Travis Scott's dad was one of my OGs when I was a kid in Texas. Obviously Travis was nonexistent yet because his father wasn't even married back then.

DWYCK' was only intended to be a B-side of 'Take It Personal,' because we had done a record with Nice & Smooth for their album, Ain't a Damn Thing Changed, called 'Down The Line.' They were returning the favor with 'DWYCK,' being that we let them borrow the 'Manifest' instrumental.

Prince, Bootsy Collins, Earth Wind & Fire and Parliament all had albums that sound different. I wanted to show, as a hip-hop producer, I'm one of those that can do anything, because I was raised on so much music aside from rap and hip-hop.

I'm a big rock 'n' roll head, I love country music, I love yodeling music. But I'm still black and funky.

I like showing versatility.

I get up early all the time.

I'm not really a comparison dude. Even when people say 'Big or Pac?,' because they're two totally different types of lyricists.

I say if you don't write your lyrics, then you can't be the best rapper alive. Not at all. You can be one of the best artists, especially in rap, you gotta write everything yourself.

Jazz came from the streets, hip-hop came from the streets. It's just a different language. It's all borne out of hard times, struggle, and the fight to have equality and things be better.

I've been listening to Herbie Hancock forever. He's gone through so many transitions, even before bringing hip-hop to the forefront with ‘Rockit' and everything.

I always followed my heart and if my heart said I gotta pack up and go, I'm gone.

God knows I'm a good guy, I'm known in the industry as a good guy. I'm not known to be a foul, evil dude that you've got to watch out for and my name is not muddy in the industry.

I don't shop beats. That was never my method coming up. I think it's very strange to have a CD of 30 or 40 beats and then just pick one.

Everybody knows with rap artists, if you can't go to the hood, it's almost like you're not authentic, even if you're a dope artist that's respected.

I'm known for taking a long time getting music out, partially, my schedule is bananas, I'm only human, and then on top of that, I'm a one-man-producer.

Dre is someone I've looked up to since 1985 when he came to my college and performed with The Wrecking Crew.

Me and Tupac were long-time friends.

I don't usually collab with producers, because I don't need to. I never have, because I don't want to break my style of how I do things.

Black men, we're known for getting into some drama with other black men, specifically black-on-black crime. We're used to the confrontational attitude.

I think the fact that Gang Starr kept getting more and more successful was the reason we never thought about our age.

I used to lie about my age at first because you always want to be 18, but then you start looking at it and you're 40, and the money's still coming. And you're like, 'Man, who cares about that?'

I can't make the new generation like me, because they didn't grow up on me. So I stick to what I know.

I'm from the pre-Pro Tools era where you had to meet up with the artist and go over things if you wanted to record a track.

I'm cool with Dr. Dre, I have his phone number, and he picks up when I call.

I'm super cool with Kanye.

I like when people don't think I can pull things off.

And hip-hop is about style and finesse and being creative and different, and to do that you have to be ballsy enough to not do what everybody else does.

All my idols have been in the studio with me, because they wanted to be there.

The ghetto music of my era is hip-hop. And Parliament, and Curtis Mayfield, and Marvin Gaye, that was all the ghetto stuff when I was a baby, and then when I was a teenager it was hip-hop and we were taking all those old '70s sounds and recreating them and putting them into a hip-hop format.

I like soul, I like rock, I like new wave, I like punk music, I like blues, I like jazz, and I was brought up on all of them from a young boy all the way to my teenage years, when I was wild and crazy, in college.

That's the thing with social media: it's a gift and a curse. It's cool on one level, but it's also bad.

There's no point in getting too worried about things, because life is too short.

I always come across like I'm looking serious, but I just don't like smiling. Honestly, obviously I'm different in person.

It's important to take time off because it's a long journey this life, and I want to be singing in 30 years' time. You see a lot of artists who get caught up in the here and now, and they just burn themselves out, and I kind of did that myself with my third album.

You know that band that are all over 'Melody Maker,' Huggy Bear, they're just a load of crap, right? Riot grrrl group - y'know, it's all sexism and stuff, women standing up for their rights: 'This girl said this at the gig off the stage.' It's nothing got to do with music. They're probably untalented gits when it comes to the crunch.

I try to think about optimism. I try to look at the beautiful things in life.

I'm an icon. I'm the Queen of Limerick.

I look like that in the morning: my hair's all greasy - it's not, 'Hey, look at the babe of the band!' I hate that kind of thing, the way women are always pushed forward as beauties... it's very easy: you can make the ugliest pig look lovely in a photograph.

When everybody's looking at you, it does your head in. When you're always on the inside, sometimes you can't see the forest for the trees.

U2 and Sinead O'Connor - I haven't a clue why we're compared to them. Apart from us all being Irish, we've nothing in common.

I was a full-time mom for seven years. You go back on tour, you're back in hotels, you're ordering room service, and you're getting an itinerary slipped under your door every,day. You're kind of thinking, 'Did I go home for seven years, or was that just a dream?'

In 1997, we took time off, and that's when Oasis broke and Princess Diana died and I was home with my baby hating the music industry. People asked what I thought about the Spice Girls, and honestly, I was so happy to tell them I couldn't be bothered to care.

Once you succeed at what you're doing, your parents see that what you were doing wasn't so bad after all, though they'd prefer to see you in a secure lifestyle where you have a contract for years and years, or you have a diploma or degree.

I lived in buses. I didn't really have anything else. I didn't feel like a female, and I ended up really kind of isolated. Everybody thinks you're so happy and so wealthy and such a big star, but you're really kind of lonely and don't know how to stop it.

My priorities were taking the kids to school and being a mum and being a daughter and being a sister. Just spending a lot of that time with my family that I'd probably lost a lot of, touring with the Cranberries.

I'm an artist, and I need to work, like everybody. We need to be challenged and that we're getting up and doing something with our lives.

When my grandfather died, I was on tour, and I didn't go to the funeral. I never got to say goodbye, and this is one of the problems of being in a rock band is that you're away, and your loved ones die, and you can't even see them.

Men have no idea how much more difficult it is for women in the rock and roll industry, and while we are trying to give birth, breastfeed, all they do is have a good time.

I don't appreciate people invading my privacy.

When the Greatest Hits came out and we did that tour, I just felt I wanted to take a break, totally. Probably because, as well, I was so young when I got famous. I did album, tour, album, tour, album, tour, then I had a public nervous breakdown where I just lost tons of weight.