in the clouds. Before, you could hold it, look at it, turn it around. Now, it's just in the air.Collection: Thinking
Rap has been a path between cultures in the best tradition of popular music.Collection: Rap
I couldn't even think about wanting to be something else; I wouldn't let myself visualize another life. But I wrote because I couldn't stop. It was a release, a mental exercise, a way of keeping sane.Collection: Exercise
Used to rock a throwback ballin on the corner, now I rock tailored suit lookin' like a owner.Collection: Rocks
We'll have a baby who stutters repeatedly We'll name him historyCollection: Baby
You could name practically any problem in the hood and there'd be a rap song for you.Collection: Song
If the beat is time, flow is what we do with that time, how we live through it. The beat is everywhere, but every life has to find its own flow.Collection: Flow
How could I be out there and not do anything?Collection: Live Life
Hip-hop gave a generation a common ground that didn't require either race to lose anything; everyone gained.Collection: Race
New York has a thousand universes in it that don't always connect but we do all walk the same streets, hear the same sirens, ride the same subways, see the same headlines in the Post, read the same writings on the walls. That shared landscape gets inside of all of us and, in some small way, unites us, makes us think we know each other even when we don't.Collection: New York
When I come back like Jordan, wearing the 4-5. It ain't to play games with you, it's to aim at you, probably maim you. If I owe you I'm blowin' you to smithereens.Collection: Games
Stop screamin', you know the demon said it's best to die, And even if Jehovah witness, bet he'll never testify, D'Evils.Collection: Rap
I don't even like the word politics. It implies something underhanded and I think we need less government.Collection: Thinking
I got 99 Problems but Mitt ain't one.Collection: Election
I think Lil Wayne is extremely talented. I think he's one of the most talented ones out there.Collection: Thinking
You shared one of the most intimate things that ever happened to you - falling in love with someone who wasn't brave enough to love you back. Your relieving yourself of your 'secret' is as much about wanting to honestly connect as it is about exhibition. We are all made better by your decision to share publicly.Collection: Falling In Love
You know the type: loud as a motorbike but wouldn't bust a grape in a fruit fight.Collection: Fighting
I love you so, But why I love you, I'll never know.Collection: I Love You
I'm not concerned with noise because I'm playing the long game.Collection: Inspirational
Your future is ahead of you. Imagine the notion of the past fifteen years of your life being a blip in your story.Collection: Past
I'd rather die enormous than live dormant.Collection: Dormant
Remind your self. Nobody constructed like you, you style your self.Collection: Self
I'm a hustler, baby; I sell water to a well!Collection: Baby
Be fluid. Treat each project differently. Be water, man. The best style is no style. Because styles can be figured out. And when you have no style they can't figure you out.Collection: Fashion
You can put a new shirt on your back, slide a fresh chain around your neck, and accumulate all the money and power in the world, but at the end of the day those are just layers. Money and power don't change you, they just further expose your true self.Collection: Self
No one's walking around here perfect. Everyone's gonna make mistakes. That's part of how you learn.Collection: Mistake
There's the gift, there's the spirit, and there's the work-all three have to come together. If one of those things is off, it can stop you from becoming who you were meant to be.Collection: Together