I think people that came out originally, like 2Pac, Biggie, Snoop Dogg,, and even T.I. and Ludacris, they were original with their vibe, but at the same time, they were classics.
On 'Old School,' I was not an actor, I was Snoop Dogg, so I came to the set with a whole different vibe, and a different crew of people. And on 'Starsky and Hutch,' I was more of an actor. I wasn't Snoop Dogg, the rapper.
I learned how to take other people's mechanisms of promoting their stuff through me as opposed to promoting my own stuff, as far as getting Snoop DeVilles, SnoopDeGrills, Snoop Doggy Dogg biscuits, Snoop Dogg record label, Snoop Dogg bubble gum, Snoop Youth Football League.
Randomly enough, all of my favorite rappers growing up were East Coast rappers. I don't know. I just related to them a little more at first - because if you're born in L.A., and you lived there your whole life, Snoop Dogg literally sounds like cars driving by. You feel me? You hear Snoop Dogg so much.
Then I met people at school who were into Erykah Badu and Snoop Dogg. I like heaps of different music, but that was a real pivotal time in terms of finding my way.
A lot of people think that it was about Biggie on the East Coast and 2Pac on the West Coast. It wasn't like that. Big ran New York. 2Pac ran America.
I wish I were closer friends with Snoop Dogg.
I'm part of the generation that grew up with great rappers like 2Pac and Biggie and people like Amy Winehouse. We've seen a lot of different artists come and go. Even people who are still here, they seem consumed and blinded by fame. It may not have taken them out physically, but they have been taken out.
If you think about 2Pac, Biggie, and Nas, all of those guys were teenagers or in their early 20s when they got started. Everybody acts like young people have to be silly and lack perspective. Those guys had incredible perspective, and everything that they said was before 25 years old.
We had a bond creatively that came out of 'Lady Marmalade.' It was our link. And people don't know this, but P!nk and I actually met when we were both 16 years old in Philadelphia. I was recording my first album, and we were working with the same producers, so I originally knew her as Alecia.
For those from my era, my age, that 2Pac vs. Biggie war will go on forever about who is the greatest. But I was more of a Biggie dude.
Snoop Dogg is hilarious. T.I. is really funny. Who else? 50 Cent is hilarious. Jay-Z is funny. I've met him, but he's funny in interviews. He was funny when I saw him, too. Ludacris is funny. Everybody is. Rappers are funny, a lot of them.
Snoop Dogg and T-Pain, to me, are like legends so it's like, any time you get to work with a legend like that, it's cool.
In the early '90s, my cousin gave me a Snoop Dogg cassette tape, and the rawness of the lyrics were something new to me.
I had to tell the city that 2Pac passed, and I had to be on the radio early after Biggie passed. Those were awful, emotional.
I've worked with everyone from Ice Cube to Snoop Dogg ... right across to working with pop stars like Justin Timberlake. Why those artists came to me is because they wanted my sound.
As with all the other rappers I've worked with, Biggie and I shared common ground. Even though Biggie grew up in Brooklyn and I grew up in Chicago, we came from the same 'hood.