My music is the essence of Detroit. At one time, we were the center of the world, man - Motor City.

The first time I heard 'White Man in Hammersmith Palais,' I loved the vulnerability in the music and the lyrics.

Man, y'know, I'm a music guy. I like a lot of different things. It depends on the time of the day and the situation.

Being an only child, you just have a lot of time on your hands, figuring things out. Just doing music, man - music just came to me.

Music is given to us with the sole purpose of establishing an order in things, including, and particularly, the coordination between man and time.

I'm going to keep on finding out the kind of man I am through my music. That's the one place I can be free. But the reason it's difficult is because I'm changing all the time.

I'll stay in the studio for 12 hours at a time, just producing music and making records. It doesn't feel like 'Oh man I've got a job to do.' It's more like 'Oh man I didn't even realize I've been there this long.'

By the time I was 14, I had seen only three Tamil films - 'Anjali,' 'Bombay,' and 'Puthiya Mugam.' And I loved the music in the films. When I found out Rahman sir was the man behind the music, I made up my mind that I wanted to sing for him.

I see all that celebrity stuff now as whatever, man. What's more important is that everyday people are liking my music, it's got to that stage. I've worked really hard for a long time for it to come to this point, where I'm putting smiles on people's faces, and I'm loving it.

I had a long, long time to make 'Rubberband,' and I originally thought that that record would last two years. Once I got over realizing that that's not gonna happen, and sort of got my perspective back, I realized, 'Man I'm really fortunate. I get to write music, make music for a living.'

I never quite lived up to the image of the black man as I saw it growing up. I was never listening to the right music at the right time or wearing the right clothes at the right time. I was still listening to Michael Jackson, and everyone had sort of moved on to gangster rap. Alanis Morissette when everyone else was listening to En Vogue.

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