Kid Cudi Addresses Cocaine Usage

Complex’s October/November 2010 

Complex: Forgive me, but we gotta start with some controversy. In "Mojo So Dope," you say that you "live through words, not metaphors, so I pass to be the rest of the freshmen." What did you mean by that line?

Kid Cudi: I didn't want anybody to take it the wrong way, because it wasn't a dis. But most of the rappers that everyone loves are rappers that use metaphors. That's not my style of rap. I like to rhyme in a more poetic way. Sometimes you don't have to use these...witty ways of trying. It just sounds like somebody is overselling shit.

You're big on not having your music compared to anyone else's.

Kid Cudi: Did you see that Wale interview that he just did, comparing us to sports? Let me clear this up: I'm incomparable to anybody. I don't care how people take that. No one can compete with me. I'm unfuckwittable; no one can knock me off my shit. I'm an unstoppable force, I'm a bullet. My trajectory is to the sky. Niggas got to do something really spectacular to fuck with me and my realm, and niggas be so bitter that you hear it in their voice.

Speaking of Wale, when you hit that fan at your show last December, he came out with a line about it ["Throwin' 'round wallets like the dude that Kid Cudi hit," from "Thank You Freestyle"].

Kid Cudi: It wasn't a shot, it's just a simple-ass rhyme by a simple-ass rapper. You can't let that shit faze you. That's one of those raps that just shows the world that you wack. Why would you even use that as a metaphor? Everybody think they Hov. Niggas ain't got the magic like they think they do; there's only a couple of wizards in this game. I'm a wizard and I know it.

Are your peers not seeing that?

Kid Cudi: The last album, I let people dis me, throw out those jabs in their verses and have their little slick remarks. This time around, I'm not fucking around. I have no time to think about other niggas. These other motherfuckers like feeding off another nigga's energy, so they mention their name. You hear me talk about niggas? I don't even talk about Kanye, and that's my homeboy! They talk about Kanye like they're bosom buddies with this nigga. Talking about "I be in Hawaii"—man, shut the fuck up, why you got to tell everybody everything? Then people like Wale get mad that 'Ye ain't give him no beats—'Ye ain't give you no beats because we ain't fucking with your raps. It's not a conspiracy theory. We don't fuck with you musically, so we're not going to provide music for you. The shit is a service, it's a quality of a certain standard. Niggas are just so thirsty it's ridiculous. I've been eating humble pie forever, and people still call me an asshole. These people don't know my fucking life—now I'm going to give them something to talk about.

Is that the album's tone? Is it just about you going in?

Kid Cudi: It's explicit, but smart explicit. I'm not holding back. I have no regard for what people consider right or wrong. Some things I follow—like the law, from here on out. But other than that, I'm doing whatever the fuck I want to do. I'm not holding back. That's why I've been so excited about this move to L.A., because I just want to keep growing creatively, all over, as a human being.

And part of that is anti-metaphor.

Kid Cudi: I want my shit to be like you're reading a novel, not a Dr. Seuss book. I felt like the last album was too short. This one is a little bit longer, it's 18 tracks and counting. It's just ten times better on all levels. The story's deeper, darker, with no holding back. It's beautiful, man. It's an emotional album.