Nas X: "My intention was always to be as entertaining as possible, I'm not like trying to comfort anyone, or their children."

Nas X: “But the one thing I’ll always know is that people don’t know what they want until they get it. They didn’t know they wanted a song about taking a horse to the old town road in 2019. But they did.”

[On Pete Buttigieg]

Nas X: "All I know is he’s from the Democratic party and he’s gay. So it’s like… I don’t want to base my support off, ‘Oh, you’re gay, I’m going to support you.’ Yeah, you’re gay. But I don’t know everything you’re planning when you’re running the entire country."

Nas X: “I tried to make sure everything sound different, so you hear no two songs and think they sound alike.”

Nas X: "I had it just Lil Nas at first because every rapper has a 'lil' in front of his name, and that's funny to me. But then I got stuck with it because I already built a fan base at that point."

Nas X: “I feel like once you're on the internet all the time, you realize everything is so connected and nothing's like really out of reach, you know, and yeah I guess that helped me push myself to hop right on in.”

Nas X: "I believe whenever you're trying something new, it's always going to get some kind of bad reception."

Nas X: “I’m always going to be experimenting musically, trying new things.”

Nas X: “The year is 2050, Stuart Little is President, the 10 year world war led by Shrek & Thanos has ended. Old Town Road has reached its 1,615th week at number one and brother nature has stopped global warming. The world is at peace.”

Nas X: “In 2017, I enjoyed my time on the Internet more than doing things in real life.”

Nas X: “I want to have fun, I want to cause chaos sometimes. I want a long, legendary, fun life.”

[On what he plans on doing next]

Nas X: "I have no idea, but it's going to be incredible. I'm excited for new music. I don't know what the heck I'm gonna do yet. But it's gonna be a fun career and a fun life."

Nas X: "I run a meme type of account on Twitter; I know what my audience is looking for."

Nas X: “I [saw] a lot of microaggressions towards homosexuality, little things like going into an IHOP and hearing one of your family members say, ‘Look at those f*ggots’ to two people eating or even just a small [statement like] ‘Boys don’t cry.’ Little sh*t like living in the hood, not being super into sports, and then having to go outside and pretend that I was.”

Nas X: “I have my name, and I have a growing fan base, so I’m gonna do whatever I want.”

[On politics]

Nas X: “I don’t want to say I support this one person because they’re doing this one thing. Because I don’t know what else they’re doing, or what they’re going to do.”

Nas X: "TikTok helped me change my life. TikTok brought my song to several different audiences at once."

Nas X: "I want to build to that mogul, legendary level."

Nas X: “Growing up, I always liked so many different sounds from so many different genres – the different aspects they could bring.”

Nas X: "I was just trying to fit into a certain spectrum. Just like, basic rap."

Nas X: "I was doing good in school, but I didn't want to do school anymore."

[On what the splash at the end of his album means to him]

Nas X: "Let's say, you're like on a sinking ship you know... Everything is going down or like you're dying basically, and you're having all these thoughts about what everybody is going to feel. You know, like you can't even settle in your own death, like [your] mind is like 'what's everybody going to think?' 'am I going to be remembered?' 'am I going to be loved?' and then at the end it's like you know death you know it's the end of the album. It's kind of, like, symbolizing like the end of life you know, and once you see the album cover, it's kind of like a continuous cycle. Basically because I feel like, you know, once we're gone here we're doing something next somewhere else."

Nas X: “Now I have even more of a purpose: to continue to find myself and, by doing so, help others find themselves.”

Nas X: "I feel like I’m opening the doors for more people. That they feel more comfortable being out. Especially in the hip-hop community."

Nas X: "I try to never throw stones, but if somebody throws one at me, I'm throwing an entire house."

Nas X: "When I first got famous, I would block everybody, but now it's like, okay, cool. For me, I would rather somebody hate the sh*t out of me when they're talking about me rather than not say anything at all, because that's giving more power to my name."

Nas X: "I want to be a voice for those who pretend to be themselves, but aren't quite there yet."

Nas X: “I feel like I’m opening the doors for more people. That they feel more comfortable being out. Especially in the hip-hop community.”

Nas X: "Take my horse to the old town road and ride till I can't no more' basically means just running away, and everything is just gone. The horse is metaphorical for not having anything or just the little things that you do have, and it's with you."

Nas X: "When I first started to do music, I was kind of doing what I thought people would want me to do."

Nas X: “I’m like Twitter-famous, but in real life. Instead of your mentions, it’s real people coming up to you. People shake your hand instead of liking your tweets.”

Nas X: “I was pretty familiar with TikTok: I always thought its videos would be ironically hilarious. When I became a trending topic on there, it was a crazy moment for me. A lot of people will try to downplay it, but I saw it as something bigger.”

Nas X: “I told college I was gonna take a semester off, but I knew I was never going back. I felt like the walls were closing in on me.”

Nas X: “I was always making memes, and now I have music.”

Nas X: “I wanted to stay independent because I figured there was no way I was going to be able to have control to create the type of music I want. I was basically ignoring a lot of labels.”

Nas X: “I guess through quarantine and life in general, watching every other star that was coming in and every star that has already been, I feel to level-up to the next place in life, you have to release something else.”

Nas X: “Just saw my new apartment. the bathtub is huge! can’t wait to cry in it.”

Nas X: “For me, I felt like [my insecurity with my sexuality] was my fear of people judging me for how I would act post-coming out. I used to ‘like’ comments where people were like, ‘Oh, I like him, because he’s not all in your face about it.’ And then I realized kind of what that was. It’s kind of like when people say, ‘Oh, I have a Black friend,’ and that kind of sits on everything that have to do with their Black history and culture, whatnot. I’m kind of like, I'm not that person, you know?”

Nas X: "Consistency is the root of all success, or anything. Anything that you truly believe in, consistency is what you need."

[On not being close with his parents]

Nas X: "I think it was one of those things that can hurt and help you at the same time, because I had to find independence within myself."

Nas X: "I've become closer with people who I met online than people who I've met in real life. I learned the ways of the internet. I've learned how to go viral, and what to stay out of."

Nas X: "At the end of the day, you are the main person that has to depend on you before anybody else. You have to love and nourish yourself."

Nas X: “My actual writing process? I have to just love the beat before I even write on it. I can’t force myself to write to a beat that I’m not immediately loving.”

Nas X: “In Paris and everybody here has 2 legs just like in America.”

Nas X: "Well, you know the saying, you know, 'Gay people go to Hell,' or anybody in the LGBT community? So it's like, 'Okay, I'm goin' to Hell.' I went to Hell! And now people are like, 'Oh my God, I can't believe he did that!' But wasn't I going there anyway? Why are you upset about that?"

Nas X: “Wow the language they speak in the uk sounds almost exactly like English.”

Nas X: “Just because you like one song from an artist, that doesn’t make you a fan.”

[In a letter to his younger self]

Nas X: "I know we promised to never come out publicly, I know we promised to die with the secret, but this will open doors for many other queer people to simply exist."

Nas X: “Giving your lyft driver 5 stars even when they f*ck up because we all make mistakes.”

Nas X: “Mentally, it’s really draining and straining sometimes. The pressure of living your entire life knowing the identity of what a rapper is supposed to be, what rappers [are supposed to] do going out there in front of all these people, it’s terrifying.”

[Regarding the recent success female rappers are experiencing]

Nas X: “You know, I feel like a decade from now, it's going to be the same like with gay rappers."

Nas X: "In my music, I’m never going to force anything to try to recreate a moment."

Nas X: “I just felt this energy, this presence of like; ‘oh my god, everything is right where it needs to be, this is a pivotal moment of my life, things are about to change, things are about to change so crazy and I just feel it and I have to keep going.'”

[On his worries about being used]

Nas X: "I've just got to a point where it's like well, even if they are [using me], then that's a lesson learned. I can't just stop meeting people because of this fear."

[On feeling like he doesn't fit in with other rappers]

Nas X: “Going to this place with all these overly masculine rappers and you’re finna be in there throwing a little ass every now and then, touching on dudes and hugging them and kissing them… at some points, I was like, ‘Should I even do this? I don’t feel like they’re going to love me like that.”

Nas X: "I was only getting like 1,000 plays a song [on Soundcloud], but I knew for a fact something huge was coming, and it happened. It didn't even take a year of making music, and then boom."

[On his hit single, Montero, reaching number 1]

Nas X: "But it also feels good to prove people wrong. It's one of my driving forces."

[On releasing the hit single Montero]

Nas X: "At first I was really afraid of alienating any of my straight fans, but then it was kind of like, if they feel offended, they were never really here for me. They were here for whatever version of myself they made up in their head."