Top 50 Fantastic Negrito Quotes

I want to make other people around me smarter and more powerful.

I just take things one day at a time. I’m just thankful that I have my legs, my arms, my eyes.

I want to be an artist, not be in the business of making hit records. Once I figured that out, everything became clear.

Nothing unifies people more than music, more than that universal riff. The one thing that unifies us and the hope that we can have, especially being an artist, is that we can create music that can build bridges and smash down very bad ideas.

Just keep being yourself. Keep being yourself, and people recognize it.

I think that was always my strength. I was never a great player, but I could write.

I had this dream that you get this record deal, and you’re a star, and everybody loves you – but I was a youngster, and it didn’t work out that way.

I like going out and looking at people, and they inspire me so much.

I think I was made for live music. It’s just great.

‘Push back’ is the word; that’s what we gotta do against ignorance. I see so much of it, and it’s dangerous.

I throw up before every show. I’m thinking about just making it part of the act.

I came up with the album name ‘Please Don’t Be Dead’ because I felt like we’d lost our way as a society – and I know what happens when you chase the wrong things. It’s the story of my life.

Prince was a hero. He was the brother, the black man that was a little different. As a kid, you thought, ‘Wow, he’s different. If he can do it, I can do it.’ I read that he was self-taught, so I started teaching myself to play the piano.

When I was born, my mother said all the nurses wanted to come see the colored baby.

Art and culture are the greatest weapons against hate agendas, entrenched ideologies, and power structures that harbor and promote the business of divisiveness.

Live performance is everything. First of all, I have terrible stage fright. But beyond that, once the music starts, it’s OK.

I take the purest and hardest forms of music… and come in completely fresh from a production standpoint. It’s like hip-hop production, because there’s a lot of taking the best parts and a lot of the repetitiveness.

I hope I contribute something useful to the human family. That’s my intention. And I hope that it’s useful to people.

Usually when tragedy is present, a great art movement is right behind it.

I knew I was an exhibitionist. I came from a huge family. I found an emotional connection being on stage.

NPR changed my life; I don’t even front.

That’s always the time to quit – when you have nothing to say as an artist and creative person.

Your dream can die. You will probably give up. But from there, you can start everything over.

I heard Skip James, and it pierced me. It felt like punk rock to me, real and raw. It was just one guitar, so simple yet so much expression. I wanted to feel and express like that, to take the shortest path to get to an emotion.

I try to be as positive a person as possible.

What did winning a Grammy do for me? It made me want to get rid of my Grammy, pack it away, and never see it again. It made me not want to speak to anyone who wanted to speak about my Grammy.

‘In the Pines’ is a very old song dating back to slavery. Lead Belly made it popular.

I had a dream, as young people have quite idealistic dreams and goals, of, ‘I’m going to go to Los Angeles, and I’m going to become a star!’ I did get this huge record deal, and I recorded this music under Xavier. That didn’t really work out.

My most revered hero is Robert Johnson. His lyrics are so consistent with rap: the danger, the boldness, the creativity.

The streets spoke to me in a way that religion didn’t.

I think once I had lived life, once I had failed enough in this lifetime and got back up a thousand times from failing, I really connected to the blues.

Exercise is good for you, so I’m always walking. I don’t drink sodas or eat fast food, either.

I think things happen, and we have no control over them, and what you take from them is really what is important.

There’s certain artists that are meant to have certain paths and go the way of the corporate world. And then there are artists who are artists.

I wanted to do life, do something interesting. I ran out of things I wanted to say in my music, so I just put it down, sold all my gear, and put on some overalls and reconnected with the soil.

When I look into the audience, and I just know we understand each other, I can see their faces, and they know what I’m talking about. I feel like I’ve helped. Everything I’ve been through in my life, it helps people. Then that makes it worth it.

Everybody agreed I had all this talent, but I didn’t know what to make of it.

We gotta bring new ideas to the table and empower each other.

I’m not interested in re-creating the same blues I love so much. I’m interested in pushing boundaries.

That makes me very happy as a human being to know what I’m doing is an inspiration to people.

Doing a concert, I look at a room full of different people, and I see you’ve got Muslims, you’ve got Jews, you’ve got Christians, you’ve got gays, you’ve got straights, you’ve got blacks, you’ve got whites. I think, ‘How can I unite these people through song?’

Fantastic Negrito is a persona, an incarnation in my third phase.

Music is something that’s so powerful and means so much to me.

My dad was born in 1905, and the men from that period were real men. He prepared me for the world.

It’s amazing: when you are challenged with less, sometimes you can produce more.

‘The Duffler’ is a very familiar story, a story about someone having something and not appreciating it until it’s gone, when it’s too late.

My life, my failures. I hope that gives people the lesson to rebuild their own lives.

I always call myself a recovering narcissist. I lived my life thinking everything was about me.

I love the power of music and artistry and feel a responsibility having a platform to preach good things.

I can’t just sit back and write about the club when our democracy is under attack. I have to be a more positive force.