Quotes about "Youth & Coming of Age"

You know, there's a lot of activism that doesn't deal with empowerment, and you have to empower yourself in order to be relevant to any type of struggle. ”

Growing up, I was trying to make it in music. I was grinding, which is just what I loved doing. I didn't have nothing else to do. In my spare time, I'd record myself. Find a beat, pulling em up. Just making something and creating for me. ”

You gotta stay on your P's and Q's. When you popping so hard, got these blessings coming down, you got the devil tryin' to get at you. ”

Naw, it - it never stops, man... You gotta be doing what you're supposed to be doing - whenever, however it's coming down, you know. If you're getting your butt kicked - you still gotta do what you gotta be doing. ”

All the music that I play today, I actually heard either at home or in my neighborhood when I was growing up in the '40s and '50s. ”

I enjoy music wherever it's coming from. ”

If the Rolling Stones are playing a concert across town, that's not my audience anyways. But I do find that there's a lot of people coming back around to see me again. ”

I have a rebellious teenage thing. If my mom says I can't do it, I'm gonna do it. But I'm pretty good. That's why it was fun to play Sam in 'The Bling Ring.' I got to be someone crazy and wild to the extreme, then go home and relax and get rid of the burden. ”

I had a country upbringing in a predominantly Maori community, and that contrasted with a very multi-cultured arts community in the Aro Valley in Wellington: growing up around a lot of theatre and poets and writers and stuff. ”

I'm not very proud of coming from a place that everyone thinks is this pure green country whereas, in reality, all our lakes and waterways are poison. ”