Mos Def is a name that I built and cultivated over the years. It's a name that the streets taught me, a figure of speech that was given to me by the culture and by my environment.

Mos Def is a name that I built and cultivated over the years it's a name that the streets taught me a figure of speech that was given to me by the culture and by my environment and I feel I've done quite a bit with that name and it's time to expand and move on.

I'm retiring the Mos Def name after 2011. I'm actually doing it.

Focused. I'm a hustler. And my hustle is trying to figure out the best ways to do what I like without having to do much else.

I feel like being into the beat of your own drum has become too prominent in the culture.

To me, playing an instrument and singing, all of these different things are just as natural to me as rhyming.