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But I've been freestyling and messing around with rhyming since I was 13. That's when I really started listening to hip-hop music.

I was a kid who got picked on in school, and now the guys beating up those kids were wearing red caps and using my music to fuel that aggression. But if they listen to the lyrics, the aggression is targeted at them.

A lot of these guys come up and say, 'Man, you were my influence, the way you thrashed the drums.' They don't seem to understand I was thrashing in order to hear what I was playing. It was anger, not enjoyment - and painful.

The aggressive side of me comes across in my music, but I'm just a sweet girl.

There's a lot of rage... you have to express it somehow. If I didn't express it in song, I'd become incredibly violent.

I was being very bad because I didn't know how to express myself. Music gave me an outlet to express myself and channel that anger.

Most of my songs start out as being very aggressive and guitar-driven.

I grew up on the rough side of the tracks. If you looked like you were soft, you would be fodder for the wolves. I came up in my neighbourhood like, 'I'm just gonna be me,' and all the thugs just said, 'It's OK, he's special.' They knew I had the talent with the rhymes, so they kept me around.

The music industry's very laid back while I'm very, very aggressive.

I have a deep, scratchy voice. Boys would call me Froggy, and my father would often tell me to shut my 'big bazoo.' I remember standing in line for confession. After I walked out, the other kids were like, 'You punched your sister in the face?' Because of my voice, my confession was like speaking into a loudspeaker.