Andre 3000's life lesson

It's easy to spot Andre 3000 from a distance, so when I saw him walking through the Gaslamp Quarter this morning I jogged to catch up.

"It's a gorgeous day, man," said the hip-hop auteur, who is at Comic-Con this afternoon to promote his animated series, "Class of 3000," on Cartoon Network. Andre is a natty dresser, and on Saturday he was resplendent in yellow trousers, a checkered summer jacket and a vintage Brooklyn Dodgers cap.

Andre is a Renaissance man with the Grammy-winning music of OutKast, with his fledgling film career and as executive producer of the cartoon series.

"I grew up loving 'Looney Tunes,' which of course had great music, and 'Peanuts' and 'Fat Albert.' Those were the standards I had going in for this series," he said.

As Andre walked toward the convention center, fans shouted out his name, but he politely declined to stop for photos and autographs: "Sorry, guys. If I do one I have to do all of them, and I'll never get where I'm going."

The soundtrack album for "Class of 3000" hit stores this month. Every episode has a music video by a different art director, and it's clear the Atlanta rapper is enjoying the endeavor.

"When I grew up in Atlanta, we weren't too fortunate, but I had a friend that had comics so I would look at his. I drew my own adventures for the characters. My favorites to draw were Wolverine and Colossus. I always thought I was going to be an artist, maybe a painter. But whatever you love when you're a kid, it comes back to help you later in life, even if it's not in the way you expected."

— Geoff Boucher

Comments

[underdog]

Great job covering the comic-con!