G-Eazy

Music is one of the toughest industries, so I respect everybody who has travelled any distance, come far in this music business and achieved anything because it is so hard, and there are so many people out there these days.

I just hear a beat and start mumbling words. I just hear sounds and rhythms, and it just kind of comes intuitively. Formatting a song, figuring out a flow, how I respond to the beat.

If we're deciding about merch pieces, t-shirts or hats, they have to be well designed and cool enough for somebody to want to buy it and then wear it and walk around advertising me and my music.

When I sample something, it's just me drawing from what I'm actually into. It's whatever sounds like a good track.

Runaround Sue' was a big record for me, as well as the music video for it.

I try to find 15 minutes a day to just be alone without any distractions just for headspace to meditate and get my Zen on. I think that helps me get through the hecticness of the day on tour with the interviews, the sound check, the meet and greets, the show and the post-show meet and greets.

If you look at any creative person's work, you can see bits and pieces of their influences. That's what an artist does.

Anything back in New Orleans is definitely nostalgic. I really played my first shows of my life and learned to perform here. I learned how to work a stage and how to connect with a crowd. It all started here.

Something I stand for is being brave enough to invest in creative ideas that I firmly believe in and bringing those to life.

I think it's natural for a creative to be sensitive. If I'm in the studio and I write something, I think it's the greatest thing in the world; it's like my baby. I just made something out of thin air that exists now in a tangible form. It's the biggest thrill in my life.

That's the nature of this business. Something that took ten years to make can crumble in an instant. It could be snatched away from you at any moment.

When I was 12 or 13, the hyphy movement was beginning to bubble. And you had local acts such as the Federation or E-40, Mac Dre, and Too Short that the local radio station would play all the time. You'd hear E-40 as much as you'd hear Jay Z.