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When I was young, people were almost identified solely by the kind of music they liked. People fell into categories of who liked what.

'Malcolm X' was impressionable for me as a kid.

Malcolm X raised my consciousness about myself and my people and other people more than any person I know. I knew him before he became Malcolm X.

I was an absolute idiot, wearing polo-necks, reading Kerouac, watching Woody Allen movies, and jazz fitted right into all of that. My interest in that whole world became very genuine, but perhaps started off a bit affected - a mixture of right and wrong reasons. I was always drawn to non-commercial music, perhaps pathologically so.

My influences in this world have always been Crazy Horse and Malcolm X, my overall influences. But I was influenced by rock n' roll, blues, and country music. I was influenced by singers.

Part of my affinity with urban music comes from being on 'Kids Incorporated,' 'cos we used to sit around and listen to Chaka Khan and Prince, and I got influenced by all that. Then gangsta rap got started, and I was infatuated with that - maybe that's why I'm fascinated by guns.

My dad always associated information with liberation. He was very much in that Malcolm X tradition.

Style has always been very important to us. We grew up in the '70s. Music was glam rock, punk rock and a very stylish movement.

Music definitely gave me a focus. I was an artist without an outlet. Let's just say if I was not famous, I could have been infamous. I could've had my own episode of 'American Gangster.'

I'm a child of the 70's; influenced mostly by albums that had a wide variety of style.