I spent a lot of time in college. I was just being academic and discovering myself through reason and analysis.

We don't want it to be obscure music. We're not trying to be indie. We want to be popular.

I know deep down I'm a star.

The whole thing about 'progressive R&B' blows my mind. Black music has always been progressive.

Innovating something that is familiar. That's the general approach, and that's what I want to do with the melody as well. It should ring true - you should like every melody sequence without knowing what's happening next.

No one is making extraordinary things alone. They might be alone in their bedroom while they're recording or writing, but they didn't actually conjure that thing out of nothing - without influence - without assistance - without anything.

For those of us who make music together, I think it's important to realize that generosity on both sides is actually going to produce the biggest possibility.

That's pretty much how every song of mine works - I start with gibberish and melody and phrasing. I speak it naturally first. And then I think about lyrics that fit into that.

It's such a challenging time, and in my small way, I will make it so that other younger women, and maybe older women, will be able to do the things they want to do, and accept themselves and their experience.

I just want to shed light, illuminate and turn the spotlight over to all of the black people who have been being futuristic and innovative since instruments were plugged into a wall. With computers, machines, and music, black people have been contributing to that a great deal for a long time.

I don't want you to feel defeated, like, 'Oh boy, why do you do this to me?' We have too many of those songs.

Fog and one blue light is all I need in life at the club. Just a dark room and loud music. I'm into that.

After it became clear that I was not going to graduate, I had this moment where I was like, 'I need to not sulk. I need to pursue - at least try - to pursue music. But if I don't try, I'm going to be a really bitter middle-aged lady working in a cubicle.'

It's been hard for me to nail visual language and personal style because I like so many different things.

It definitely feels different to perform to people who know your music. Because people's feedback is not just, 'Oh my God, that was amazing. Who are you?'

In the music industry, you can't create success without having to engage a white man. It's just not possible. Whether it's executives, A&Rs, and the people that hold the key to your paper, inevitably, you'll be met with whiteness.

I like smart rappers who aren't necessarily trying to be deeper than you, like Danny Brown.

I'm quite scrutinous when it comes to who I put myself in the room with.

Even on my most angry song, I'm also still saying, 'Thank you for helping me to learn.' I've always wanted to give voice to that complexity in our experience.

I'm interested in bridging and filling in space that hasn't already been filled, so when it comes to making music, I've just always wanted to be able to reference things that producers in the big pop major label context do, without compromising the entire sound of the record.

Growing up, Missy Elliot and Janet Jackson were definitely major references.

'Seat at the Table' has expressed real adversity, struggle, and also triumph and joy.

I try to make it a sonic experience so that when you put your earbuds in or when you're in your room, it sounds like an enveloping feeling. I think that is the most important thing, that wherever you are, it is wrapping you up and making you feel safe and comfortable.

Sometimes I learn by someone giving me warnings and giving me advice about what to do next. And other times, a lot of times, I have to put my hand into the fire.

A lot of white men in the music industry are promoting and participating in black culture in a way that is pretty careless. They want the currency of blackness, but they don't want the brunt that comes along with that.

'Take Me Apart' doesn't feel cohesive in a singular way but in a varied way. You can fixate on individual songs, and there are references from all over the place: Anita Baker to Bjork. I wanted to show all the facets of myself.

I'm just trying to soundtrack your real life. I'm just trying to give you a place to feel safe in all the parts of your experience.

A black woman's handbook in this industry is, 'Whoa.' The chapter on 'Don't go there.' The chapter on 'How to say that nicely,' how to express that you don't like something so that you don't lose the opportunity - which is what we're doing all day long.

I want to speak in the tradition of rhythm and blues and soul music, but also push how it's dressed and how it's delivered to the audience. And hopefully that gets embraced by as many people as possible, but the goal isn't necessarily to speak to everyone. The goal is to get it out as exact as it is in my head.

I would say Tracy Chapman was the first time I obsessed over an entire record. I knew every song; I knew the exact amount of seconds between each song. That's the level of obsession that I had.

The most rewarding thing for someone like me is for someone else to find solace through my music.

When I called 'Cut 4 Me' a mixtape, I was thinking about a few elements: One is used instrumentals. The project is more centered around introducing you to an artist; it's not meant to be seminal. It's 'Hi,' 'Hello,' a thing that you first hear.

The assumption is simply that I hit on all the things I've hit on so far by accident, that my talent is just this raw thing that pours out of me, and then white people feel like they have to come in and contain it, refine it, and bring it to the place where it can been released.

I guess the bottom line is I don't make music that is consumed en masse.

As much as we like to pretend we're just getting on stage and whatever, it's like, no, I practiced in front of the mirror my whole life.

Most of my friends, growing up, were upper-middle-class white kids, so it was a different reality at home both culturally and linguistically. It created a lot of insecurities for me, but it also did a lot of amazing things that I didn't know were happening at the time.

At the end of the day, I would like to have the farthest reach in terms of being able to communicate to as many people as possible. So it's not that I enjoy being obscure; it's that I sonically don't want to be situated here or there.

When I was little, my parents would have these gatherings, and it was a common thing for me and my cousins to have to put on, like, shows.

I'm finding out what part of punk culture or white indie culture I actually still want to hold onto - What are the values? What are the contributions that I actually like? - and it not coming from a place of desperation or wanting to be embraced or wanting approval, essentially.

As it pertains to my black womanhood, there's just a lot of ground to cover. There's a lot of stuff to say.

The act of me just being robust in the world is so radical - it's so radical for a black woman to think she's going to be a star, because it takes so much to get there. It's still a battle every day, but I feel happy because I feel like I cracked the code and figured out how to work through it. Now I want to give the map to other women.

I am your homegirl, at the end of the day, but I also feel very... outside. So if you're finding solace in feeling outside with me, then we're good to go.

I've always had this commitment to not being in one thing.

To me, the best writing points to something literal or common but is also nuanced: The moment when somebody is telling you they love you while simultaneously disappointing you. Everybody's experienced that.

I don't write lyrics. I hear the track and sing in gibberish over it, then I try and fit words into the phrasing and melody that I already have set. Everything is left to chance.

Popular music was this abstraction - an abstraction that I was relating to immensely but was ultimately far away.

I am not carefree. I'm just not. I experience an immense amount of joy, a crazy amount of joy through sadness and so much struggle. There's something problematic about 'carefree black girl.'

I'm just tryna be honest about all the things that I dig in my music. It's not just this over here, it's also that over there.

I like to try out different methods to get to good songs.

I really do like Solange, sincerely. I'm down for her, and I trust her judgment.