The burden of poverty isn't just that you don't always have the things you need: it's the feeling of being embarrassed every day of your life, and you'd do anything to lift that burden. As kids, we didn't complain about being poor; we talked about how rich we were going to be and made moves to get the lifestyle we aspired to by any means we could.

My brands are an extension of me. They're close to me. It's not like running GM, where there's no emotional attachment.

I grew up in Marcy Projects in Brooklyn, and my mom and pop had an extensive record collection, so Michael Jackson and Stevie Wonder and all of those sounds and souls of Motown filled the house.

Growing up, politics never trickled down to the areas we come from. But people from Obama's camp, and Obama himself, reached out to me and asked for my help on the campaign. We've sat and had dinner, and we've spoken on the phone. He's a very sharp guy. Very charming. Very cool.

I didn't go to many movies. My mom would make a family outing and bring chicken in the theater. Smell up the whole place. The most impactful movies were 'Godfather II' and 'Scarface'. I loved the human complexity, and those movies are so well shot. Cinematic greatness. I really stopped going in my early twenties.

I try to make music with emotion and integrity. And authenticity. You can feel when something's authentic, and you can feel when it's not: you know when someone's trying to make the club record, or trying to make the girl record, or trying to make the thug record. It's none of that. It's just my emotions.

I was forced to be an artist and a CEO from the beginning, so I was forced to be like a businessman because when I was trying to get a record deal, it was so hard to get a record deal on my own that it was either give up or create my own company.

Nothing me and Kanye can do musically was gonna match the event of what we were trying to do. So we were trying to deliver an album and experience at one time; that was the idea for 'Watch The Throne'.

I was a really good student. In the sixth grade, I was reading at a twelfth grade reading level. But I got bored.

I've talked to Bill Clinton - he's the ultimate rock star; no one's more charming than him. People clap in a restaurant when he finishes dinner! I don't get that treatment. I get it when I walk onstage, but not when I have dinner.

One of the reasons inequality gets so deep in this country is that everyone wants to be rich. That's the American ideal. Poor people don't like talking about poverty because even though they might live in the projects surrounded by other poor people and have, like, ten dollars in the bank they don't like to think of themselves as poor.

When I came into the music, I was forced to be a CEO. I was forced to be an entrepreneur; I was forced to... because I was looking for a deal. I didn't have this grand scheme of starting a record company and then morphing into a clothing empire.

Successful people have a bigger fear of failure than people who've never done anything because if you haven't been successful, then you don't know how it feels to lose it all.

For me, being with Obama or having dinner with Bill Clinton... it's crazy. It's mind-blowing, because where I come from is just another world. We were just ignored by politicians - by America in general.

Hip-hop is more about attaining wealth. People respect success. They respect big. They don't even have to like your music. If you're big enough, people are drawn to you.

Hip-hop has done more for race relations than most cultural icons; and I say save Martin Luther King, because his 'I Have A Dream' speech was realized when Obama was elected into office.

I was an artist, I was executive producer on my first album, so I've always had to manage both. I couldn't get a record deal. It wasn't by choice - I couldn't get a record deal, so I had to figure it out.

I've always believed in good music over bad music. I believe in two sorts of musics. And the lines that separate us, I don't believe in that. That's for people who need to easily define what they're hearing. Me, I'm cool with everything and anything I'm hearing that's music. It comes under one definition for me.

The burden of poverty isn't just that you don't always have the things you need, it's the feeling of being embarrassed every day of your life, and you'd do anything to lift that burden.

Successful people have a bigger fear of failure than people who've never done anything because if you haven't been successful, then you don't know how it feels to lose it all. You don't have that fear. So why do you think people get stuck in those boxes? It's that fear of going back down.

I was never a worker. And that's not even being arrogant. I was just never a worker.

I treat people based on who they really are, not the name. Everyone has to be respectful and be a human being. No one's above... That's how I carry it with anybody.

Shakespeare was a man who wrote poetry. I'm a man who writes poetry. Why not compare yourself to the best?

My mom always taught me - you know, little boys listen to their moms too much - that whatever you put into something is what you're going to get out of it.