Killer Mike
The police are paid by the public and carry a public trust, and they take an oath to protect us as citizens. The police have lost sight of that and must be reminded that we pay them to protect us, not to simply engage and cage us.Collection: Trust
I think all politics is local.Collection: Politics
People don't accredit Killer Mike and El-P with having the humanity that we do. They don't understand that the darkness and the anger that we rap about comes from a place of love, care, and concern.Collection: Anger
Being a cop must be hard. My dad was one and never wanted any of his children to follow in his footsteps.Collection: Dad
I don't want to be walking around angry and feeling rage.
My ears are shot. I'm a musician.
We need more Rocafellas; we need more Bad Boys.
I believe in smart people.
No Child Left Behind left a lot of kids behind.
Rap is supposed to scare soccer moms.
Nas is truly one of the greatest lyricists to ever come out of Queens, which has produced more great MCs than any other borough. He's one of the greatest MCs of my lifetime and in the world. He's also a friend.
The best advice that I've gotten from Nas is honestly to just be me and to keep staying true to myself. It took me a long time to figure out how to pop, but then, when you get famous, people are kind of like, 'Oh, well, we don't want as much of you.'
A lot of time, when you're poor and you ain't got but 15, 20 bucks in your pocket - if you can't change your shoes, you can change your look with a haircut.
I like the New York style of funk, the California style of funk, but the South I never felt like - and Atlanta particularly - got the credit for taking their lessons and progressing on it.
My mom had did a wonderful job of giving me two great dads: I had a biological and non-biological dad.
I'm a student of Ice Cube and Scarface, which means the stuff I rap about is not radio-friendly, and it's very opinionated. and it's very much from the perspective of a black man in America, and our opinion ain't always popular when we have a political opinion.
I have white friends who have the Confederate flag on their license plates, and I have no issue with that if they see that as a matter of heritage. But I do not think it should ever fly over a state, city, county building, or school, for the simple reason that it represents secession from the Union.
An army took on the Union; an army lost. That nation, the Confederate States, lost. And if - that flag - in terms of publicly or state-sponsored things, or local or county or city-sponsored things - should be forever wiped from the memory, because that side lost.
My grandmother had been a part of the civil rights movement.
Bernie Sanders is the only politician who, consistently for 50 years, has taken that social justice platform into politics.
If we could figure out ways for kids to exit college without having the burden of debt, what we have really figured out is how to create a more fertile breeding ground for people who can think innovatively and progress us as a species.
A lot of times, our greatest minds are locked into a 9-5 job.
My biggest failure was trying to start and run a music label. The music industry was dying, and I wasn't ready to help other people the way that they needed to be helped. I was trying to, and I was stifling myself with it.
Rap, to me, is communal. It's something you do with your friends. So becoming a member of a group was the dream.
I write in the booth and memorize in rehearsals.
For me, muscle cars are a tribute to American ingenuity.
America has done a great job making brutally fast, stripped-down cars.
I just like cars, period. I can find something to like about pretty much any car. I've had as much fun whipping around Italy in a little Mini Cooper as I've had whipping through Miami in a Bentley GT.
I used to have go-karts and mopeds and motorcycles when I was a kid. Then my grandpa let me drive a real car at about 13 or 14 and I just... I never cared about bikes again after that.
I'm a black man who grew up in America. I'm a father of four children. They don't all have the same mother. I own a business.
I'm not going to stop being who I am.
I'm not going to restrict myself as an artist.
In my 20s, I was just angry.
A lot of times, elections are lost, and the hope of the public is lost because they don't turn out.
I'm trying to get more into television and film. I know, like, a million models and rappers have said that, but I actually enjoy voiceover and acting in particular.
My hair is dry. A lot of shampoos and greasers don't work with me, and so I started playing around with a chemist on a product that'll work with me.
I shouldn't have to be preparing my children that the world is going to be unfair to them for the rest of their lives.
I'm a man's man.
I maintain hope that this country can be what it's supposed to be.
You a role model by way of someone will model after your role. They'll model themselves after what they perceive is success. That doesn't mean they take your morality and virtue seriously. They want what you want, and they're willing to do what you do to get it.
I grew up working class in Atlanta.
I've been watching wrestling since I was three years old.
I've been a music fan all my life, and you know the difference when the musicians care.
I prefer a real villain to a false hero.
You do not fly the flags of losers over the winner's country.
The older I get, the more of an anarchist I become, and I don't mean in a punk rock way.
I was raised a black child in the South, where you're indoctrinated into a religion that an oppressor gave you.
Freedom is not something you're even trying to fight for; you are free. Go. Make sure you live free every day.
My hope is that very young people in America who have experience with the streets, hip-hop, college, higher learning will fuse all that together. I just want to be the music that can relate to both sides, that stitch together their lives or represents their experiences.
I've been in the newspapers since I was about 15 - not for rapping, but for real substantive stuff I was doing in the community, organizing around gang violence in the schools. So I had already made my grandma proud before I was on TV. I've always been who I am.