Art Quote by Toby Keith

I pay attention to lyrics and I know what rap fans care about. I try to write for the average listener and I'm conscious…

— J. Cole

I don't have any sympathy for the subject matter, [but] I have great respect for rap artists. In fact, not for the rap artists,…

— Stewart Copeland

Rap is from the streets and I'm from the streets. That's why a lot of people accept me.

— Vanilla Ice

Pop songs are not as graceful as they used to be. Performers today haven’t gone through the regimen of learning how to write. And…

— Hal David

Let's be honest. We don't take rap serious the way other cultures take rock-n-roll, they take country. They artists are being loved.

— Master P

I just feel like, with rappers, there's so much complacency. It's like, 'Oh, I'm a rapper. I'm successful. I make money. That's all that…

— J. Cole

I see N.Y. hip-hop like I see N.Y. streets. N.Y. streets are grimy; it's a grind. N.Y. rappers are hustlers - whatever sound is…

— Nas

When hip-hop was new and raw, it was all about being an MC. You wanted to be respected as a lyricist. But as the…

— Big Daddy Kane

If you think about rap and how it has become so much easier to record music and release it, and you think about everyone…

— G-Eazy

The roots of rap are originally ghetto-ised or extremely working class. So when you're an artist who's making something which isn't how its mainstream…

— Zadie Smith

This is where hip-hop has become so doomed lately, in this confusion that rappers are street guys. You are not street guys. Get out…

— Ethan Brown

I don't feel that rap has been respected as an art form. Because people have seen rappers rap off the top of their heads,…

— Ice T