How many people can say they had Anna Wintour on a record? Not even an album, just a mixtape? It's audacious, disrespectful, and I feel like it's a little bit raw, and that's what Dirty Money is.
— Dawn Richard
The problem with Danity Kane is everybody wanted to play everybody's role, and when you're in a group like that, that can't survive.
When you see what you really are, good or bad, there is a fearlessness to understanding your purpose.
I connect so much with Peter Gabriel's sound because, to me, he always had that South African vibe. His drums were always something to move to: it was almost like Calypso. I'm a big fan.
There's definitely that tribal Africana thing going on in my sound. It's that marching band, second-line music, that Creole-influence in the kick, and the snare that drives everything for me. I think it's really what's separated my sound from a lot of the R&B and pop music out there.
It doesn't bother me when I'm labeled, but it's so... limiting. It's so boxy.
I watched my parents lose everything, from a house to birth certificates. We were homeless for about six months, then we stayed in Baltimore, and my parents got jobs.
I don't wish homelessness on anyone, especially when you come from where your parents work hard.
My director, Monty Marsh, is really awesome - I've been working with him for years now.
There's always going to be a fight between mainstream and underground because the mainstream is a very small bubble, and the underground scene is a very small bubble, and they both see themselves as secret societies. But I never saw it that way. I always thought music was open to all things.
'The Red Era' is for everybody. Every gay, every fluid, every black, every white.
'Armor On' explains why I needed armor in the first place. Sonically, you'll hear this battle of, 'I love you, no I don't. I love you, I hate you.' That's what you'll feel. You see the story kind of fight against itself.
Hair pieces and head dresses have always been something that's been part of my culture.
I love what a women embodies. I love our bodies; I love the way we communicate with our bodies. I love the way dance creates movement. It's art in motion.
I always knew who I was, but everyone else wanted to me to be their 'idea' of the 'right' artist. At times, I even believed them.
I did write more mainstream stuff with DK. But you could always tell the records that I wrote in contrast with everybody else's because the format was a bit different. The harmonies were used in a different type of way. Way more metaphors in the mix.
'Redemption' sounds like a jubilee. Like a second line, if you will.
I got in the audition line called 'Making the Band' because I wanted to be in a band. If I didn't, I would have done 'American Idol.'
R&B needs to see a new light. It doesn't have to be pigeonholed.
My uncle is in the hall of fame for creating by hand some of the most intricate Indian Mardi Gras garb.
I come from an era where lyrics were full of imagery and metaphor, and that's all I know. I think people miss that.
'Blackheart' was the moment for me to really open up and let people into the world that is me.
I'm not a very open person.
When I was 4, I had a schedule. I was playing softball. My brother was playing football. My parents were teachers, and they'd owned businesses. We like to work hard. Work and then books. Books and then work. We just knew that we had to excel. It sounds militant, but trust me, it was fun.
It's always interesting when you're doing things yourself - getting the lighting, getting everybody together. It's exciting.
A lot of 'Blackheart' was me, literally in a dark room, confessing my sins; Poe was the influence for that album. But that melancholy has a hopefulness - in every Poe story, there is always a moral at the end.
I lived in the library with my grandmother as a child. I still love the smell of books; the library card is still my friend.
I like being in charge. I like being able to control my own destiny and ideas.
It's a lot of work being an indie artist, but it's worth it.
I wake up every day in a different headspace, so on any given day, my hairstyle will change.
I promised myself that I wouldn't be afraid to be who I was when I chose to do this music thing.
Be exactly who you are. You can fit in any space you see yourself in. Be fearless.
Songwriting was my own journey. I never fit in with structure in songwriting.
The black geeks of the world, we feel like we don't have a home.
Everyone who knows Puff knows Puff rolls with himself. His hustle is money. That's what he does.
You don't need validation from other people. You've gotta find it within yourself and sit in it and roll with it.
There's a fine line between artist and product. I don't think the industry purposely does it, but I think that's just the way they maneuver. You have to be careful that doesn't become your story, where you become a product, and your art is tarnished because you're just seen as a tool to make money.
I'm big on showing people versatility. I'm constantly trying to push myself to break barriers and the idea that we have to stay in one lane.
I want to show that you can be just as amazing as labels and compete as a business and work as a business even though you're an artist.
I had no idea that what I thought was my low wasn't really my low. That's what a lot of people think - then life reminds them, 'No, there's lower.'
You don't know how far you can go until you push it.
When I was growing up, there was no one. There were very few black women in tech; there were very few black women in the fashion game. We didn't have our Grace Jones - Grace Jones was before my time. We didn't really have a lot of black women in electronic and punk who were celebrated in the same levels as, say, your big mega-superstars.
I really got back to my New Orleans roots - my grandfather played with Fats Domino. We had to leave after Katrina, but I feel like, spiritually, I'm back there.
I'm okay with being the oddball.
I've had two platinum albums. I have worked with thousands of people. But the most rewarding feeling is to see people on Twitter say, 'Do you see what Dawn and them are doing? They are number one.' It's the most rewarding feeling because of all the tears, all the bad stuff, and the people that said I couldn't do it.
I don't really feel there's rules in my everyday wear. I kind of do whatever the hell I want to do.
My music speaks of warriors. It speaks of women being kings and this sense of pride of being more, even though you have less.
I'm not mainstream. You gotta find me.
There is a thing about women that needs to be understood. We don't sit well with being put in a certain place.
I started to write my own stories, like small novels, and those novels became poems, and after poems, they became lyrics, and song came from that.
