A Quote by Rakim

Being a new artist, I was trying to make a good album and hope that people like Kool Moe Dee and Melle Mel and some of the firstborns appreciated it. I was being influenced by them brothers there. That's where I got my start and my first listen.

Rakim

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Album Appreciated Artist Being Brothers First Good Got Hope Influenced Like Listen Make New New Artist People Some Start Them Trying

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Rakim
American - Musician
Born: January 28, 1968

I was heavily influenced by Melle Mel, Kool Moe Dee, Grandmaster Caz, but I kind of wanted to take it somewhere else.

Rakim

The first rhymes I wrote, I was 9. It was Kool Moe Dee-style.

Black Thought

I think that Kool Moe Dee birthed Rakim, Rakim birthed Nas.

Big Daddy Kane

Of course, if you're gonna make a rap song, you're gonna want to sound like Melle Mel.

Ad-Rock

I think on the first album, my aim was to write a good song and have a good melody, and I wanted lyrics that would connect with as many people as possible. On the second album, I took a lot more of a personal approach. I wasn't trying to make conventional, structured songs; I was really trying to get a lot of emotion and my own personal journey throughout it. I just focused more on being honest than getting the normal song structure down.

Emeli Sande

I get nostalgic for things that didn't really exist. I might have a cassette from the first time a Melle Mel track, say, got played on radio in Manchester. And it might be a copy of a copy of a copy of a tape and there's all these weird nuances and distortions that have affected what I know as the truth, if you like, of that track.

Rob Brown

I got to talk to people like Mel [Lewis] and Milt Hilton and Benny Carter and Clark Terry and... Jay McShann. I just found myself in some circumstances, on some gigs or sometimes in clubs, with the ability to talk to some of these people. Just being around their energy and being around that history was invaluable. And what I normally say to young people that are getting into the music, if you can and go... now there's less of those folks around, sadly.

Jon Gordon

Risks are a measure of people. People who won't take them are trying to preserve what they have. People who do take them often end up having more. Some risks have a future, and some people call them wrong. But being right may be like walking backwards proving where you've been. Being wrong isn't in the future, or in the past. Being wrong isn't anywhere but being here. Best place to be, eh?

Paul Arden

A lot of people do talk about the demise of the album, but I still believe that if an artist tries hard to make a great album, people will buy it and listen to it as an album, rather than just a collection of random songs.

Moby

I understand why some bands don't like test new songs, but for us it's been very helpful and it hasn't really backfired. I was nervous that our second record was - you know, you could hear the whole thing on YouTube before the album came out because we played it all live, but it ended up being something that people appreciated.

Taylor Goldsmith

You're never going to release the next album and have it be different from your other two, three, four, five albums. People give them a hard time, but it's like, 'I'm an artist, I'm trying to grow. I don't want to have the same album for 10 albums in a row!' Same thing for a martial artist.

Benson Henderson

All my life, even as an actor, I felt like I was really trying to be dutiful, which sometimes got in my way of being creative and being an artist.

Fala Chen

I'm definitely seeing more and more new people at shows, which is exciting. It's nice for me, because it's a fresh start. I don't feel as obligated to play old favorite songs - it feels like I'm free to try new things because I'm meeting people for the first time. But there's a lot of people who are showing up and they know all the words to the first album and they're requesting songs from the second album.

Willy Mason

I don't like to watch a movie where it's just kind of like all one note, dee-dee-dee-dee. I want spikes of adrenaline and highs and lows and exciting tension release.

Catherine Hardwicke

I think most bands probably peak on their first album. We peaked on our third album. On the first album, I feel like I wish the production was a little better. I'll always hear a song I don't like. I look for what I could have done to make it better. It's always difficult for me to listen.

Johnny Ramone

I have to go into the studio to make my second album knowing I'm making an album. When I first started making songs I didn't have an album in mind, that's why a lot of them I like - I'm talking about how I haven't got a deal, how I'm living, you can never really top the first time, but we'll see how it goes.

Kano

A Quote by Rakim

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