Vic Mensa Quotes

You don't need a record company to turn you into anything.

I ain't on no major. Everything independent. Either way it goes, I am doing me, and I am doing Freddie Gibbs.

I made this record without a record label.

Leaving the record companies tweaked something inside me and I realised I don't have to deal with labels to make something happen. If I want to meet someone, I don't have to go through the label - I'll just go to them. I took my life in my hands and social media has just helped me do that more.

I'm pushing ahead on my own - you no longer need a large record company to make you a star.

I'm one of the few that comes from this vantage point: I never tried to get a record deal.

It's been awesome going indie. I don't need to be on a major label. I love not having to walk into a specific radio person's office to try to convince someone to play my songs. At the end of the day, it's more work, but I've discovered that I like to get my hands dirty.

I don't have a record deal, I'm not looking for one, I don't have a manager, I'm not promoting anything.

If I could have stayed independent from the jump, then, maybe, things would have been different. 'Return of 4Eva' would have been an album instead of a mixtape.

Finally I'd found this way where I didn't need a record label; I didn't need to wait for some phone call to tell me, 'Go and do it'. It's like, I'm going to get up with a bag of CDs and an amp and my guitar and make it happen for myself. That was such a liberating feeling, and I think it was the start of everything.

You can now be a master of your own destiny. I'm not sure why you would sign up with a record label.

'Love Tattoo' I recorded without a record company. I'd gotten turned down by the record companies - they said they didn't get me, which is fine, I suppose.

Every single thing that I was told that I couldn't do without a label - get in the charts, get on to the Radio 1 playlist - I've done.

You no longer have to have a big record label behind you and have to kowtow to the politics that enabled you to get there. You can be a phenomenal artist and put your stuff out there on YouTube and find yourself becoming a star.

I'm an independent. I've signed with no label.

I don't have to worry about what the average record company person thinks because I am the record company person.

I want to be role model for people to be like, 'I don't need a major label to be a successful artist and to have a successful song.'

I always thought that if record companies didn't understand me, fine - I'd go and do it by myself.

When I got into the music industry, I wasn't focused on being the most famous artist or even getting a major record deal. It was just to make music on my own terms or create my own image, do my own hair, do my own makeup.

I never solicited a major label and I certainly wouldn't now.

I took the process of doing as much myself as I could like a duck to water. I set up my own label and publishing, etc, and it was a fun learning curve two decades ago.

A lot of things encouraged me to start my label. I think it's very important for an artist to know how many records they've sold and where they've sold. I know that I have never been treated the way I'm supposed to be treated - like an artist. That's why I do things for myself. I feel like I'm a free man.

Commercial success still hasn't come to an artist that isn't signed to a record label. There are very few artists that can succeed without the help of a record label. The role of the record label is still required, it's still necessary.

I don't get a big recording budget or much promotion, but I have creative freedom.

I don't have a manager who's secretly on Interscope. I'm the complete opposite of an industry plant.