A biography for Madlibhasn’t been written yet.
“As long as I'm living decent, then I'm cool.”
“I guess I only work with versatile rappers, chameleons like Guilty Simpson, J Dilla, and Doom.”
“My pops had me at the studio since I was born. That's why I got into music. He would let me go up on the controls and mess with stuff.”
“Prince Paul's one of my teachers. He's always been one of my main inspirations as far as interludes go and getting a little quirky at times.”
“If I'm really hyped to do something, I can do most of an album in a day.”
“People only know me for what they've heard, but that only represents about 10 percent of what I've done.”
“I'll take two months off just to listen to records and not do any music so I can absorb all that and then when I go do my music. It's all in me. I'll listen to a different genre every two days or something, study it, 24 hours straight.”
“I get bored with music so I try to listen to things in different types of genre to see what's possible.”
“There were a certain amount of people that were down with me, and we would just sit in the room and make music.”
“I don't like drama in my life, but I like reading about it.”
“Interviews are my least favorite thing to do.”
“If I sample a song, I usually make samples out of the whole album. Then I move on after that. Doesn't mean I'm going to release that whole album, but I do that.”
“As a kid, I was trying to copy what I heard. Namely, I was just listening to producers I looked up to, like 45 King and Marley Marl, and trying to do what they were doing.”
“I'm a positive dude.”
“I do a few shows every year, but I'm mostly at home, making music. Day and night.”
“I've always done music with so-called thug- or gangster-type lyricists. I've always been associated with that because I'm from the West Coast.”
“I think a lot of guys are influenced by 'Pinata.' I fathered a lot of styles off that album.”
“I don't worry about collaborating. Whatever happens, happens.”
“Dilla was a John Coltrane-type dude. He was always on a higher level. He inspired my music to become looser and more soulful.”
“I've got about three or four rooms of records, and two rooms of instruments.”