Top 48 El-P Quotes
#1. Why should I be sober when God is so clearly dusted out his mind?
El-P
#2. We're fighting internal struggles, I am the cancer for my own cure.
El-P
#3. I've never had a huge collection of records; I've never been a beat digga.
El-P
#4. I don't have any delusions of grandeur. I just want to make music that doesn't make me bored.
El-P
#5. A good rapper is a good rapper, a good album is a good album. I don't think anyone is inherently good.
El-P
#6. There is a difference these days between who's making the music and buying the music, in terms of the way that they think, grew up, and their perspective. It's become much more diverse.
El-P
#7. For me, growing up in hip-hop culture, it's all about having the next style, the new fashion, the new way to express yourself, the fly new beat. I can't sit still; I have no nostalgia. I don't have to have nostalgia.
El-P
#8. My favorite era of hip-hop was between '85-'89. That was the era that got me to love hip-hop.
El-P
#9. I hope that people take away hope, maybe not in an obvious sense, but in the form of hearing somebody who's genuinely fighting to stay above water. And in that fight, there's hope. In that fight, maybe there's positivity.
El-P
#10. I'm a pretty intense person. And I don't know if intense is fun. I put myself through the wringer. That's just how I work.
El-P
#11. Trying to separate myself from my instincts of pessimism and cut out and define what it is that I really do love, what I'm here to be, why I'm here, and what I think is worth being alive for and fighting for. And those things change, but I think that that's something I am always chasing.
El-P
#12. I think branching out is cool, but I think that you have to branch out in a way that makes some sort of organic sense. I would love to put out a rock record eventually, but it would have to somehow philosophically make sense for me.
El-P
#13. When we're putting out records that people are responding to, it's amazing. And it's obviously what we shoot for every time. It's a tricky balancing act. But as long as it's sort of a righteous idea, then you're good to go.
El-P
#14. There's nothing worse than being shackled by some miniscule sort of technology you have onstage, and I think your mettle is going to get tested in those moments.
El-P
#15. Everyone just wants to feel good, and I don't think that all music is designed to make you feel good.
El-P
#16. I do these records. All of these ideas that I have, that I put out there, that inspire me to write, are a purging in a lot of ways. I have to expel them in order for myself to walk around and actually smile and be a regular, or a living, person.
El-P
#17. There are all the offsprings of people who are influenced by punk. It sounds completely different - but it's still rock 'n' roll. When hip-hop came on the scene, it was the last legitimate creation of a new genre.
El-P
#18. I'm a fan of some of the hyphy stuff. Hyphy has been going on a lot longer than the press has been recognizing it.
El-P
#19. The only thing an artist is useful for, and the only reason why we don't just line 'em up against the wall and shoot them, is because, at their best, they're the reflection of our lives, that most regular people can't even afford to think about.
El-P
#20. I always wanted to do a deal with Russell Simmons, and now I've got my signature on a piece of paper with his.
El-P
#21. I don't think hip-hop is a dying art form. I think it's impossible for hip-hop to be a dying art form.
El-P
#22. That dark humor has always been a part of what I've done. It's always been somewhat tongue-in-cheek.
El-P
#23. I'm trying to consciously evolve myself. I have no delusions of grandeur.
El-P
#24. I think that every record label has its trials and tribulations, its ups and downs. The only thing you can do is hope to recognize what it is that makes you great, and to try and continue to capture it.
El-P
#25. I've always believed that if you cannot do it, then you should not do it.Only when it comes to the point where you've literally dug yourself into a hole, where it's sink or swim, is that viable to me.
El-P
#26. I would feel pretty embarrassed if I was doing what I do and I wasn't at least attempting the eloquent translation of the human experience in some way.
El-P
#27. I've been approached by major labels every single year of my existence as an artist. Since 1996.
El-P
#28. Most people aren't happy about being consistent and staying at the same place for years. People want forward progress and motion.
El-P
#29. I think that everyone who does music, and everyone who does art, or everyone who decides at a young age that they're gonna do that, is someone who feels like an outsider. The world is not really set up for that.
El-P
#30. Change is a direct element of hip-hop. That's the whole thing with style.
El-P
#31. Oh my god what am I doing with my life?
El-P
#32. Hip-hop is always moving. It's always looking for the next style; it's always trying to one-up the last person.
El-P
#33. The emergence of the independent hip-hop scene has replaced what we called the "underground scene". It's what the underground scene has evolved into: actual businesses.
El-P
#34. At the core of everything I do, is not my ambition but my desire to make music. Somewhere along the line I stumbled onto something that was bigger, different than anything I had ever imagined, which was actually being involved with other people. I just don't live the average artist's life.
El-P
#35. I'm not trying to change the face of hip-hop music. I'm trying to make my records and always take the next step for me.
El-P
#36. My father was a musician, and I've always loved writing. I grew up in New York City during a time when hip hop music was surrounding you with the hip hop culture, and it felt natural. I was a really huge fan of the music.
El-P
#37. I'm not really one of these people who's been known for particularly hopeful sentiments.
El-P
#38. My whole mode is to do what I want to do and let people understand me through that.
El-P
#39. As you get bigger, your staff gets bigger, and your costs get bigger.
El-P
#40. There's a responsibility as a musician to do the music that you want to hear.
El-P
#41. I believe that if you're an artist, it's like a gift. If you can do this for a living and you can be involved in it, it's something that you can't ignore. It's the chance for you to have a
El-P
#42. There are two types of people, two types of performers: Performers who know how to keep a show going literally when the power is gone and performers who haven't had that much experience and will panic and freak out and don't know what to do.
El-P
#43. The fact of the matter is, if you're not putting out stuff that people are feeling, then your record label doesn't mean a goddamn thing.
El-P
#44. My problem is not to reinforce or destroy any ideas anyone might have about me, how I do what I do, what my intentions are, the way that I do it. My only job as far as I can see is to do the music that I want to do. All those other things are completely out of my control.
El-P
#45. Maybe my great struggle, and it's probably not anything different from too many other people, but it certainly is what drives the music, is a hugely internal one.
El-P
#46. I couldn't really be a part of high school, because I have a terrible time doing things that I don't want to do. I'm not good at it. It's not even like, I'm a rebel. I'm just bad at it, you know?
El-P
#47. I try to take a snapshot of who I am now, who I am becoming, as opposed to who I was when I was first starting to make records. I'm not trying to make boring adult music, but I try to make music more reflective of what matters to me now.
El-P
#48. I can't sit in the same place. I gotta keep going.
El-P
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