Yasiin Bey (Mos Def) Quotes
Mos Def is a name that I built and cultivated over the years, it's a name that the streets taught me, a figure of speech that was given to me by the culture and by my environment, and I feel I've done quite a bit with that name. [But] it's time to expand and move on.
Quotes to Explore
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I'm an optimist about other people. I'm not an optimist about myself.
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A hen is only an egg's way of making another egg.
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I didn't expect to have music as my main thing. I always thought I was going to be a lawyer. When I graduated, I was doing really well with my music in Malaysia. I had stable income, and I had really good momentum in the music industry, so I had to make a decision whether to stop that and continue being a lawyer.
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I know I should be Wonder Woman. They need an international actress - a fresh face. They need a woman who's tall, athletic and dark-haired - and an actress who can play the part. That's me. So, I'm coming to L.A. to work hard and meet the industry. And if 'Wonder Woman' comes together, I want it.
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I love working with people and having them bring something to the table that I couldn't. I think one of my favourite artists to work with has been Kucka. She's Australian, too, and it's great working with her because we kind of have a very similar take on music, and we like a lot of the same stuff. We're not super-precious about ideas.
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It's not like I ever sat in my room and said I was going to start a media company and become an editor in chief. It was never my dream. It was something that just happened.
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I never saw myself as being ambitious, I saw myself as being in love with the profession. I'm a people person. I love to get to know different kinds of people.
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The cost of liberty is less than the price of repression.
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In business, you're the Chief Salesman. Create a sense of demand, rather than waiting to have demand.
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I love stories about two people who are doing illegal things, who we really enjoy watching despite the fact that we know they are doomed in some way.
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I love Channing Tatum!
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As a child, my mother told me lots of fairy stories, many her own invention. She, too, tended to reverse the norm.
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Mothers are the people who love us for no good reason. And those of us who are mothers know it's the most exquisite love of all.
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I used to play hooky from school so I could watch cooking shows.
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The go-to reflex all over Hollywood is still likeability. I've always had a problem with it because I think I have a weird barometer in the sense that some of the characters I've cared about the most in movies are characters that are often thought of as despicable.
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When I got out of college, I moved to Seattle because it was the nearest big city and still didn't know if I wanted to be a composer, conductor, singer, actor. I just got day jobs and auditioned and took what came, and the theater doors were the ones opening the most.
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When you have to get into the character each morning, give it your voice, your face, it was torture.
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Ferran Adria making hamburgers... some thought it was crazy. But getting them perfect was a challenge. Plus I'm fascinated by all aspects of food.
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When I joined WKRC, they were very concerned over my ability to ad lib or speak extemporaneously, which was an unknown factor up until that point.
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If I wrote a musical it wouldn't be about me. Although I do some magic, so it would probably be about a magician who appeared and re-appeared all over the place.
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When I first immigrated to the United States, there were not many jobs that stood out. So I worked at a gas station, cleaning.
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There's a place for R&B in the U.K. industry - a huge market. I hope that 'Boo'd Up' can be a testament to the fact. Sometimes, it takes you moving outside the box to prove that it can be done.
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Since the new film has been out, I'm doing quite a lot but then in July I will start doing things at home. I have to fix the house up, see the grandchildren and such.
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Mos Def is a name that I built and cultivated over the years, it's a name that the streets taught me, a figure of speech that was given to me by the culture and by my environment, and I feel I've done quite a bit with that name. [But] it's time to expand and move on.
