Annie Ilonzeh Quotes

In the '50s, listening to Elvis and others on the radio in Bombay - it didn't feel alien. Noises made by a truck driver from Tupelo, Mississippi, seemed relevant to a middle-class kid growing up on the other side of the world. That has always fascinated me.

I have a personal relationship with Dizzee Rascal - I know him, he's cool - so this is no disrespect to him or any other British rappers who tried to make it in America, like Wiley and Tinie Tempah, but the type of music they were making to be accepted over there - it doesn't translate.

Ultimately I am happy that everybody is embracing hip hop and the sounds from the streets.

Europe were kind of the first ones to embrace my music; the kids from around the way would come out to my shows and really enjoy it.

If you come from Africa with your economic poverty and your cultural riches, and you meet someone like Peter Gabriel or a person from a big record company, and they tell you that what you are doing is marvelous, that makes you feel powerful.

A lot of people say I tried to emulate Tupac, but when I look back at my career, we're very different artists. I took pages out of Pac's book, of course, and lots of other rappers - Biggie, Nas - of course you take pages out of those books, but you eventually make it your own thing. And I think I did a good job of that.

Hip-hop in Africa has been very often a duplication of an American experience, but in a context that's totally alien to it.

I don't know that there's a division between American and British, European, South American, Asian sensibilities when it comes to rock n' roll or, really, any form of music. Songs travel, and people take them into their lives in all different kinds of unpredictable and really untraceable ways.

This worldwide spread of recognition is insane. I was brought up in a small country. If you made a Swedish film that just got into a film festival somewhere, that was like the biggest thing you could wish for.

I love 2Pac, the cadences of 2Pac.

South America was amazing, very powerful. We didn't imagine they like K-pop there and they loved it!

As a lover of both hip-hop and jazz, I feel like much of the latter community still doesn't truly embrace hip-hop as a musical extension.

For someone like MC Ren, who is still alive and I can go talk to, that's more of a niche challenge because I do have to match his energy, and I do have to pay homage to who he is as a person, but that just comes with research. And the difference there is I can do the research there right on the spot. I can just go ask him.

I'm not a pioneer of hip-hop; I just saw it and said, 'This thing is incredible, and these people are incredible. They should be exposed all over the world.'

We didn't have any problem with 2Pac. We liked his music.

When I was still back in Cameroon, because I didn't know English, I used to listen to French rap all the time and then a little bit of American hip-hop. And then, when I got to the States, that's when I really got into all those guys - Lil Wayne, Rick Ross, all those guys.

Once upon a time Americans didn't want to listen to Canadian rap and now Drake's the biggest rapper in the world.

One of my best friends is quite into rap, and I'm always being introduced to music by him.

America is very far away from Korea, so we were very impressed that people knew K-pop, let alone liked it!

Music has no language barriers and this has been proved right several times by the Chennai audience.

When I perform in another country. The local people there sing along to my song in Korean.

African music, though very old, is always being rediscovered in the West.

It's the true meaning of music being a universal language, constantly fighting and going through different boundaries in order for new people to hear the music and be like, "Oh, sh*t! I mess with this Pitbull kid."

There are guys like Chance the Rapper; I'm a big fan of his.

I call America our emerging market. They find it very amusing when I said that.