Janelle Monae
Janelle Monae
Janelle Monáe Robinson, known professionally as Janelle Monáe, is an American musical recording artist, actress, model signed to Bad Boy Records, Wondaland Arts Society, and Atlantic Records. After making a mark with her first unofficial studio album, The Audition, she publicly debuted with a conceptual EP titled Metropolis: Suite I, which peaked at number 115 on the Billboard 200 in the United States...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionSoul Singer
Date of Birth1 December 1985
CityKansas City, KS
CountryUnited States of America
I always carry my classic black-and-white tux and custom-made George Esquivel saddle shoes.
Children go with whatever makes them feel good - like if that's the color green or orange, they do that with their clothes. As I've grown older, everything reversed. My music, my personality - onstage those things became my colors.
Lauryn Hill, P-Funk, Marvin Gaye, Public Enemy - I have a very diverse palate for music. I can go from Judy Garland to Jimi Hendrix to Stevie Wonder to Rachmaninoff. I just love great music.
People don't ask Jay-Z to take his shirt off when he rhymes,
I take goldenseal, Echinacea and cod liver oil when flying to boost my immune system.
I believe that imagination inspires nations. It's something that I live by.
You are only as beautiful as the many beautiful things you do for others without expectation.
Even if it makes others comfortable, I will LOVE who I am
One of my core values is to help redefine what it means to be a strong and beautiful woman in the music and fashion worlds and to empower the wonderful things that make us unique.
I've cried over string arrangements.
Some songs you get. Some songs you may not. And I think that's the beauty of art: to question and to ask, to understand the deeper meaning after two or three or four listenings.
I'm always thinking about that young girl or young boy who doesn't quite know if their music, their messaging, their imaging, their voice is going to pop, if people are going to understand them. So I represent the other and those who feel like they don't even want to be normal. They embrace the things that make them unique.
I'm a believer that the more I'm giving, the happier I am, and the more beautiful my exterior will be.
Part of what my music represents is to stand up and be the voice of those who feel like they are not heard and want to be treated with respect regardless of race, color, orientation - android, cyborg, whatever.