For me, the arts has always been sort of my saving grace.

I feel like Black Thought is a name that has so much meaning and depth, not only to me but to my fans, that it's something that I wanted to hold onto a little bit tighter.

Something that is funny, that I use sometimes if I'm doing comedy, is the fact that I'm now often mistaken for the rapper Rick Ross. And I don't know that I've ever corrected anyone - like I've never said, 'No no, I'm not Rick Ross, I'm Black Thought from The Roots.'

When I was coming up, a freestyle wasn't a freestyle unless everything was completely improvised, in-the-moment and right there, and you had to incorporate various elements of what was going on in the room on the day.

I mean, I'm no superhero.

There are some millennial artists that I totally get and understand, and I know what they're talking about. People who I've worked with and who I'd like to work with. But there's a whole element of artists that I can't explain what they're talking about.

Lots of people are saying that I shut down mumble rap in one 10-minute setting. But that wasn't my intention, because mumble rap - if we go back - that's something I invented.

I was raised as a Muslim.

I made the mistake of going to a barber who was not from Philly, and let's just say, I would never do that again.

I grew up in Mount Airy, a middle-class enclave in the Northwestern area of Philadelphia.

The most profound memory I have from my childhood is burning down my house at 6 years old.

The Roots brand is like the Lipton of hip-hop, so to speak.

I'm in great company and some may say that the underexposure has added to my allure and the staying power of me as a MC and The Roots as a band.

Some of my favorites are the classics like 'What They Do,' 'Proceed,' 'You Got Me,' and 'Silent Treatment.'

Nah, I don't feel overlooked, underappreciated, or none of that because it's a short list of artists, past and present, that I kind of have respect for. And in all of those situations, the admiration and respect is mutual.

I think the true artist - musician, dancer, writer, actor - a true artist is able to sort of articulate pain and tragedy, in a way that sort of expresses what the listener or the beholder may have been feeling but was less able to communicate.

I feel like I've been around for such a long time, as a writer and as an artist, that I need to sort of speak to the way that my perception of the world has sort of changed.

I got a family to take care of and kids to feed. That's my motivation, this is my job.

I strive for improvement. want to be a master of my craft.

I want to be at the top of my game.

The Roots - we signed our first record deal when I was about 19 years old.

By the time I was, you know, 16 years old, I had done a lot of growing up.

For me, I'm a super private person.

I'll read a book. I'll watch a documentary or a film or whatever. I'll go to an art exhibit and just try and open myself to influence.

We've always been a band that intentionally transcended race and age.

The Roots are well-respected and considered vanguards in the music.

I think at the end of the day the diversity has served as a major… that's what has determined the difference between The Roots and some of the other artists from our graduating class. I feel we followed the De La Soul, the Native Tongue blueprint.

I've become a functioning cog in the machine called The Roots, but in my youth I was comin' from a more braggadocious, egotistical perspective.

You can always hear me breathing during my verses, but that breathing becomes part of the music.

The thing that's carried over from my visual-art education into what I do musically is my openness.

I've never studied music.

I used to be a Def Jam artist. I was - I survived Def Jam.

Philly DJs sort of always won battles and always won awards and stuff like that and were always super sharp.

Questlove and I - we were in high school with artists like Boyz II Men and Amel Larrieux.

I've always sort of listened to news radio.

I started as a visual artist and I've always dealt with music in that same sort of way.

It's weird what can trigger the beginning of a song or some bars. It can be a banging slice of apple pie or it can be smelling a certain perfume or something.

So in my personal opinion, I definitely feel like I'm a legendary emcee, and I also feel like we're a legendary brand, which is why I started rebranding ourselves years ago by saying 'The Legendary Roots Crew,' which is how we're introduced on 'The Tonight Show.'

To be in a band with the other founding members that never sleep is inspiring. Questlove put out five books a year and deejays every night and still do the same day job that I do, only with more responsibility. It drives me to find a way to juggle it.

I'm anti-ageism in the arts.

I feel like the youthful experience is what drives the creativity, and I feel like experience and maturity as an adult, experience as an elder statesman, that refines it.

I think poor folks are the only people who cannot afford - financially and otherwise - to be sick.

I give back because that is what I was taught and it is what I believe.

I think we need more community health programs and we need to develop programs that are low-cost.

Passyunk Productions is our film & tv production company. The name comes from a street in Philly, Passyunk Avenue, where the concept of The Roots was born, as Ahmir and I started out busking on the corner of 5th & Passyunk back in the early '90s.

Our plan for Passyunk Productions is to make an impact in the film & tv world by leveraging our collective resources, telling great stories and creating smart programming told from a unique perspective.

Although there are people who regard 'Do You Want More?!!!??!' as our first major release, I think 'Things Fall Apart' was the real arrival of The Roots, so to speak.

We always do kinda like the bare bones representation or variation of the voice and drums, which is what we feel is the foundation or backbone of rapping and hip hop.

A lot of our earlier material was freestyle tunes.

If there's a track that's rhyme friendly, the verse will basically write itself. If the track is less rhyme friendly, you have to put forth a little more effort to get the song out.