A Quote by Kelis

Am I R&B because I'm black? Am I pop because I have a song called 'Milkshake'? Or can I just be who the hell I am? Good Lord, people make it seem like we're doing heart transplants here, but we're just making music!
When I am doing music, I sometimes become over compulsive to 'always make some new music'. I think I am like this because I sense what others are perceiving me as. If I work extraordinarily hard because of these expectations, I will, but I just cannot produce the good music that I want.
Perhaps...I am the face of one of your fears. Because I am a woman, because I am Black, because I am a lesbian, because I am myself--a Black woman warrior poet doing my work--come to ask you, are you doing yours?
I am not thinking that because people say I am great that I really am great. I am just doing a job, just like everybody else. The only difference is that a lot more people see what I do.
I am saying what comes out, because I'm really not a methodical writer. I'm not a good building writer, where you are like "well, I going to make a song today, and I think it will be a pop song." Some people are great at it and it's beautiful. If I am feeling musical and I pick up the guitar, usually something will eventually come out and I'll see where it goes.
I would definitely say I'm a country girl at heart; I wanted to make sure that I established my music first at Country just because that is the artist that I am. But it wanted to spill over into pop too, which I don't have a problem with at all and I think is awesome because it spreads it to a broader audience of people.
That's the thing: pop music has sometimes had a bad reputation for being about a lot of other stuff than the music. And I am just a lover of pop music. I love pop. I love big choruses. Dramatic choruses - they're the best thing in the world. And I do this because I love making music and performing the songs.
I am black; I am in total fusion with the world, in sympathetic affinity with the earth, losing my id in the heart of the cosmos -- and the white man, however intelligent he may be, is incapable of understanding Louis Armstrong or songs from the Congo. I am black, not because of a curse, but because my skin has been able to capture all the cosmic effluvia. I am truly a drop of sun under the earth.
People tell me I am brave. People tell me I am strong. People tell me good job. Well here is the truth of it. I am really not that brave, I am not really that strong, and I am not doing anything spectacular. I am just doing what God called me to do as a follower of Him. Feed His sheep, do unto the least of His people.
I am 100-films old. In my heyday, I have done a lot of commercial films, including dancing around the trees with the heroine. But after working with Rituparno Ghosh, my understanding of cinema changed. Whatever good I am doing, it is because of him. If I am being called a good actor, it is only because of him.
I think everybody don't know what color I am. It's like, "He's not black enough. He's not white enough. He's got a Latin last name but he doesn't have - he doesn't speak Spanish. Who are we selling this to? Are you making urban music? Are you making pop music? What kind of music are you making?"
There are so many amazing out, gay, black artists who are really great in their own fields, but they aren't necessarily trying to make pop music. I guess my thing is different because I am trying to be part of that world. But doing it my way.
As a black person I am no stranger to prejudice. But the truth is that in the political world I have been far more often discriminated against because I am a woman than because I am black.
I am not an optimist, because I am not sure that everything ends well. Nor am I a pessimist, because I am not sure that everything ends badly. I just carry hope in my heart.
Not that I feel like I have a lack of confidence, it's just good to stand up in front of people who don't really know what to expect. Am I going to say something? Am I going to sing? And often when I do say anything it gets a laugh, because everyone's already used to laughing. So I can seem like I'm actually a funny person.
I am not really thinking, I am just, working with the music. And people have asked me, why don't you say more, or why do you not have singers, or why don't you sing? I think it's because, if I would have words for what I am doing, I I could write. But I really don't. It's a whole different thing. And I think it's one of the beauty of instrumental music is that it can be background. It can be what people call "easy listening." But it's really one of those things where it's as much as you are willing to give it.
I am so secure in who I am. I really am! And I'm not conceited. I just think, 'Wow, okay, that's the life you want to live.' It wasn't about who he chose. I mean, I had moments, 'Am I not sexy enough? Am I not pretty enough? Am I not smart enough?' But in so many of those questions, I immediately stopped and said, 'No, don't start doing that.' Because you can get stuck in that cycle and you can carry on to other things.
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