Rap Quotes
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Rap and spoken word have reawakened the country to poetry in itself. Texting and Twitter encourage creative uses of casual language, in ways I have celebrated widely. But we've fallen behind on savoring the formal layer of our language.
John McWhorter
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When I was 13 years old, I was dressing in a rap style. And then I changed schools, and the rap style became old-fashioned, so I changed it completely.
Louis Garrel
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You can't expect to be on MTV and critique George Bush. You can't expect to be on BET or the cover of 'The Source' advocating Jesus Christ or Buddha or Hindu Krishna or Moses. As a conscious rap artist, you have to play in the arena that you're supposed to be in. What is that arena? That arena is the college market. The conscious rap artist woos the college market, even though the college market is the wildest, most sexed-out, drug-driven market in the country, possibly the world.
Lawrence "Kris" Parker
Boogie Down Productions
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I made the decision that I was going to make rap music in, like, fourth grade, so it's been something I was saying for a long time.
Chance The Rapper
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My focus is anything that allows me to express myself. Rap, dance, photography. Those are my forms of expression.
Keith Stanfield
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A homeless man once told me that dancing to rap music is the cultural equivalent of masturbating, and I'd sort of fell the same way about playing John Madden Football immediately after filing my income tax: It's fun, but - somehow - vaguely pathetic.
Chuck Klosterman
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Some guy was just like, 'You rap fast, man. Like a little machine gun,' and from that moment, I was Lil Uzi.
Lil Uzi Vert
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What I don't do is try to like become whoever I'm rapping with. The people who go get an LL album want to hear LL.
LL Cool J
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I think when people think of Compton, of course, they always think of gangster rap. But if you ever had an opportunity to go to Compton, you would know that Compton is a beautiful city.
Aja Brown
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I think that hip-hop is more of an individual effort. That means you're an artist from the streets, they expect you to rap about the streets, because that's what happens there.
Conor Oberst
Bright Eyes
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A lot of the rap shows I saw as a kid were boring, but if you went to a Rage show or a Justice show, the kids were losing their minds.
Donald Glover
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People in my family and camp who grew up listening to rap music love 'We Are Young.' I've heard it play at weddings. I've heard it in graduation parties. It's a big idea and big song.
Janelle Monae