Red-hot songs were born on the black streets of Baltimore, where I delivered five-gallon cans of kerosene and ten-pound bags of coal.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
I grew up on the streets of Baltimore, a city I love to this very day.
Two records put me over the top with hip-hop. One of them was 'Planet Rock,' and the other had no lyrics - it was called 'Numbers,' from a group called Kraftwerk. Every kid in the 'hood in New York and New Jersey was popping, locking, and breaking to that record. It was the hottest track on the street at the time.
A lot of the songs start with an image. I was sitting there playing the guitar and I pictured this old, dirty green car, with the window rolled down, in the hot, hot, hot Texas heat, and this beautiful woman I knew when I was a kid sitting behind the wheel, looking out at me.
I was once making a burger for myself at my boyfriend's house and a lyric started pouring out and I had to catch it, so I ran to another room to write it down, but then the kitchen caught fire. His cabinets were charred, and he was furious. But it was worth it for a song.
Although I was born in New York, I moved to Baltimore when I was young. And I like to say New York birthed me, but Baltimore raised me. A big part of my heart was always in Baltimore.
The roots of my music start from the ghetto.
It sounds like something from a Woody Guthrie song, but it's true; I was raised in a freight car.
I was born in a ghetto on the North Side of Pittsburgh. I was born as Emmett Till was dying and the civil rights era was being born.
I was raised on the streets, in hot, steamy Brooklyn, with stifled air.
Thinking back to boyhood days, I remember the bright sun on Harlem streets, the easy rhythms of black and brown bodies, the sounds of children streaming in and out of red brick tenements.