Big Daddy Kane Quotes

‘Once you appreciate an art form, you’re open to everything.’ – Big Daddy Kane

‘I want to be remembered as a combination of Malcolm X and Marvin Gaye, a strong black leader and a sexy entertainer.’ – Big Daddy Kane

‘You never hear a country-western station saying ‘We have old school artist Willie Nelson in the house.’ They say ‘We have the legendary Willie Nelson.” – Big Daddy Kane

‘I believe that music is infinite.’ – Big Daddy Kane

‘Now if you call ‘Ain’t No Half-Steppin’ ‘ or ‘Raw’ an old-school song, I agree with you. But if you call Big Daddy Kane an old-school artist, I disagree with you.’ – Big Daddy Kane

‘Being acknowledged as one of the best is enough for me.’ – Big Daddy Kane

‘I don’t get too political in my music, because some people tend to get bored with the message: I say what’s necessary and leave it at that. The books of Malcolm X go deeper than any song. But entertainers can be educators. Music touches the soul. Knowledge touches the mind. When you combine the two, you capture the whole.’ – Big Daddy Kane

‘A kid will be like, ‘Yo, you’re Big Daddy Kane. My father listens to you!’ It kind of makes you feel like one of the Platters or Temptations or something. You feel like you’re super-old. But then again on the flipside it’s cool to see like someone that’s two or three generations after you excited.’ – Big Daddy Kane

‘Shame is something that’s man-made.’ – Big Daddy Kane

‘Actually, I was supposed to battle Rakim back in ’89.’ – Big Daddy Kane

‘Yeah, if you go too far, like there’s some rappers that use words that just be a little too out there, it makes it where someone doesn’t really know what you’re talking about and don’t really have the time to sit and try to understand.’ – Big Daddy Kane

‘When hip-hop was new and raw, it was all about being an MC. You wanted to be respected as a lyricist. But as the years passed and hip-hop became big business, hip-hop became like country, rock and pop. And so you now have people who write the songs for rappers.’ – Big Daddy Kane

‘I have a lot of love for Long Island.’ – Big Daddy Kane

‘If you’re White then yes, you have White privilege. It’s there for the taking if you choose to use it, you know, just keeping it 100.’ – Big Daddy Kane

‘Ol’ Dirty used to come out to Queens and spend the night at my crib a whole lot.’ – Big Daddy Kane

‘I think that a lot of battle rappers have a difficult time making songs because they don’t know how to do a song format. They’re so stuck in that whole battle rap mentality that really all they want to do is just kick rhymes.’ – Big Daddy Kane

‘You know for some strange reason I like to write the verse first. I mean I know the majority of people do the chorus first and when I think about it, I guess it does make more sense to do the chorus first, but I just like to write the verses first, I don’t know why.’ – Big Daddy Kane

‘The flow that I use, I really developed my rap style in the mid ’80s based on Grandmaster Caz from the Cold Crush Brothers, from listening to him. That’s like really who I pretty much patterned my style from and I just really took it to another level once I had the opportunity to get out amongst the world myself.’ – Big Daddy Kane

‘Me personally, I think that when I take my time with something, it comes out a lot better, because I can really, really get my point across, and if I see that like, this might be a little too deep, I figure out a way to dumb it down so that everybody can understand where I’m going.’ – Big Daddy Kane

‘I think that a lot of times you have artists that try to deliver a positive message.’ – Big Daddy Kane

‘Me and Rakim were always clear that we were rivals.’ – Big Daddy Kane

‘Rakim is a great lyricist. To me, it was always beautiful to be compared to him.’ – Big Daddy Kane

‘It’s like do White privilege exist? Absolutely. In the case of passing judgment, you have to make sure that you’re passing judgement on the right person.’ – Big Daddy Kane

‘Premo is one of those producers that I’ve always had a lot of respect for. I’ve always thought that he’s just extremely talented. More importantly, he’s one of those dudes that just sticks to his formula, like if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.’ – Big Daddy Kane

‘Think that I started taking emceeing very serious probably from the very beginning. Because I started as a battle rapper. It was something that I was doing hoping that I could hang with my older cousin.’ – Big Daddy Kane

‘I was going to different neighborhoods around Brooklyn battling cats back in – this started in ’82, so that’s like eighth grade. Maybe 13, 14.’ – Big Daddy Kane

‘I think that when it comes to emceeing that there’s so many different approaches. You have your party rappers, which pretty much is where it all originated from. With DJ Hollywood, Lovebug Starski, Eddie Cheeba, and all those guys in the ’70s. Basic party rap.’ – Big Daddy Kane