Being self-made is a state of mind, and once you put that mentality to work, your success will come.
Dave East
My journey is self-made because I came from nothing. It's the best feeling now, because I don't really feel like I owe anybody.
No matter how dope you are, if you ain't really built, if you ain't put that groundwork in, you gonna flop. Nobody gonna fill those arenas.
A lot of people change for good. Some people just fall off. Just trying to progress in anything, no matter what you're doing, I feel like any progression you make… some people aren't gonna be around you that were around you.
It took mad failures for me to start to win.
You're born a certain way, but you don't gotta die like that.
I stand out. I don't really think I fit in with the 'what rap is' today. I feel like I stand out because I'm talking about me and my homies and stories from my life. I ain't really trying to have you turnt up all day.
I wouldn't tell nobody to sign no slave deal or sign your life away or nothing like that, but if the deal is right and if it benefits you, you'd be a fool if you did not take advantage of it.
Everybody knows I smoke, drink, and be up in the club, but I don't want that to be my entire thing. I want them to see me get up and go to the gym after a night of clubbing.
I'll never give up my style.
I'm never gonna sell my soul or violate myself for no amount of dollars or fame.
Spanish Harlem is like every ghetto in America. There's every distraction possible. To make it up out of there is really a task itself.
I'll never put out some super-dumbed-down music. It'll always have some substance to it.
I think my music is more personal than most of the music I'm hearing.
I'm not feeling R. Kelly. And I got a daughter, so I'm super not jacking R. Kelly at all.
I want to put out music that everyday people can relate to.
I want to be one of the greats. I feel like the money and all that is going to come, but I want to be a name that, like, when you say Nas or Jay Z, that's forever.
I always wanted to do something I knew I could love to wake up and do every day, and rap was just second nature to me, growing up in Harlem. I never really had to try.
I never thought I'd be sitting across the table with the owner of Hennessy.
The fashion and the rap go hand in hand with New York City.
People don't get signed by Def Jam every day on my block.
I want to eventually get to a point where I can make all types of music for every type of crowd.
My father brought a basketball to the hospital when I was born, and he already had it embedded in his head that I would be a ball player.
I am not going to lie - my looks helped me.
I wanna be in a movie, I wanna have a clothing line, I wanna put myself in a position where, when I'm dead and gone, or I can't rap anymore, that's still moving. Tupac and Biggie, they've been dead 10-plus years and people talk about them everyday. I'm gonna try to speak everything into existence. I know the music is my key to get there.
The reception on 'P2' has been crazy. Every show on the tour has been sold-out. I didn't think people were gonna catch on to it that quick because I started the tour the same day it came out.
When I go back to my hood, Queens, Brooklyn, or here in L.A., the people that's not famous, that's what inspires me.
Since the '80s, Harlem has the place to go. Before the '80s, just as far as hip-hop go, Harlem has always been a strong point, fashion-wise, music-wise, all of that.
Islam really brought a discipline to my life that I didn't really have before. My old mindset was if they ain't helping me, I ain't helping them, but you can't live life that way.
With me, I record so much that I just get in the zone.
I got it tatted on me, 'born broke, die rich.'
Nobody uses skits at all anymore, so it seems like I use a lot. That's how I grew up on tapes. Biggie tapes, Biggie albums would have skits. The Lox would have skits. Mase would have skits. All the dudes I grew up on in Nineties rap would have skits on their projects, just to make you feel like you were right there with them.
My standout moment I would have to say was when 'Black Rose' dropped and getting the co-sign from Nas and The LOX. I would say all those moments together were crazy for me.
I think R. Kelly is twisted, sick-minded, nasty, perverted - he different. I don't know anybody like R. Kelly.
Wu-Tang was going through it. They didn't come from great homes or families. They really came from hard beginnings so it just made me reflect on my own situation. If Wu-Tang was able to make it, why can't I?
Nas really introduced the world and a lot of people to me - that was ideal as far as me first coming in.
I wanna go to every country on the Earth.
I've been able to provide for my family, move out of Harlem and travel the world.
A lot of creativity coming from the east side of Harlem. It really built my character and who I am.
I'm still an athlete at heart, so I always want that comfort and something that feels like an athletic shoe.
Where I'm from in Harlem, everybody look like a rapper.
Islam has a negative outlook on it around the world based on what the media tries to show. They not showing the peace.
I was incarcerated for a little while in Baltimore, and my celly was Muslim. I was watching him pray every day, and his outlook on getting out of that situation was a lot more positive than the other dudes that were Muslim in the jail.
After the first three or four years of me taking rap seriously, it started to look more promising. I started booking shows and more people were playing my music, so I starting believing this could actually work for me.
Deep down in my heart and what I've seen and what I've been around, there is nothing better than Islam.
A big part of what kept me focused on the music was already failing with basketball. I played basketball all of my life. When basketball didn't work, I knew that I had to make it in whatever I decided to do next.
If you're a fan of anything I do, I'm always telling a story. I'm into that - I like it when you don't know if it was true or not.
I'm never really trying to focus on one aim.
I always had a gift with writing. I can really write. I always felt like I can write movies or somehow get into that.
Growing up in Harlem, I was always in the parks playing ball.
