Hop Quotations

It's Christmas time and my rhyme's steady bumpin. Everybody happy, hair still nappy, Gonna steal a gift for my old grandpappy...

I'm mostly concentrating now on continuing to make history in Hip-Hop, making everybody proud of me, I'm not just a rapper now, I'm in history now.

It's always been a luxury to be able to hop a plane to Paris, to Venice, to the Grand Canyon.

Hip-hop don't have no fresh energy, none at all. It's money driven, everybody tryin' to make that cheque, nobody putting art in their albums any more.

I love hip hop music, I make hip hop music.

Even when I was a hip-hop DJ I always kept it classy. The motto is always 'flashy but classy.' You've got to be original and stand out from the crowd and take some chances. But you've always got to keep it classy.

I don't dislike rappers or hip-hop or people who like it. I went to the Def Jam tour in Manchester in the '80s when rap was inspirational. Public Enemy were awesome. But it's all about status and bling now, and it doesn't say anything to me.

I don't want to disrespect hip-hop by being something I'm not. I'm Pooch Hall. My strength is in front the camera and holding dialogue.

The Bronx is famous for two things. Hip-hop, and 26 world championships.

I'd like to see people pay attention to the science of hip hop. The knowledge part, the political side of what hip hop could do, or where hip hop is gonna go. I always say it's gonna become universal as we become a galactic union.

I've done so many hip-hop albums already I got tired of just hip-hop.

Hip-hop is a voice for voiceless poor people.

Hip hop classes and ballet are what I've been keeping up with, and of course my usual abdominal workout, which consists of 500 sit-ups a session. Or I take a 30-minute abs class at my gym. But dance classes are a full-body cardio workout, which always brings me success and keeps me feeling great.

I'm a tomboy at the end of the day, so anything that causes me to have to run around, fight people, roll in the dirt, hop a fence - I'm all for it. So I really would love to do an action film.

You have this ability in hip hop to be invincibly cool, and that is a part of G-Eazy.

Hip-hop and electronic music are so similar, in the fact that they're both very visceral, have so much bass; a lot of times, it's the same tempos. The culture and some of the sound design is different but a lot of times, it's the same stuff.

Hip Hop is thee dominant youth culture in the world right now.

If you really dissect hip-hop you will find a whole lot of Charles Mingus, Ron Carter, Ahmad Jamal, a lot of classic jazz samples in there.

Hip-hop is still cool at a party. But to me, hip-hop has never been strictly a party; it is also there to elevate consciousness.

I don't talk to media or anyone before games. I just put my headphones on, turn up some hip-hop, and get in the zone.

I think hip-hop does a very good job of infusing comedy and humor and wit into music, a lot more than other genres.

The thing about being in America is when you are driving with the sun on your back, there's hip hop. I never used to be into hip hop, but there's hip hop in the food, soul food, there's hip hop in the cars.

The 'chinked out' style is a school of hip hop - that's the way I like to think of it - that incorporates Chinese elements and sounds.

I like upbeat songs, and I listen to a lot of Linkin Park and Green Day. I also like hip hop and R&B artists such as Drake and Rihanna.

My definition of hip hop is taking elements from many other spheres of music to make hip hop. Whether it be breakbeat, whether it be the groove and grunt of James Brown or the pickle-pop sounds of Kraftwerk or Yellow Magic Orchestra, hip hop is also part of what they call hip-house now, or trip hop, or even parts of drum n' bass.

When I got my first guitar, I played along with everything I heard that had guitar in it, like the Ramones, Nirvana and Sublime, as well as whatever hip-hop and R&B stuff was on the radio.

I want kids of this generation to see that everything is cool, that there's some kind of unity in hip-hop. We all found something that's really important to us, and music is all we've really got.

Dropkick Murphys get me going, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Nirvana... plus, all the regular hip-hop stuff.

I was a fan of heavy music - first metal, then punk, then hip hop.

I'm not sure you can lindy hop to 'We're All In This Together,' but I'm sure the nuns would welcome Zac Efron round for tea!

One of the things that makes me most happy about music is that I can look at a picture and see Da Brat, Missy, Lil Kim, Left Eye, and I know Aaliyah is a singer, but to see them all in one photo together hugging and laughing and really having genuine love for each other... I want to feel that with my hip hop sisters.

There was no match for Barry White. His music is just going to live forever. It's not limited to disco or soul or hip-hop or anything.

Hip-hop is definitely not what it used to be, which was creative, original music.

Hip-hop reflects the truth, and the problem is that hip-hop exposes a lot of the negative truth that society tries to conceal. It's a platform where we could offer information, but it's also an escape.

Somerset desperately needs more high-end music making on its doorstep, so the chance to share great music spanning genres as diverse as orchestral classics, trip hop and jazz, in the utterly relaxed and cathartic environment of a Somerset field, is for me the fulfilment of a long-term dream.

November is Hip-Hop History Month, where we give celebration to what hip hop has done to bring together people of the world, people of all nationalities, young people, all the political systems and politicians on the planet.

Hip-Hop isn't just music, it is also a spiritual movement of the blacks! You can't just call Hip-Hop a trend!

I make soul music for hip-hop heads. It's music I'd want to sample if I were a rapper.

Hip-hop is such a disposable art form from a business standpoint. It never treats its artists as art; it never treats its product as art.

I guess the difference between the Korean hip-hop scene and the American hip-hop scene is that in the American hip-hop scene, you know, they have their Jay-Zs. They can become conglomerates through hip-hop. In Korea, it doesn't happen.

I remember back in the day when Chuck D called hip-hop the 'black people's CNN.' Well now, hip-hop is more like Fox News. It's biased, and highly suspect.

I have done so much for hip-hop and 'til this day, I haven't received any awards or any recognition for it.

I can put a hip-hop beat to reggae. That is, I can have real reggae in the drums and in the rhythm, and on top of it I can put The Rolling Stones' feeling, anyone's feeling on top. Nobody has ever done this before, man.

When I say a spoken Hebrew sentence, half of it is like the King James Bible and half of it is a hip-hop lyric. It has a roller-coaster effect.

Rap is a gimmick, but I'm for the hip-hop, the culture.

The beautiful thing about hip-hop is it's like an audio collage. You can take any form of music and do it in a hip-hop way and it'll be a hip-hop song. That's the only music you can do that with.

A lot of underground hip-hop will inspire me as far as rhyme patterns - really wordy, intelligent lyrics.

Quentin Tarantino is a hip-hop artist. I told him, 'You're hip-hop!' You keep seeing surprises, and a clip here and there, because Quentin is hip-hop. A hip-hop artist will drop a single, leak something over here, and drop something over there 'cause he knows it's hot. He's on the spot with the way he does things.

Salsa, classic rock, soul music, jazz... all of that was a part of my education in making hip-hop music.

I am one of the founders of Hip-Hop along with my brothers Kool DJ Herc and Grandmaster Flash.

I've always wanted to introduce hip-hop filmmaking to film. There's hip-hop art, dance, music, but there really isn't hip-hop film. So I was trying to do that.

Ultimately I am happy that everybody is embracing hip hop and the sounds from the streets.

I wouldn't want to hear Beethoven without beautiful bass, the cellos, the tuba. It's very important. Hip-hop has thunderous bass. And so does Beethoven. If you don't have the bass, it's like being amputated. It's like you have no legs.

Hip-hop is getting to the point now where they are going to start sounding like Al Jarreau or Bobby McFerrin or some of the other poets. Some of the better rappers can rap real fast without even melodies. It'll get to that same point.

The only thing I wanted to accomplish was to finally get recognized by the music industry. If you know the awards, answer me this question: Do you see an award for soul music? No. They have R&B, funk, hip-hop and all sorts of contemporary things.

Hip-hop isn't as complex as a woman is.

The whole point of bike-sharing is to give New Yorkers another way to commute. A lot of folks in Bay Ridge work in downtown Brooklyn or other parts of the borough. For them, it would make more sense to hop on a Citi Bike than to wait for a train or a bus.

How you act, walk, look and talk is all part of Hip Hop culture. And the music is colorless. Hip Hop music is made from Black, brown, yellow, red and white.

I'm headed towards greatness. I think I'm making history in hip-hop.

I have thought about the next steps, and you know, they still don't know that I can dance. They don't know it, and it's frustrating me because I feel that it's an edge that I have, and I'm not talking about I took this hip hop class, I'm talking about this is how people actually know me.

I'm forever learning and that's why I'm always able to create new styles and new dimensions of hip-hop.

The thing is with hip-hop, it has its waves and the waves crash against the beach and the new waves come in. So to stay relevant you have to roll with that.

Hip-hop is the streets. Hip-hop is a couple of elements that it comes from back in the days... that feel of music with urgency that speaks to you. It speaks to your livelihood and it's not compromised. It's blunt. It's raw, straight off the street - from the beat to the voice to the words.

A lot of the hip hop artists don't write music. They write words.

The only reason I've been so critical of hip-hop is because I've always been aware of the effect that it has, and the reflection that it gives of the African-American community

There's not a hip-hop artist that didn't snatch of piece of Bob Marley. It's totally impossible.

Rap is rhythm and poetry. Hip-hop is storytelling and poetry as well.

I feel like a lot of people in the hip hop world don't take me seriously as a rapper, and I feel that first-and-foremost I came up as a rapper before I started singing. All a lot of people know from me is 'Cupid's Chokehold,' and they don't scratch the surface and see beyond that dude who sings the song about his girlfriend.

I like Nine Inch Nails, and I like hip-hop.

I consider music to be storytelling, melody and rhythm. A lot of hip-hop has broken music down. There are no instruments and no songwriting. So you're left with just storytelling and rhythm. And the storytelling can be so braggadocious, you're just left with rhythm.

I got into hip hop from my uncle; he was always playing us Kool G Rap and Big Daddy Kane. He was a bad boy, and my mum was not really happy that I was hanging out with him.

From Dickens's cockneys to Salinger's phonies, from Kerouac's beatniks to Cheech and Chong's freaks, and on to hip hop's homies, dialect has always been used as a way for generations to distinguish themselves.

Hip-hop educated me about other forms of music, because it sampled from all different styles.

Ever since I was a kid, I was always a fan of hip hop. If you get your limelight whether your sixteen or twenty-one or wherever you're at, you get your lime when you get your lime, but if you're a part of hip hop and a child of hip hop, then you will always be a part of hip hop.

From folk to tribal to Cab Calloway, Cole Porter, Gershwin to the Rolling Stones, whose first record was all covers, to country-western, bebop, blues, and even the referencing in classic hip hop to cliched love ballads of the '80s or whatever - that is kinda gone, and that's just terrifying to me.

Detroit is right now a new Mecca for Hip Hop.

Blues, rock and hip hop are more about a lifestyle and culture than notes on a page.

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.

I think the hip hop world and the rock world still have a lot in common, but it certainly seems like things happen and break at a much faster pace in the hip hop world.

At the end of the day, you want to be always the one that's one step ahead of everybody, and when it comes to hip-hop, culture and art, you want to be that signature guy.

That's what my music... I'm working on a solo record right now, it's gonna be more hip-hop than anything, like electronic hip-hop, futuristic hip-hop. I'm probably gonna be rapping on it.

I toured with Skrillex, did an HBO commercial with Diplo. In the hip hop movement, I was the first artist Travis Scott ever featured with before he blew up. I had the songs with Chris Brown and Tyga. I've worked with some of the biggest artists in the world.

Dancehall is just like hip-hop in that it doesn't always talk about bling; it talks about conscious issues.

I am a hip-hop fanatic, and rock fanatic.

I loved hip-hop. The first stuff I heard was Public Enemy, and I couldn't believe it. It was amazing, and I've always loved hip-hop.

Hip-hop deals with bragging and braggadocio, being boastful. It's always been about who's got the most money.

Hip-hop in Africa has been very often a duplication of an American experience, but in a context that's totally alien to it.

I don't like rap music at all. I don't think it's music. It's just a beat and rapping.

Hip-hop is so much about character and caricature that people just see you as a character. Very rarely are you flesh and bone to people.

What's wrong with hip-hop is the system that controls the definition of it. There needs to be more balance on the airwaves.

Hip Hop has become real constrained. The creative juices and creative flows have been diminished.

Hip-hop went through different stages, from the beginning in the streets of the Bronx, to the whole Tri-State area and then to the rest of the United States and the rest of the world.

I now possess the tools as a producer and a songwriter to really just go out and make smashes all day long. I could make an album full of smash records that got pop appeal. But my heart is in hip-hop. My heart is in telling stories. And it's like therapy for me.

Well, hip-hop is what makes the world go around.

I don't even listen to hip-hop anymore. All my friends are white and over 40.

Hip-hop is too young to put a definition on it

I've been dancing my entire life. Jazz, hip hop, ballet. And then there's tap dancing. I love to tap.

Joining another big time rock band was the last thing I was looking for, but as the tour went on, I really dug playing to a lot of people, the band sounded great, and just being out there again, got me over my depression and so I decided to hop on board.

I was in a competing company and have been dancing since I was four - ballet, tap, jazz, hip hop - so it's a huge part of my life and my music.

We used to talk about wanting to get some money, but that's when hip-hop was based on your dreams and your fantasy. The whole thing now is the dreams and fantasies were achieved, and you don't want to make it the focal point. You can't keep beating that dead horse.