Growing up in any big city, you get exposed to so many beautiful cultures. I've grown up with a lot of open eyes around me that's influenced my eyes to open.

Jazz is more raw than punk in a lot of ways. It's so expressive. A lot of people say to me, especially older people, 'It took me ages to get into jazz.'

I've mainly been sampling jazz because the tone of the chords are expressive in itself, so it's quite nice to write over. It's got interpretations of a lot of different genres, too, a lot of dubby-ness and experimental stuff.

I was always wrapped around music being a tradition, a skill.

I like taking different elements - clothes, shoes, lighting - and creating a total transformation. But it's never about hiding: it's about drawing something out from deep inside of me that's really true. I'm always trying really hard to tell you the truth. That's what this is all about for me.

Can dancing change your life? Yes. It's changed mine. What I've learned is, it's not about how good you are technically. It's about your soul coming through. It's about having fun.

You can't fight the fact that Detroit is a de-industrializing market and it isn't facing dramatic, positive transformation.

There have been times I've planted stuff in songs where four years later I'll be singing it from a subconscious, kind of chameleon little lizard mind... and at a certain moment, all of a sudden, I'll hear a line from a different vantage point and it'll change its meaning. It's something I wrote but it changed because I did.