Top 125 Quotes & Sayings by Gza

Explore popular quotes and sayings by an American celebrity Gza.

Last updated on December 22, 2024.

Gary Earl Grice, better known by his stage names GZA and The Genius, is an American rapper and songwriter. A founding member of the hip hop group Wu-Tang Clan, GZA is the group's "spiritual head", being both the first member in the group to receive a record deal and being the oldest member. He has appeared on his fellow Wu-Tang members' solo projects, and has maintained a successful solo career starting with Liquid Swords (1995).

American - Celebrity | Born: August 22, 1966

Source: Wikipedia

Oh, hip hop is always changing.

Gza

Rap - it's a childhood passion. Writing rhymes, it's something that I was doing before rap records even existed. And I will continue to write until I can't write anymore.

Gza

I like science and mathematics. When I say mathematics, I don't mean algebra or math in that sense, but the mathematics of things.

Gza

Hip-hop started with street poets with great lyrical skills, and that's what hip-hop has always been about for me.

Gza

In chess, you have to bring all the pieces into the game. It is about development. In writing, you have to develop the story.

Gza

Learn all you can learn. Never stop learning.

Gza

Since early childhood, I've been trying to learn all I can. Science is everything; it's not just physics. It's the way of understanding your environment, the world around you.

Gza

I think I'm okay; I got a pretty good shot when I concentrate. I like pool.

Gza

Our love of kung fu goes back to the Bruce Lee days in the 1970s. Outside the action, we loved the interesting, heartfelt stories and the dialogue. It was RZA's idea to draw all that in there as samples.

Gza

Before hip-hop existed, we were listening to soul songs from the '70s. I grew up with Motown, Elton John, and the Beatles. To me, that's good music.

Gza

If you take a song like 'We Will, We Will Rock You,' 'You got blood on your face... ' - he's rhyming on that! And if you take the lyrics out of that song, you get a hip-hop beat. It's a rock song, though. So it's not out of my element for me to get with Black Lips.

Gza

Emceeing has always been about making the most intellectual, most creative, wittiest rhyme as possible regardless of any subject. It was always about bringing the best out of yourself.

Gza

I've studied rap in every borough.

Gza

Snowboarding is skateboarding without the wheels, just on snow. It's the same thing, just that one is on hard ground with the wheels, the other is on snow. You just have to know how to maneuver your board and do things you want to do.

Gza

Writing is sort of like chess for me. You have to think carefully before you move, thinking, planning.

Gza

When I was growing up, to be an emcee meant to write the most clever, intellectual, and wittiest rap. And that's what we did.

Gza

I used to make demo tapes with cats that rocked with Russell Simmons and people like that. The history goes so far back; I've always been really focused on writing dope rhymes.

Gza

Even if we didn't make records, we would have done it on the side for fun. Like, some painters sell their work; others just keep it - they love to do it whether they get paid or not.

Gza

My favorite subjects was science and math. But as I got older, I was hanging out cutting class, going to hooky parties.

Gza

Chess is a game of stimulation.

Gza

One of the basic principles when you dealing with mathematics and Islam: Seek knowledge.

Gza

I'm a late-night person who likes to eat a lot of breakfast stuff at night.

Gza

I never really thought I had an extensive vocabulary like that, and I'm not an avid reader. I didn't read a lot growing up - at all.

Gza

Hip-hop is my vehicle for scientific enlightenment. It wasn't until my music career matured where I was exposed to science as an intellectual pursuit.

Gza

We've done a lot of shows and a few albums without Dirty. He was a wild and crazy dude.

Gza

I'm not a sports person, but every now and then, I incorporate sports in my rhymes because I'm always grabbing from certain things and getting inspired by something whether I'm totally involved in it or not.

Gza

We were always scientifical in our raps.

Gza

I don't knock material rappers, but let me hear it in a different way. How many songs do I have to hear about rims on a car? It's ridiculous. There's no substance. It's a hollow shell.

Gza

As far as being a vegetarian, it's a moral thing, a health thing, a conscious thing - a combination of all. I think it's better to be that way.

Gza

I don't eat meat - chicken, fish, none of that. I eat a lot of vegetable sandwiches, like lettuce, tomatoes, sprouts, cucumbers, whatever I can put on bread with mayo and eat, y'know.

Gza

Why is the sky blue? Why is the grass green? Why is metal a conductor of electricity, and wood is not, but you're more likely to be struck by lightning when standing under a tree? These are questions that require science to answer.

Gza

I'm just really, really laid-back-slash-lazy. Last minute with everything.

Gza

I don't like to just be simple. Even though some of my stuff can seem simple at times, I like to write in a way that, when you listen to it over and over again, you hear something new, and it requires you to think.

Gza

Rap has always had a braggadocios flavour to it. That goes all the way back to 'Rapper's Delight.'

Gza

Normally when I do an album, I have a concept behind it.

Gza

I probably take about a month to write a song, depending on how much time I can dedicate to it, and it depends on how many hours a day there are and how many days in a week and weeks in a month.

Gza

I just listen to a lot of stuff. Sometimes I play music; a lot of times, it will be stuff from back in the day. Sometimes I scan through the radio. Not the average stations that play the everyday thing.

Gza

I think artists sometimes go back to something when we never should, for many different reasons. You hear a lot of stories that make you feel good about the work and the project; sometimes you try to relive that, like, 'I want to make a part two.'

Gza

A lot of artists think that to be current, you have to follow what's out there and do something that's so unlike what you normally do. It can work, but it doesn't if you chase it.

Gza

Wu-Tang has opened many doors for hip hop.

Gza

I like snowboarding, and I like to watch it.

Gza

I like broccoli. I like rice. I like carrots. I like vegetable juices. Y'know? I mean, I'm with all that.

Gza

I usually do about five drafts per rhyme for each song.

Gza

I'm always touching plants and vibing with them.

Gza

I would go to an aunt's house, and she would let me play music, and she had 'The Last Poets' album. At that time, albums didn't have explicit stickers on them, so some of the songs had profanity on them, and I was moved by that. I would listen to those songs, to the flow, and I'd balance it back and forth with the nursery stuff I had.

Gza

Moog has been incorporated in a lot of our music. I know RZA has several of those machines. So, it did play a major role in a lot of music we were doing.

Gza

Music is forever changing.

Gza

When we did 'Back In The Game' on the Wu-Tang 'Iron Flag' album, I did a verse about gambling. I didn't want to be 'back in the game' or 'back on the block' - that's typical. I made it all metaphorical.

Gza

There's no set way to do anything. Sometimes you have to go outside the box; sometimes you can do things the standard way. Like, you don't have to have a beat to write a song: sometimes you can write lyrics without the music.

Gza

Most people associate Wu Tang with Staten Island or Shaolin, but actually, I'm a native of Brooklyn. I was born in Crown Heights, raised in Bedford Stuyvesant, Brownsville, and Bushwick.

Gza

Like MCs, each chess player has his own style: how he likes to open, when he likes to attack. Just like we face off with each other lyrically, we challenge each other's minds on the chessboard. Sharpen each other's swords.

Gza

Education is the tool. Even if we haven't directly instructed a session, I think Wu-Tang has been an instructor of education to anyone who has been a fan, anyone who has supported our movement, whether its been from buying a Wu-Tang CD or coming to see a show.

Gza

If you hear people talking about the Golden Era of rap, they're usually talking about the early Wu Tang Clan era and then Nas and Biggie and so on. But for me, it goes back to the '80s - 1986 to 1989.

Gza

Rappers should sit down and construct quality lines.

Gza

I played on a 10'x10' chessboard at a hotel in Miami. The pieces were heavy, and I got tired just making a move. Not cool with that.

Gza

Live a life full of humility, gratitude, intellectual curiosity, and never stop learning.

Gza

When the Black Lips sent a track over to me, I thought it sounded like a Beastie Boys track, the way the singer was singing and flowing on it. He was right in the pocket.