Talib Kweli
Talib Kweli
Talib Kweli Greeneis an American hip hop recording artist, entrepreneur, and social activist. He is the son of professional educators. In 2011, Kweli founded Javotti Media, which is self-defined as "a platform for independent thinkers and doers". Kweli earned recognition early on through his work with fellow Brooklyn artist, Yasiin Bey, formerly known as Mos Def, when they formed the group Black Star. Kweli's career continued with solo success including collaborations with famed producers Kanye West, Just Blaze, and Pharrell...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionMusician
Date of Birth3 October 1975
CountryUnited States of America
Hip hop is at its essence a folk music, because it speaks the language that people are still speaking at ground zero, it speaks the language that people speak on the streets.
But Rawkus is integral to what I do, because the cats who started Rawkus are the first ones who really saw my vision, and gave me a platform to get it out there, so I'm definitely totally grateful for that.
With Prisoner of Conscience, the focus was - I've worked with Madlib, High Tech, Kanye West, J Dilla. I feel like I've worked with some of the greatest of all time. That's been overlooked. That's been overshadowed by the weight of the lyrics.
But there's so many things in life like women, like children, like God and family that transcends the world of hip-hop.
I'd like to work with Outkast, I'd like to work with RZA, I'd like to work with Timbaland, York, a whole bunch of people.
I look at the deejay thing as a tier thing. If I'm not going to compete on that level, I'm just going to do it as a hobby.
They ask me what I'm writing for - I'm writing to show you what we're fighting for.
I feel like I have way more resources, way more experience. I'm better. But my fans romanticize the earlier stuff, and I don't think it's just like a nostalgia thing of "He's not as good" - I think it's because that earlier stuff was aggressively marketed as a lifestyle to them.
Unfortunately hip-hop is so competitive that in order for fringe groups to get in, you gotta be better than whoever's the best. So before Eminem, the idea that there would be a white rapper that anybody would really check for was fantastic or amazing or impossible.
By the time you get into other kinds of music - R&B, country, or whatever - it becomes something that's romantic. It becomes something unattainable. Never-ending undying love. And in hip hop, we're still taking direct inspiration.
I gotta be dope first. I gotta be appealing to your senses, and to what you like first. Then the message happens. Then you relate to the message.
My fans like to be romantic. I feel like I'm creating at least at the same level or even a higher level of creativity than I was at twenty-one. I've gotten better as an artist.
"Art Imitates life," of course, is that phrase by Oscar Wilde. I called that song "Art Imitates Life" because Oh No was in the studio and he actually came up with that hook. When I was trying to figure out a name for the record, it just kind of made sense.
As an artist, I have to be a leader of my fans, not like follow them. Because if I chose to follow them, you know, they could do it.