Fiasco: 'Comments not an attack on Jay-Z'

Lupe Fiasco has explained his comments in a recent interview in which he said, "I don't want to be Jay-Z," and appeared to criticise the music mogul.

The Grammy-winning rapper denies that he has any disagreement with Jay-Z but says that hip-hop supserstars like Lil Wayne and Kanye West should not necessarily be used as examples of personal success.

The 27-year-old told MTV: "Jay-Z 's a personal friend of mine. He executive-produced my first album. My comments were just an example using him of how people rate success.

"There's an idea of the status quo that every rapper wants to be Jay-Z. Nah. Every rapper does not want to be Jay-Z. Every rapper don't wanna be Kanye West. Everybody don't wanna be Lil Wayne. They wanna be who they are.

"You're a fool trying to chase that success down and manage it like that. I always look at my success as further than a dollar sign, further than record sales. Everybody thinks because you're black and you're from the hood, you wanna be Jay-Z."

He added: "There's kids who wanna be astrophysicists and don't care about rap. That should be okay. You should be okay just being you, working your regular job and being happy. That's why I made that statement. I felt it needed to be said."