Top 77 Taboo Quotes

As long as you’re having fun and being positive and progressive, I’m going to say you’re living a Zumbao lifestyle.

We’re a positive type group, not a preachy group, but we want to be able to let the people know that we are conscious about what’s going on in the world.

When it comes to being on stage, I might be on stage one minute and the next minute I might be in the audience, dancing and lifting people’s spirits.

Before we had Fergie, it was me, will.i.am, and apl, and we were showcasing our dance moves in our videos.

We’re not just three guys in a rap act. We want all sorts of people at our gigs.

I’m building my own brand outside of the Peas. It’s not Black Eyed Peas, it’s Zumbao. Zumbao is different from the Peas because it’s all on me and I can’t feed off of anybody other than me.

Zumbao’ is a word that is not commonly used in mainstream America or even mainstream Latino America. For me, I needed a word that describes me as a performer, as an artist and that is just me wilding out and being crazy. I’m Zumbao.

We have a global audience… we travel, and our name travels.

When you’re getting chemotherapy, you feel so alone, even when your family is there, or your friends are there with you. Sometimes it’s just you, feeling like you’re in a fight against something that you can’t control.

I grew up in a predominantly Asian and Mexican community, and because I did breakdance and poplock and all that, I did get a lot of criticism: ‘You’re Mexican, why are you doing that?’

I want to really brand myself as an individual.

Most of my career, people have the misconception about me as being threatening and scary, and having an intense look, but that’s not the real me.

I’m not into fame and ego.

I was the first Pea to have kids – you know how it is – I have three wonderful children, and when we talked about that time, and Fergie would say ‘Tab, what is it like?’ I always told her when the time is right, it’s gonna happen for you, and God bless her, and I can’t wait to see baby Ferg.

Apl, my bandmate, is from the Philippines. He came to America in 1989, and the first person he met was Will.i.am. And then, I met them when we were 17. Our common ground was music.

I’m the performer of the group. My thing is like, every time I come on stage, I always bring it 120 percent, 150 percent.

Black Eyed Peas is me, Will and apl.de.ap. That is who Black Eyed Peas is. We are the sole members.

Apl introduced me to all the Pinays he knew, and so I married one.

We’re a direct mirror of the audience, and that shows how hip-hop has expanded. It’s no longer just an urban thing, and it’s no longer just an American thing, either. It’s a universal thing.

You really need to stop and appreciate what you have, the love you have from your family, your friends, the love that you have for yourself.

My personal music style is very Latin and very soulful. It’s dance meets hip-hop.

At home, I’m daddy and a husband. There’s no Superman’s cape. I’m changing diapers, giving my kids baths, and coloring ‘Angry Birds’ and playing games with them.

I’m happily married; I love to spend time with my wife going to movies, restaurants and travelling.

I know that being in the entertainment business… my first son, I had to sacrifice being away, being on tour a lot and I wasn’t really present.

If I was going to play any video game, it’d be things like ‘Mike Tyson’s Punch-Out!!,’ ‘Street Fighter’ and ‘Mortal Kombat.’

Hip-hop is huge in Canada, in Australia – everywhere.

I was almost giving up because the chemo was so intense and aggressive that there were moments I had to find the inner strength within myself.

When I see children in New Delhi, babies walking around in no diapers and their mother is in a corner putting up bricks, it gives you a sense of being grounded.

Even if we are 50 or 60 years old, if we can do it we will continue to create content that pushes the envelope.

We want to be able to make our own songs and write our own arrangements. We want to incorporate the live sound so we can be free onstage and in the studio recording. That way we can come up with original and creative stuff.

We don’t get concerned with stuff like pressure. We just do what makes us feel good.

We’re best friends that get to travel the world and create a movement. That’s what’s special about Black Eyed Peas.

It was great to have my son see if you chase your dreams sometimes they become reality.

When they told me I had cancer, I thought I was going to die.

Apl is very humble, but he’s humongous in the Philippines.

Just being in the industry that I’m in, you get people building up your ego – ‘Oh, you guys are the best, you guys are gods.’ So I started believing the hype – ‘Yes, I am a god!’

Apl has a lot of songs that are paying homage to his native tongue. He’s from the Philippines. He has songs inspired by his culture.

Our daughter is a miracle baby, and having time with her and my sons means everything to me – they’re why I kept fighting.

Every time we come out, there’s a hunger for creative expression or creative ways to put out content that isn’t duplicated from our last run. Whether it’s technology, messaging, visual… we’re always pushing the envelope.

We grew up with break-dancing and MCing, the old school, that whole era of just having a good time and knowing that the music was good.

We have songs that are inspired by the Latin side. We have songs that are inspired by rock, African rhythms. Whatever country we go to usually inspires us.

I grew up listening to a lot of hiphop music and R’n’B. Bands like A Tribe Called Quest, De La Soul, Big Daddy Kane, Boogie Down Productions, Cypress Hill, New Edition, Bob Marley, Prince, Stevie Wonder, and a lot of Spanish music.

Our show is all about energy and all about the skill, so we never have to alter it for different audiences, although maybe we might get crazier at a punk-rock show. With kids moshing and crowd-surfing, we might have to get crazy as well.

Let’s face it – negativity sells records.

The Peas is the mothership you always go to. But when you able to bring something new to the table, it makes you stand out as an artist. I am not chasing the same things as Fergie or Will.i.am.

I wake up every day with a smile – I’m a blessed man, and every day is special.

They didn’t tell me what type of cancer I had. They didn’t tell me what stage I was in. They just told me, ‘Mr Gomez, you have cancer.’ My life flashed before my eyes. I thought about my kids, I thought about my wife. Nothing prepares you for the shock of someone telling you you have that horrible disease.

A lot of people have a misconception about artists, that they’re invincible, you know, they’re on a different plateau. But I’m just a human being.

Before the music and before the fame, I loved Apl for Allan Pineda, for being a brother that he is and for the inspiration – for him to actually come to the States from the Philippines and make something of his life. That’s inspirational.

It’s all about evolution and for us, we try to think outside the box and not try to duplicate what we’ve done in the past.

In order to maintain your longevity, you have to know the business. It’s not about just rapping and performing.

Cancer – there’s no prejudice. There’s no age limit. It can happen to anybody.

We just decided to make our dancing as important as our MCing and our production. It’s an element in hip-hop that a lot of people are afraid to use.

We don’t want to live in the past; we want to go into the future.

The Black Eyed Peas as a whole is something I always look forward to.

That’s the beauty of Black Eyed Peas, we don’t pigeonhole ourselves into just one category. We’re the chameleons of hip-hop.

I emptied the trash and wiped down tables. But my job that I remember the most was picking up horse manure for the Electrical Parade.

Life is too short to be serious.

From alternative to Brazilian to hip-hop to old R&B, that’s what we listen to. And we don’t just listen to it only if somebody plays it. We actually go out and buy these types of things and support different forms of music because we love them.

When I went to Standing Rock, it opened my mind, as did going to Indian reservations and speaking to kids about music and arts.

I’m half Native American and half Mexican and I support all native peoples around the world.

It’s powerful when you’re able to celebrate your culture, but also bring the arts and music to the masses.

I was in a group called Pablo, while Will.i.am and apl.de.ap were a part of the Atban Klann. They signed to Ruthless Records with Easy-E. When Easy-E passed away in 1995 they changed their name to the Black Eyed Peas and asked me if I wanted to be a part of it. The rest is history.

I didn’t want to be a deadbeat dad, so I said, ‘OK, my mission is to provide for my son in the future,’

It’s more about the music and doing good shows than it is about our ethnicities. We’re not trying to label ourselves as the all-around universal ethnic group. It’s not a gimmick.

Black Eyed Peas music appealed to everybody and that’s why we incorporated EDM influences, dance influences, house influences, and we mashed it up with the Black Eyed Pea melodic pop sensibility that still has bounce to it.

Hey, I was one of those hip-hop kids who used to hate on things that would become popular.

In L.A., we played rock venues because we had a band, which hip-hop venues couldn’t accommodate. And within that, we created a show which we could put on in front of anybody.

We were just going for growth, bigger sound, just a spectrum of people. More global. That’s how we decided to do a song like ‘Where is the Love’ – it allowed us to tap into a broader audience, because the message means a lot to us.