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If you put this in the context of Detroit in '64 or '65, the economy was booming. Everybody had jobs and there was a whole nightclub culture where bands could work.

How did we suddenly become entranced with gangster culture? I saw it this morning on campus. When did the black community say we should all look like criminals?

I understand that Detroit was a pretty rough place to grow up in the '70s and '80s.

We were in the heart of the ghetto in Chicago during the Depression, and every block - it was probably the biggest black ghetto in America - every block also is the spawning ground practically for every gangster, black and white, in America too.

I'm from Detroit. I was from a kind of violent neighbourhood.

We got into all the trouble you could ever imagine. We figured that if the Jones boys and all the gangsters ran Chicago, we had our own territory now. All the stores, all the crime, we were in charge of everything, my stepbrother and my brother.

People know Detroit for the cars, but the suburban areas of the city are really beautiful. It's much more inhabitable than people think. Many believe it's like Berlin at the end of World War II.

I've performed in Auburn Hills, at The Palace, so I haven't really been in downtown Detroit, but I've been able to be here, and I can really see, what the city was. Like, I can feel why Motown started here and how amazing it was.

I grew up in what my mom will always dispute as 'the hood.' She just doesn't like the name. But it had its similarities to any neighborhood like that. The all-black neighbors and the all-black problems and the all-black happiness. And I really loved it.