As Lupe Fiasco prepares for his new album, Testuo & Youth, the rapper chatted with DJ Skee about his new album, the backlash from his first single, "Kick & Push," and why he's an important role in hip hop embracing the skateboard culture.
"There was some very insecure skaters" he said. "Tony Hawk not being one of them, fortunately, who just felt like I was trying to encroach on their territory when I really did the song as a tribute for a skate shop,"
He also explained that the song was never meant to be a single, but loved its ripple effect for people like Lil Wayne to have an interest in the culture.
"It was never 'posed to be a single, never meant to be a single," he said.
"It was for a skate shop called Uprise for a skate DVD and then it just took a life of its own...But when you're the first through the wall, you always get a little bloody. Then it paves the way for the Lil Wayne's and the other people to kind of come in and capitalize on the culture even 10 times more than I did. From there all the way up until now, I always try and make things that I'm personally attached to, that have a personal vibration with me that I feel are real and honest and wherever that takes me. So whether that's skateboarding or having a grandmother that passed away from cancer and homies that are fighting it right now to make a song like 'Mission,' it's all in the same boat."
He also chatted about almost signing to Roc-A-Fella Records, and why he's cut down the amount of records on his new album.
Check out the interview above.
Source: DJSkee
