No longer recluse from the music scene, Lauryn Hill explained to FUSE backstage at her recent star-studded Rock The Bells performance why she decided to take such a long break from releasing music. “I was a stay-at-home mom,” the artist said, describing what her life has been like the past 12 years. Jump below for Hill’s full interview, where she explains what inspired her to finally return to performing.

Hill was already well-known for being in the highly respected hip-hop outfit The Fugees, but the singer scored an incredibly amount of success—as well as a flurry of Grammys—with her debut solo LP, The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill, released eons ago in 1998. Hill fled from the public quickly after, however, because she became a mother and wanted to make sure her children “had normalcy, privacy and the right to be real people without the scrutiny and the pressure and the challenges the media can put up sometimes. I wanted them to have a real childhood.”

“I wanted a real life as well outside of public scrutiny,” she tells FUSE. “I wanted that freedom to do whatever I wanted to do.”

As for why she’s finally making a comeback, the singer explained, “I think I’m ready to express myself again. You have to life life so you have something substantial to share, or it’s pointless and vain.”

Hill says there might be an album in the future, or at least “some recordings”, but didn’t seem completely positive when or how those would be released.

Are you guys happy to have Lauryn back, even in hyperspeed form?

[Vulture]