K'naan Quotes

My question about my art and my music has always been, 'Am I good, or am I good because?' I'm not the artist who wants to have the 'because' attached.

It was not my dream to be an artist. How could it have been? I thought, artist, much like a leader, was something you either were or weren't. Never something you set out to be.

I enjoy mediation. I think the artist's position is often to mend the things we feel are broken. Whether that's between two cultures or two thoughts. We're always trying to reach, trying to expand something.

It's not really that I'm interested in filmmaking. I'm interested in the instrument of it, you know.

To reach your goal authentically is probably, in the end, going to mean much more to you than having reached it in a false way.

Art isn't held with the same high regard as it is after success. In any country, in any language, you're a loser if you're making music until you prove otherwise.

I am one of those people that's never been really cynical about life, you know.

I have moments of darkness, of anger, and moments of rage. They do creep up at the most inopportune times. Not to recognize that in my music would give people a sense of sainthood that I don't necessarily have or even want to have.

The poetry I grew up on is really an intense form of poetry; it's so pure and powerful.

You want to reach people, but you also want to reach them in the most authentic way. You now have a mass market and an audience that's listening, but they're in love with a song that means absolutely nothing to you.

I think it's a mistake to work on success in career. I've worked on my passions obsessively. How can I say what I want to say more precisely than the last time I said it? Success is such an elusive concept. When you work for it, I think you get it in a way you might regret it.

Quotes of the Hour

We've gone further on this album, where we have a Big Band song, kind of a Sinatra-type song; we have a couple songs that have electronic music on them. We've got a couple rock songs, maybe a little heavier than what we've done. So the title 'Jekyll & Hyde' really covers the breadth of the record.

I sing and play the guitar, and I'm a walking, talking bacterial infection.

I've been married twice. Most women would rather not be married to a traveling blues singer.

Stalin is the most popular figure in all of Russia.

He who wonders discovers that this in itself is wonder.

K'naan Quotes

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