I am, always have been, and always will be proud of my Nigerian heritage.
Jidenna
A great tailor is like a great personal trainer - they tailor that suit to your natural physique.
A classic man is a distinguished man. He cares about taste and his craft. He's all about the simple model that I live by - eat, drink, be swanky, and have fun getting the job done. He makes sure that he's excellent in all things and that he cares about his neighborhood immensely.
Swanky means classy and funky.
The trick of Afrobeats is it doesn't just move your upper body, it moves your hips as well, and I think that's what people have been missing in popular music for a while. I think that's what people need around the world.
Every single place that's brushed upon me has made me the artist that I am - from Nigerian Highlife music and the vocal melodies that I grew up on when I would be sitting with my father and his fellow chiefs, to the funk and freeness of the Bay Area groove, to L.A.'s smooth G-funk legacy, Brooklyn's lyricism, and now Atlanta's trap history.
Everything you touch touches you.
It's better to do your purpose imperfectly than to do someone else's purpose perfectly.
My nickname is 'Chief' because my father was a chief in Nigeria.
Most of the suits I try to wear are bespoke.
I've always been dabbling in suits, but like a lot of people in the neighborhoods I grew up in, I had my snapback; I had my v-neck. I still got them in the closet. I got my J's, my Forces; it was standard.
My father raised me to build computers, hardware. Literally, as an 8 year old, I had a soldering iron and circuit boards, and this was in neighbourhoods that wouldn't have a whole lot of money or anything. And I figured out ways to just hustle.
I don't have one geographic location that I'm exclusively loyal to.
I wanted to remind myself and others of the old Jim Crow, so that we can remind ourselves that we're still living in the new Jim Crow. I feel it's important to dress in the fashion of the times.
I myself have been scrutinized by militarized police, but I know officers who actually handle themselves in a certain way that makes me feel safe.
I think it's the job of the artist to reflect the times and also reflect his or her views of the world.
For me, I wear a suit because I need to remember what's happened before me.
There are always pluses and minus to commercialization. It broadcasts something to the masses. So that's the plus. The minus is it may lose some of its meaning if you dilute it.
First of all, I respect The Game. He's trail-blazed for artists like myself. I appreciate him, having - living in L.A. myself and knowing what he stands for and what he stood for.
Even if the production doesn't feel African, the vocal delivery - singing through your nose. Specifically, Highlife music from Nigeria. That was the first music I ever heard as a child. So singing through my nose is something I do often, and that's directly rooted in my heritage.
Ever since the decision of Robin Thicke and Pharrell, we believe that it was important to make sure that we are safe. When that Robin Thicke verdict came out, we realized that the game had changed in music.
The most important thing for me is the thing I strive for. But I also hope when I play my songs for people - adult, children, mostly children - that they feel mighty, they feel noble, they feel like warriors. And they feel like they can do anything in the world because that's how I feel.
The affinity towards suits was a functional thing for me early on because I was thrifting at secondhand shops, and it was also initially a way of grieving - my father had passed, and he used to wear suits all the time.
America is haunted by an apparition steeped in slavery, and I wanted to remind everyone that, 'Yo, we've got to handle this.'
I work predominantly with tailors from Nigeria, Ghana, and Senegal.
Yes, it's still a man's world, unfortunately, and we have a long way to go in this country and all countries - but there's something to be said for just feeling the spirit of a true man, and I think that's what 'Classic Man' speaks to.
I think one of the things that I picked up from Nigeria is the constant pressure to be excellent. Parents drill in this responsibility towards family, but also a responsibility toward making sure your family name is heralded.
Not unlike our country's history, my personal history was founded upon an unfortunate history of racial conflict between black and white.
Does Martin Luther King really want his birthday commercialized?
I started singing because it was a natural evolution in hip-hop to me. Without Prince, I wouldn't have embraced that. I wouldn't have been able to embrace me.
We're social beings, and I need to know and remember where I came from.
I thought the suit was something that would suit me.
I began my studies in a sound and electrical engineering program, but I ultimately created a major called 'Ritual Art.'
I feel like we haven't dealt with the ghosts of America's past, and the way to deal with it is to confront it, so every time people see me, I want them to be reminded and to confront that ghost.
I describe myself as a big kid with an old soul, I'm very playful whimsical, but I definitely have that old soul as well.
I think a lot of people try to be someone else, and Young Thug really is who he is. I love his melodies, how he dresses, how he carries himself.
One day, my mum bought me this music production software for my computer, and I started making beats... I realised it was more like production than a video game, but it was a video game when I was playing it. That's how I got into music production.
When I brought home a 98 percent on a test, my father would say, 'Ah, ah, where are the other two points? Go and get them, then bring them back.' My father and Nigerian culture has always stood for excellence.
In Brooklyn, all the kids call me the 'Willy Wonka of the Hood.'
I think hard-core capitalism tends to commercialize everything.
Willy Wonka had his chocolate factory; I have my Fear & Fancy Parlor.
I was born in Wisconsin, but I quickly moved to Nigeria as a toddler.
I reached rock bottom halfway through college. And it was - because of all the pressure that I think we're talking about right now - the pressure to learn how to budget, the pressure to really abandon everything that you ever learned. You don't have a comfort zone anymore. You don't have your neighborhood. You don't have your family with you.
When I was a boy, I was sagging my pants like everyone else. Some boys become men and continue to sag their pants because that's their form of rebellion.
The one thing that I learned in college, actually, was that you may reach tremendous highs and tremendous lows.
People thought 'Classic Man' was processed. But then they realized, 'Oh, this guy actually is that man, and he actually dresses like that.'
When I originally came to the U.S., my mother came with a couple hundred dollars to her name. I didn't know we were struggling because she hid that from me. But it was definitely a struggle to get through life and get through school.
If I'm shopping at the Gap or Old Navy, I'm saying that I'm an ordinary person: I don't want to be seen; I don't want to stand out. That's a statement. If I'm wearing a leather jacket, there's something about me that's kind of a rebel. So everybody says something, whether they want to or not.
I'm the guy on the corner that is slightly peculiar but fun and funky.
I believe what Wondaland is doing is creating depth.
