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Tavis: Talib Kweli is a talented, socially conscious rapper who became a critically acclaimed star after his debut solo CD 'Quality.' Later this summer, we'll finally get to hear his much anticipated second solo disc, called 'Beautiful Struggle. He's also touring around the country this spring and summer, hence his being in L.A. right about now. And from his CD 'Quality,' here's a clip from the video 'Get By.'

Talib Kweli: Get by, just to get by,

just to get by, just to get by,

our parents sing like John Lennon,

imagine all the people

watch me rock like Paul McCartney

from now until the last Beatle drop,

this morning, I woke up feeling brand-new,

and I jumped up feeling my highs,

and my lows in my soul, and my goals

just to stop smoking and stop drinking,

and I've been thinking...

Tavis: T.

Kweli: T.

Tavis: How you living? Ha ha! T, T. I like that. You been all right, man?

Kweli: Yeah, I'm good, man. How you feeling?

Tavis: I'm doing well. Nice to see you.

Kweli: Good. You, too.

Tavis: So before we get too deep in this conversation, did anybody from my staff go in the makeup room and ask you how to pronounce your name?

Kweli: Yeah.

Tavis: You know, there was a huge debate here on the set, and I didn't want to take their money. You know, they act like we had never met before and hadn't done this a few times in a variety of mediums.

Kweli: Yeah, you know how we get down.

Tavis: You know how we get down. But there was a big debate how to pronounce his name. And even now, fans who are just discovering your music and coming to love you as an artist don't know what the preference is, how you pronounce your name.

Kweli: Well, you know, my parents call me Tah-leeb, and that's what I grew up under. The Muslim community calls me Tah-lib. And, you know, being I'm partnered up with Mos Def and Black Star--he's a Muslim. And so he would always pronounce my name Tah-lib, and whenever we would do the shows, he'd say Tah-lib, Tah-lib, Tah-lib, even though I grew up under the name Tah-leeb. So, you know, that stuck in my head as far as, you know, the hip-hop community. When I say my name when I come on shows, I say Tah-lib, but my parents always call me Tah-leeb.

Tavis: Yeah. Long as--the checks cash the same way.

Kweli: Yeah, you know. As long as it's spelled right. You know what I'm saying?

Tavis: Ha ha ha! As long as it's spelled right, you don't care. Now, as I mentioned a moment ago, you're doing the tour thing right now, but unfortunately, you don't have a CD to give me, and I can't hold up the CD, and I can't play the CD.

Kweli: I do. I do.

Tavis: You brought one with you?

Kweli: But I gotta give it to you a little bit later, 'cause it's a mix tape.

Tavis: I got it. Now, the reason why I said that, though, as you well know, is because you're doing the tour right now, but you're not out promoting the new CD as yet, because this CD hasn't dropped yet, even though it was supposed to drop. And it didn't drop, because I heard that the Internet thing messed you up.

Kweli: Yeah, well--yeah, it's interesting you bring that up.

Tavis: Yeah. Ha ha ha!

Kweli: The Internet thing didn't quite mess me up, you know what I'm saying? 'Cause I'm still rolling. I'm still on tour. We still developing a buzz. But, you know, I'm not on Ruckus Records right now. I'm on Geffen Records, which is a major label, and they're under Interscope. And you know, it's a lot more involved, and the corporate structure is a lot more dense right now. So decisions as to put the music out have to go through a lot more channels. A lot more people have to approve stuff. And so it's difficult.

Ruckus, even if they disagree with me, I could be, like, 'I want to put this record out now.' And they might be, like, 'We not sure we can promote it properly, but if you say so.' With Geffen, it's like, 'We're not sure we can promote it properly, so it ain't coming out.' You know, and it's like, you know, they're in the business to make money, and if they see an opportunity to make as much money as possible, they're gonna try to do that. And they feel like holding my album right now and waiting for a single, a hit single that they feel like they could work properly, it's the best way for them to go. I feel like I got the single already, but it's my job as an artist to always feel like that about my music. You know? And that's a conflict you're gonna have in the music business until the end of time, I think.

Tavis: What about the conflict--at least I've read about the fact that some of your stuff got leaked on the Internet and you had to go back in and redo some of the cuts?

Kweli: Yeah. I mean, I felt like when that happened, it showed that there was a need to put my music out sooner. I felt like there was an urgency, because people were going as far to steal the music and put unfinished versions of my songs on the Internet. So I felt like we need to jump on top of that so that we don't get taken advantage of by these people, but so that we take advantage of the situation. Um, you know, again, my strategy is different. I gotta just keep moving, you know? It's a blessing in disguise, because I have no problem with downloading music or file-sharing.

Tavis: I was about to ask you that. Now that you've been burned by this process, have your opinions changed, or have they remained the same, whatever they might have been, about downloading?

Kweli: Yeah, I mean, they remain the same. I respect any artist's integrity, and artistic integrity is something I'm always striving for. And if you steal my music or download it or file-share it once I present it, I don't have a control over that. Go ahead and do you, you know what I'm saying? Because I'm always gonna be supported by people who want to support me. I don't need to worry about that. But when you are stealing and downloading, presenting for the world something that I haven't finished or something that I haven't presented to the world, then that's what gets me offended. Because it's, like, that means you just have no respect for me as an artist. If you steal my music, you might've liked it that much where you had to steal it. But at least wait for me to finish it before you steal it. And that's my only issue.

Tavis: Before I get to talking more specifically about your artistry and the work that you do, this CD title, when it does come out, which we hope is gonna be in August--

Kweli: It'll be out in the summer. Somehow.

Tavis: Somehow this summer. 'Beautiful Struggle.' We got the name of it, we got that far. So explain the name for me.

Kweli: I got the name from Mos Def, really, because he used to always say that and have that on his voice mail, 'Life is a beautiful struggle.' And it is. You can't appreciate struggle unless you see the beauty in life, and vice versa. You can't just have beauty and not have any struggle, you know, and that's what my struggle is in this business.

That's what black people, people of color's struggle has been all throughout the world. It's been a struggle, but that struggle has made us so beautiful, and I wanted to convey that through music. In my other albums, it was more about proving what a good M.C. I am. This album, I wanted to let the music lead and really talk about what people were really going through. I've always been known as, like, a conscious M.C., a M.C. who takes responsibility seriously, but I spend a lot of time braggin' and boastin', 'cause that's what hip-hop music is built on, on braggadocio. I wanted to spend more time really talking about what's going on with people and really be honest with myself.

Tavis: Is there a burden? I mean, I've asked you the flip side of this question, but never this side. I've talked before--you and I discussed any number of times about this responsibility that you have and the love that people have for you for being a socially conscious rapper. I guess I want to ask now whether or not there's a burden that comes along with that, though.

Kweli: There was, and I mean, there still is, but--

Tavis: What's the burden?

Kweli: I got to find ways to shoulder it. Like the immediate burden was when I came up with Black Star, with Mos Def, we would do interviews and people would be, like, 'What do you think of Jay-Z? You don't like Puff Daddy, do you?' They would automatically pit us against young black men who were doing the same thing as us. And that struck me immediately, because I never looked at myself as separate from what they were doing.

When I first started this, you know, I used to work for this promotions company called Stress Entertainment Puff used to do all his parties through, and I looked at hip-hop as part of music. I looked at it as something you could say something with. Just depending on who you are, you could all get down, and people was down by law. Now it became the separate thing of underground versus commercial, which took up the slack for the, like, east coast-west coast thing they was trying to do. You know what I'm saying?

Now it became underground versus commercial, and they put us in a box, me and Mos Def and a lot of artists doing what we was doing. And you would see underground and conscious in front of our names as a prefix, but it would almost be like tongue in cheek. It would almost be like, 'Well, it's that corny underground stuff.' You know what I'm saying? It wasn't said in a way that was respectful in a lot of ways, and in the same way that people would talk negative about gangsta rap and not really understand what its roots are.

So I saw the need to break those walls and those barriers down in interviews. So anytime someone referred to me as underground and conscious, you know, I'll wear it, because I am conscious about what I say and do, but I would make the distinction and let them know that I do the same thing as these other brothers. It's just a different part of the spectrum, and I try to celebrate the similarities between me and other artists when people try to divide me with it.

Tavis: My time with you is so limited. Before I run completely out of time, let me go back to 'Beautiful Struggle.' When this thing does drop this summer, what are people going to hear on this CD?

Kweli: On the 'Beautiful Struggle,' I worked with a lot of artists who I love, and I really appreciate their music. Kanye West, Hi-Tek, Charlemagne, Midi Mafia, Organised Noise, Just Blazed, the Neptunes have all contributed tracks. Mary J. Blige is on it, Faith Evans is on it, Anthony Hamilton.

Tavis: You got everybody but me on there.

Kweli: Jean Grae, Common, Tavis Smiley.

Tavis: You got everybody on this joint, man.

Kweli: Yeah, you know. I mean, it don't sound like that. It sound like it's still my album, but I really appreciate these people's contributions.

Tavis: Yeah. What do you want to do ultimately with this thing, because whatever your struggle has been, whatever your beautiful struggle has been, there is some beauty in it, and you putting your thing down--I got less than 30 seconds here. But what do you ultimately want to do with this wonderful gift that you have to do something different than everybody else is doing?

Kweli: I think my gift has been that I could be myself. My name is Talib Kweli. That's the name my parents gave me. And hip-hop is so beautiful that it allows room for me to just be myself and be successful being myself. I don't have to take on any extra persona. I could just be me and do it, and hopefully that's what people get out of my music.

Tavis: I'm glad you are you, and I'm glad you're doing it. Nice to see you.

Kweli: Good to see you, too. I'll see you later at the show.

Tavis: I will see you at the show and catch you on the road all summer long, for that matter, as often as I can. All right, so Neal Kendall is my producer, and Neal's the guy I had that bet with about the name.

Kweli: OK.

Tavis: So, Neal, I want my check--

Kweli: He said come up off that screen.

Tavis: That's right. Come up off that--I want my cheddar as soon as I tell people that you can catch me on the radio on NPR and catch me back here tomorrow night on PBS. Until then, thanks for watching. Good night from L.A. I'm going to get my check from Neal. Keep the faith. Love you, Talib.