Conscious Music Quotes

I'm like, 'Why aren't artists owning their masters? Why are labels robbing artists dry, and they have to spend all this time on tour to even break even?' Like, what happened? Why are they promoting things that aren't either socially conscious or elevating the human consciousness?

I've always been known for making socially conscious music in the midst of the love songs and the bedroom songs.

We used to have MTV and all these ways we can show our videos, and it was these rap shows, and it was everything. And then it became not cool to be conscious; it became cool to just hang out. Escapism rap became the norm. And, when I say "escapism rap", I mean getting high, get your cars, get your money, get your jewelry, go to the club, have your women, and it just became all about escaping your reality and not making your reality better on a real tip; not just on the have fun tip.

Being called 'conscious' is a great thing to be, but it's the connotations and preconceived notions that come with the buying audience about what conscious music can be.

The kind of music I'm trying to make is conscious, to make people think and feel and get inspired.

Kendrick Lamar is a great, great thinker. He's a tremendous artist.

One thing that is constantly on my iPod is India Arie - I like her a lot; I listen to her a lot. I think she is just a spectacular artist.

I like Peter Tosh, Bob Marley of course. All of Capleton, Sizzla, Frisco Kid, Buju Banton.

I have songs - even from my first album, I've always been on some socially conscience/love whatever music, you know?

My songs is hard stuff which politicians don't want on them radio station because they still want people to live in ignorancy.

A Tribe Called Quest music was so inclusive, so conscious, it brought such a community together.

It doesn't get any more underground, conscious or indie than Macklemore, Ryan Lewis, but because they got a couple of really big pop hits, actually some of the biggest pop hits that hip-hop has ever seen, people are missing that part of their story. People are not counting that blessing.

Someone like a Bob Marley - he was singing Scripture.

Singers like Beyonce and Kendrick Lamar are very conscious of what's going on around them, and they're waking up lot of young people with that knowledge. They bring their enlightenment to the world; the world that is buying their records.

If you're a conscious rap artist and you're worried about Billboard charts, you're gonna have a problem.

We were a country band with a social conscience.

Like the song "Stereo", to me that's like, kind of hip-hop in that slacker way. There's some slackerisms mixed in with that stuff, but it wasn't really conscious, I guess. When things would get more typical rock'n'roll that was my fallback to go to those kind of lyrics instead of the alternatives.