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I'm writing songs to perform, to entertain. And when I'm really trying to get inspired, I go backwards, and I just rap.

I started rapping because I wanted people to hear what I have to say, I want as many people to hear me as possible, and I do everything in my power to make that pop.

I didn't ever want to make a rap album. I considered it too limiting. Now that's exactly what I've gone and done.

The writing process, the way I go about it is I do whatever the beat feels like, whatever the beat is telling me to do. Usually when the beat comes on, I think of a hook or the subject I want to rap about almost instantly. Within four, eight bars of it playing I'm just like, 'Oh, OK. This is what I wanna do'.

I didn't want to be that artist that is successful as a result of someone else. Not that that's wrong, but I felt like I had what it took. I really believed I could do it on my own, so I wanted to try, at least.

One of the biggest obstacles I've overcome in my life was thinking I didn't deserve to be successful. Artistically I'm not as much of a heavyweight as someone like Paul Simon or Joni Mitchell, because I'm not a creator of original music, and I worried about that for years.

I didn't want to just be an artist and let someone else have all that control over me. I knew I would have to produce.

You want, as an artist, to be pushing yourself to do what you haven't done before.

With 'Acid Rap,' I allowed myself to be really open-minded and free with who I allowed into my musical space. I wanted to make a cohesive product, but I also just want to make a bunch of dope songs inspired by whatever sounds I liked.

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.