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As a songwriter, you try your best to write a good song, and you like nothing better than hearing a good song. It's easy to admire a great song, and you want to share out of enthusiasm.

Just knowing how to rap doesn't necessarily mean that you're a good songwriter.

You need to understand that a skilled professional songwriter can accelerate your success as an already talented musician. These people are writing every single day, so their craft is really sharp, and it's the best songwriters who consistently get on the radio.

I think people appreciate a songwriter who shows different sides. The whole angst thing is cool, but if that's all you've got, it's just boring. Everything I write, whether it's happy or sad, has a sense of humor to it.

I still very much appreciate the storytelling of the best rappers.

I pay attention to lyrics and I know what rap fans care about. I try to write for the average listener and I'm conscious of the mainstream without selling out.

It is setting goals and trying to be a business person, but at the same time not losing sight of who you are writing songs for and what your goals are as a songwriter. So believe me, if you think I've got it down I don't it is a constant struggle.

The cool thing about being a songwriter, or a writer, I guess, in general, you can take on a lot of different things, experience a lot of different things, just by writing about them.

I speak from the heart. Certain people follow lyricists and people that put words on a dictionary together, and this and that. I'm more of a rapper that speaks how I feel. I just tell it how it is.

A lot of rappers don't have to go through what I had to go through as a singer. I was always in a bubble that they put me in, but I was always punching out. It was a tough line to walk.