"I don't want you to feel defeated, like, 'Oh boy, why do you do this to me?' We have too many of those songs."
"I've always had this commitment to not being in one thing."
"To me, the best writing points to something literal or common but is also nuanced: The moment when somebody is telling you they love you while simultaneously disappointing you. Everybody's experienced that."
"I don't write lyrics. I hear the track and sing in gibberish over it, then I try and fit words into the phrasing and melody that I already have set. Everything is left to chance."
"I've grown up feeling very American but being constantly bothered by people - there's internalized racism and feeling weird about being second-generation."
"Fog and one blue light is all I need in life at the club. Just a dark room and loud music. I'm into that."
"Popular music was this abstraction - an abstraction that I was relating to immensely but was ultimately far away."
"I am not carefree. I'm just not. I experience an immense amount of joy, a crazy amount of joy through sadness and so much struggle. There's something problematic about 'carefree black girl.'"
"I'm just trying to soundtrack your real life. I'm just trying to give you a place to feel safe in all the parts of your experience."
"Anyone who understands anti-racist work, a white person specifically, understands that it is not black people's responsibility, or any person of color's responsibility, to dismantle the structures that keep white people in positions of power. We do our job to thrive, to survive. To protect ourselves, to sit together and feel better and to heal."
"I'm just tryna be honest about all the things that I dig in my music. It's not just this over here, it's also that over there."
"It's been hard for me to nail visual language and personal style because I like so many different things."
"'Seat at the Table' has expressed real adversity, struggle, and also triumph and joy."
"As it pertains to my black womanhood, there's just a lot of ground to cover. There's a lot of stuff to say."
"It's such a challenging time, and in my small way, I will make it so that other younger women, and maybe older women, will be able to do the things they want to do, and accept themselves and their experience."
"I like to try out different methods to get to good songs."
"When I called 'Cut 4 Me' a mixtape, I was thinking about a few elements: One is used instrumentals. The project is more centered around introducing you to an artist; it's not meant to be seminal. It's 'Hi,' 'Hello,' a thing that you first hear."
"I would say Tracy Chapman was the first time I obsessed over an entire record. I knew every song; I knew the exact amount of seconds between each song. That's the level of obsession that I had."
"I really do like Solange, sincerely. I'm down for her, and I trust her judgment."
"When I was little, my parents would have these gatherings, and it was a common thing for me and my cousins to have to put on, like, shows."
"I spent a lot of time in college. I was just being academic and discovering myself through reason and analysis."
"When I was growing up... I'm not going to say I listened to everything, but when it comes to vocals, I was really adamant about imitating all kinds of voices."
"I would love to do an album of standards!"
"There's definitely a push and a pull to 'legitimize' electronic music live by playing the same way that a band would play."
"I am your homegirl, at the end of the day, but I also feel very... outside. So if you're finding solace in feeling outside with me, then we're good to go."
