Well, I believe that the depth of your struggle can determine the height of your success. I was inspired to come out of everything I've been through and end up in a place where I never thought that I would be.
R. Kelly
I'm no angel, but I'm no monster, either.
I'm very responsible. And with ability you have to have responsibility. I'm not perfect. But you have to make sure that your children will know that daddy makes mistakes.
People can say whatever they want about you without knowing the facts. They can criticize you without even knowing you, and hate you when they don't even know you. All of a sudden, you're, like, the bin Laden of America. Osama bin Laden is the only one who knows exactly what I'm going through.
When I met Michael Jordan on a basketball court at an athletic club - we hooped together in Chicago - he came to me and asked me if I wanted to do a song for his upcoming movie. I was like, 'Yeah!' I didn't even ask what it was.
In life, you have people that love to party. That's me. People that love God. That's me. People that love sex. That's me. People that love people. That's me. And people that make mistakes. That's me also.
All the sounds on 'Trapped in the Closet' - the knockin' on the door, when I grab the keys, when I walk down the stairs, the car horns - we sampled all of those things around my house.
I've programmed myself musically to come up with love-feeling tracks that are romantic, sexy, but classy, all in one. And that's the challenge. Once I create that music, then the lyrical content starts to come - you know, the stories and things like that.
When you go to church, if the pastor at some point doesn't make you laugh, he probably ain't gonna make you join.
They say marriage will change you but it didn't change me. Being in love changed me.
You know, I'm no different from a fireman. You got to run into a fire no matter how big the blaze is.
I gave a Christmas party last year - well, two Christmases ago - where I did a Sam Cooke show. I didn't perform as R. Kelly. I performed the Sam Cooke show from 1964, when he performed at the Copacabana.
I try to write life and not songs. People live life, and when you write life, you're going to mess around and touch somebody's heart, and they'll relate to you and what you're singing about.
'Trapped in the Closet' is pretty much forever. I've got a leash on this thing now. I'm going to walk it.
Biggie was a lyrical genius: he was a musical painter with words. As he rapped, you would see the picture come to life as you heard his story. You hear a lot of rappers rap; you hear a lot of singers sing, but you don't see the movie in your head the way you do when you hear Biggie rap.
My mom actually had a band called Six Pack - even though there were seven of them - who went around Chicago performing popular songs. Her voice was like Gladys Knight mixed with Aretha Franklin.
I started calling myself the Pied Piper, when I started using the flute sound in my music.
I will always do R. Kelly - I'm not perfect, but I'm perfectly me.
When I first came in the business, I had a couple of close calls on planes going to London for shows. There was one time where the plane had to fly around until a storm ended, and then we started having a question about fuel, so we had to go through the storm. It was the worst thing that ever happened in my life. That really messed me up.
I was the highest-paid street performer, probably, in the history of Chicago. I was making like $800 a day.
I'm the Ali of today. I'm the Marvin Gaye of today. I'm the Bob Marley of today. I'm the Martin Luther King, or all the other greats that have come before us. And a lot of people are starting to realise that now.
You don't see me in the club. And the reason is because I would rather be in the studio mixing these musical potions. Now sometimes they blow up in my face, and there's a lot of smoke. But that's who I am. Music is what I do.
I'm a lover of all sorts of music, which makes me a chameleon when it comes to performing anything, whether it's opera or whatever. As long as it's good and it feels good, I'm going to cling to it.
I walk around every day with a radio playing constantly in my head, and this radio station plays a lot of hits. But it's all my songs, so that's something to be excited about 24 hours a day.
My greatest competition is, well, me.
Being single has its ups and downs, and being in a relationship has its ups and downs. It depends on how you balance it and how you handle your problems within your relationship.
I started learning everybody's riffs, from Donny Hathaway to Jeffrey Osborne to James Ingram. That helped me create my own style of singing.
I only feel sorry for weak people. And mostly what I've come to find is that the weak people are the ones that are the haters.
You don't want R&B singers to get into beef. Leave that to the rappers, let them do that - R&B, be classy.
I've really been writing a lot of country songs. I used to get criticized for doing a 'Bump & Grind,' then turning around and doing a gospel song. But the truth is I'm glad I have a gift that allows me to switch lanes.
I still feel like I'm alone at times - even if I'm in the midst of a million people. Because no one - including me - understands my mind creatively. I haven't really been formally introduced to my gift yet. I feel like I'm still on the runway.
Nobody knows 100% what affects the human body, mind or spirit.
'Love Letter' is a concept album, and whenever I do a concept album - and I love doing concept albums more than any other kind of album - it allows me to get dressed, in a way, musically.
I've called myself the Pied Piper, I've called myself the Weatherman, I've called myself Kellz, I've called myself a lot of things, changing the name, switching it up, just flipping, remixing. But never to harm anybody. Never to make a deep statement for people to dig into and figure it out.
As with all the other rappers I've worked with, Biggie and I shared common ground. Even though Biggie grew up in Brooklyn and I grew up in Chicago, we came from the same 'hood.
If you're gonna tell your life story, you gotta be honest, or don't do it.
You save money so your kids can go to college - no matter what they are or who they are. They're your kids; you gotta support them.
Country music tells stories, and I've always loved to tell stories.
Downstairs in my house, I have a museum room. I keep all of my awards down there, and childhood photos, and even all the clothes I've worn on tour, in videos and on album covers.
I've had money thrown onstage, dollars, couple of five-dollar bills. I took the money, but it wasn't much.
When a person is found not guilty, they're found not guilty.
I just never, in my career, got into doing a lot of press.
You can't satisfy everybody. I will continue to do my job until I get fired, and the only people who can fire me are my fans.
I have always been infatuated with country music. Country music tells stories, and I've always loved to tell stories. I said that when I establish myself as an artist that can do pretty much anything I want to do in music, I'm going to make a country album.
I used to get criticized for doing a 'Bump & Grind' then turning around and doing a gospel song. But the truth is I'm glad I have a gift that allows me to switch lanes.
My music has shaken hands with the world somehow - it's a beautiful disease, and I'm glad I got it.
R. Kelly is a thing on TV, but nobody knows Robert and what he's been through.
There are so many songs in me that haven't been born yet. So I can't call myself a genius, but I never turn away a compliment, and I feel like I'm on my way to that mountain.
You're younger, you might want to go to clubs and kick it, but as you get older, you start seeing that life has more meaning to it. The people that you love are the people you want to start trusting and start wanting them to trust you and start respecting them.
On many different singles, I was able to marry my music with rappers who understood the natural bond between us.
