1237: Rakim

1987

I came in the door / I said it before / I’ll never let the mic magnetize me no more / But it’s bitin’ me / Fightin’ me / Invitin’ me to rhyme / I can’t hold it back / I’m looking for the line / Takin’ off my coat / Clearin’ my throat / The rhyme will be kickin’ it / ’Til I hit my last note.

1988

I was a fiend, before I became a teen. I melted microphone instead of cones of ice cream. Music orientated, so when hip-hop was originated, I know how I got to where I am. I get a craving like I fiend for nicotine, but I don’t need a cigarette, know what I mean? I’m ragin’, rippin’ up the stage and blowin’ ’em away.”

1992

I look for shelter when a plane is over me / Remember Pearl Harbor? New York could be over, G… I had a lot of friends fighting in the Gulf War at the time, and I would be in the crib watching TV, chilling, but in the back of my mind I was wondering what my brothers were going through and if they’d even survive. The idea was to write a song from their perspective.

1997

‘This time I wanted to feed the world,’ he told Mojo in 1997. ‘I wanted the beats to hit ’em right away, and I wanted the lyrical content to hit ’em right away. I wanted to make ’em understand. Immediately.’

2009

I think what I was trying to do was incorporate my musical influence. I came up in a household [with] a lot of different music: my mom playing jazz to R&B, soul; my brothers and sisters with Earth, Wind & Fire to Michael Jackson. So I was trying to incorporate different rhythms in my rhymes. And it kind of worked out good, you know? At the time, I didn’t know it was going to be this different. You know what I mean? But I was shooting for something different. Like, some of my influence was John Coltrane — I played the sax, as well. So listening to him play and the different rhythms that he had: I was trying to write my rhymes as if I was a saxophone player.

2013

I came up listening to a lot of jazz, and just listening to the different rhythms that the jazz artists was using then, it was a little more complicated than hip-hop, you know what I mean? So me knowing that, once I started rhyming, and I had a couple of favorite jazz artists, like John Coltrane, Charlie Parker, and you know, Miles Davis, Dizzie Gillespie… But just listening to the rhythms that they was doing at that time. Once I got into hip-hop I tried to incorporate some of their rhythms in my flow. And, one of the main things I should try to do was imitate John Coltrane’s solos into my rhyme style, just trying to incorporate different rhythms that I heard coming up and trying incorporate what I knew into rap kind of made it what it was, and I guess, a little different than what everybody else was doing.”

2016

I’m feeling really blessed right now… I’ve got a great balance and a strong focus. We are out on the road a lot, but we’ve been able to switch up shows… Sometimes doing festivals, sometimes working in clubs and theatres, sometimes DJ, sometimes live band… The changes keep engaging, for me and hopefully of the fans. When I get home… a lot’s going on. I’m back in the lab… I think what I’m working on right now will surprise some people and maybe open up some conversations about the Hip Hop culture.”

2020

All I wanted to do was write rhymes. I didn’t care about meetings.

Photo by Leo Wieling on Unsplash