Michael Dyson Quotes

By denying its musical and artistic merit, hip hop's critics get to have it both ways: they can deny the legitimate artistic standing of rap while seizing on its pervasive influence as an art form to prove what a terrible effect it has on youth.

I think rap definitely has its place in the art world. I think it is an art form. But, just like any art form, you can misuse it.

I love the song 'Picasso Baby,' and I think the performance art piece was brilliant. I love that fact that Jay Z is continuing to raise the bar on hip hop.

I like the way hip-hop is now. It's grown up enough so that it can get involved with politics if it feels like it.

I originally wanted to embrace the imagery and forthrightness of rap music. There are some interesting, dynamic voices in rap. But I find most of it irresponsible in its overt violence and commercialization of anger. As artists, we believe we can will action through language. If that's the case, we have to take responsibility for what we say.

Let's face it: pop music in its myriad permutations will always be sexually presumptuous, racially controversial and, frequently, politically charged.

I guess hip-hop has been closer to the pulse of the streets than any music we've had in a long time. It's sociology as well as music, which is in keeping with the tradition of black music in America.

I look at WorldstarHipHop in the morning, Bossip, Global Grind, and everything in between, but it's all so quick, I don't even think about it. And I've never been a fan of lyrical or socially conscious rap music.

I think that hip-hop has done what it was supposed to have done, which is it defied all the laws of what is statistically a music genre and what statistically is not a music genre. Because it wasn't supposed to be here.

I think hip-hop is no more misogynistic than America is as a society. I just think hip-hop is a lot more brash, a lot more bold, a lot more loquacious. There are a lot more words that go into a hip-hop song than go into a regular song.

With rap, it's a funny thing. You can say things, and people can take 'em the way they wanna take 'em.

If rock-and-roll is well done, there's nothing so terribly wrong with that kind of music. But the lyrics are another story.

I think hip-hop does a very good job of infusing comedy and humor and wit into music, a lot more than other genres.

Rap is the only interesting music left - it's the only genre that's still pushing itself, and experimenting in a way that I find exciting.

My whole thing is to inspire, to better people, to better myself forever in this thing that we call rap, this thing that we call hip hop.

Hip Hop emerged fearlessly and unappoligeticly reflecting our society.

I hate English kids rapping - complete crap.

Watch The Throne' is my favorite project. The production, the way they carried themselves, it's amazing.

Hip-hop basically controls the world through fashion, through music, through language, through culture. It's basically running the world, no matter what anyone wants to think, and that's just the way it is.

I don't like political rappers.

In the future, hip-hop is going to be called American folklore.

I have been skeptical, sometimes, about the importance of rap music, which I think is a capitalistic project to make money.

People told me that Miley's '23' wasn't hip-hop. Let me tell you, she went in and owned that track.

A lot of rap music can get repetitive.

Rap music was and is, for me, everything.