Finding Your Rhythm with Questlove

basically like uh i'd lie to a girl like i just like the cutest girl in school and you know i inserted myself in the conversation like no no that that was the wrong prince song it was this song from 1940 no no no no you're coming in with your little nerdy self yeah they're like ew no one asked you and like one of them finally bit the bait like well what do you mean i said well we uh we we sampled it last night who sampled it oh you know me and my group what group him and you know tariq was just like sitting by himself eating a bagel or whatever and i went to fourth period class um which is in the basement and mid rehearsal i was like i better cover my lie and it's seven it's seven flights up with no elevator so literally run upstairs you and i just told him if anyone if anyone asked you we're a group and he was just like okay and that's how hey hi craig robinson i'm michelle obama what are you looking forward to i'm looking forward to the season starting for the boys because they're both in high school and i'm the assistant coach this is it could be great and it could be a disaster i can't wait to hear but i'm you know i thought you were talking about what am i looking for today obviously yes we are both looking forward to man let me tell you amir john thompson why am i saying johnson either or my dear dear friend amir who i'm calling johnson yes but that's okay hey better known to the world as the one and only quest love is here with us today well it's it's it's so it's it's exciting it's intimidating and and i was are you intimidated well here let me tell you why mish because you amir he's intimidated let me tell you he said he can't believe it but i the way i envision this is i listen to music you hear music and you've always heard music me yes from from a young age and i always use the example of you know when you got your first album stevie wonder you were like you hear these talking book you like you hear these lyrics you hear this and i'm like yeah yeah i hear these lyrics just fine volume is right where i want it and you know i'm like more of a i like beats i like beats right but you like everything music you like the history like you you you whenever i come to your house the music's always on it's just like for me when i dj'd all i saw was how am i going to keep people dancing and and and you know you got quest love i i'm even embarrassed is this why you're intimidated because you feel like you're a dullard i'm a i'm on i feel like a knucklehead yeah well let me tell you why i'm intimidated because you feel like you're a dullard i'm a i'm a i feel like a knucklehead let's get him out here give uh why don't you properly introduce him yes amir quest love thompson not johnson is a six-time grammy winner academy award-winning and emmy-nominated filmmaker new york times best-selling author dj and cultural polymath he's a member of philadelphia's influential hip-hop group the roots which i really love because they used to be they were called the square roots and you know me being a math guy i just i just love the fact that they were called the square roots i didn't know that until we were doing the research and is the musical director for the tonight show starring jimmy fallon most recently quest love directed the acclaimed documentary of my favorite group earth wind and fire to be celestial versus the weight of the world so it is it is our honor to welcome amir quest love thompson to the it's great to meet you hi sweetie it's great to be here great to be here hey busy man the busiest man on the planet so every time i have seen you we haven't had a chance to meet because you are always i'm always working and and the the the closest i got to meeting you was at barack's 60th birthday party okay but you you could you you walk past me i was like quest love i'm craig robinson's very nice to meet you he's like hi and you kept walking because you were performing and now you were dj he wasn't just performing he was directing all the entertainment directing all the music and you were you had you were doing food yeah i forgot yeah you you were doing we had cheese your late night cheese steaks yeah yeah and i was like well i don't think he knows who i am i'm very much aware who you are but i i just wanted to tell you you do not have to do everything she says you can come to a party and like enjoy yourself i i know you you want to know something he can't um here's the thing one one of the one of the myths not the myths i'll own it that you know there's a part of me um you know i'm generation x and of course um when you're raised in the the boomer generation my parents my uncles my you know hard work hard work was always a thing but we're gonna talk more about um the amazing work that you've done uh protecting the legacy of so many artists that we love on i want to spend some time on that but you know i want to talk about you you um uh because you are such a little brain that's the perfect word thank you i mean and i've known you for a while but we really never get a chance to just sit down and because you always have him working well because he's always working because i want to like my gift is bringing music to people so i enjoy that and that's your that's your comfort zone you know that's your gift that's your that's your love language you know um but just reading your memoir which is beautifully done i mean i love the way you created a different approach to telling your story including other voices um you know uh it's almost like a a muse on your life you know you were ruminating in many ways um and it really worked well but i didn't realize how unusually obsessed you were about music at such a young age i mean the way you talked about even thinking in terms of circles and things that spun and your relationship to records can you talk a bit about young your early relationship okay so this is weird this is the first time i'm going to tell this story from the perspective of like kind of quasi disclosure um i decided to get tested for autism adhd like a year and a half ago oh okay which i highly recommend to a lot of us yeah that might be avoidant on those things yeah so you know and always telling my story i i kind of lived under the umbrella of framing myself as like uh the outcast or the black sheep or the weirdo or the family you know like the the one that you're not too sure about my mom tells me um this story she tells me this story once about my aunt babysitting me and i was like oh my god i'm gonna be like oh my god i'm gonna be like oh my god i'm gonna be like and they would notice that i was transfixed by things that rotate in the circle and were you in a baby then oh absolute baby okay okay one or two yep um whenever well i was told i never gave much trouble like uh they would rotate uh i had a circular spinning uh light yeah above my bed and you turn that on and instantly that calms me or i guess you could say it's like a stimmy or that sort of thing okay and so you know i was like oh my god i'm gonna be like oh my god i'm gonna be like oh my god i'm gonna be uh they noticed that whenever they would put records on the turntable i would just sit there and watch it rotate and my aunt one day decided to test something she put the record on the record player and she's like he stood there for 20 minutes and watched it but i didn't play the music yet and he just stood there like and so and you know i even joke that um half the music that i gravitated toward was based on how the label looked rotating yeah yeah so i wasn't i i joked that i i was never a fan of uh the capital records logo so i was like late to discovering the beatles and natalie cole right it's like the logo it just didn't speak to you i'll punish your whole catalog if i don't like the way your logo looks like on the on the turntable um but you know my both my mom and dad uh my father was a uh kind of oldies doo-wop legend of the 50s and so uh i also believe that i'm the last of the generation of parents that don't trust babysitters yeah yeah so i was i was pretty much a farmhand we never had a babysitter and our kids rarely had a babysitter. So did you have to go to work with your parents or like just. No, they just didn't go anywhere. They didn't go anywhere. Oh, they stayed in. My parents did not go out. Well, yeah, when I tell this to musicians today, like, they're like, wait a minute, you're trying to tell us as an 11-year-old, you were in these nightclubs with your parents. And I was working. Like, as a kid, I kind of guess I became default production assistant, maybe production manager. So ringing out monitors. But we're talking about like at seven. At seven years old. Well, yeah, I mean, starting at seven, by the time I was 10 or 11, I was operating the lights, the monitors. And then my dad's drummer gets into a motorcycle accident at Radio City Music Hall. And, you know, my dad was elated because he found a cheaper option than me. So. And you had been taking drumlet or practicing drums or taking. I don't know if someone like you took lessons. My mom says by the age of two, I was notating rhythm. So pretty much I could play drums like an adult by six. By the age of six or seven. That's unusual. Well, it just seemed normal to me. And look, now on social media, I'll see two, three-year-olders, these prodigies. But yeah, by 12, I became the drummer and the band leader. And then I pretty much stayed in that position until like my first show was at Radio City Music Hall. And I think the last show I did, my dad was at Madison Square Garden. And then the next day, The Roots exiled to. We didn't exile. We pulled what I call pull a Hendrix, which is we wanted to move to England and conquer Europe and then come back to the States once we became, once we were fit. We went to the gym. Yeah. Yeah, but yeah, my life, pretty much I will say that we had about 3,000 albums in the household. So I really wasn't an outside person. Yeah. And I wasn't either. You know, it took me a while to become an outside kid. And I, I love to spend time reading with music, with albums, which is what Craig said. I, he, what did you say? You heard music? I listened to music, but you heard music. Absorbed it. Yeah, I absorbed it. I was just on the periphery and you were deep in it. Well, it's funny you mentioned, you said that Talking Book was your first album. I mean, as of this recording that we're doing right now, I believe that in two days will be the 50th anniversary of Songs in the Key of Life. Yeah. And that day is seminal to me because my teacher, my music teacher, I think her name was Miss LeWin, was basically like, you know, have your mommy and daddy. And she pulled out, she pulled out this record. And to me, I always, I always joke with Stevie that the cover to me, first question I asked was, did an adult describe to you what the cover of Songs in the Key of Life was? Yeah, that's a good question. And I was like, because to me, this five-year-old in me was like, he looks like he's drowning in donuts. Or those, those Swedish cookies that later become the sewing kit. Yeah. You know, the perfect circle, right? Yeah. Yeah. It would be so transfixed because it's such a, it's not like a negative photo or whatever, but it's a very unusual, like, how would you, how would you explain to Stevie Wonder what is album cover to one of the greatest albums ever? Yeah. It's, it's a very unusual album cover and it had me transfixed. And, you know, the day we brought this record, I can only, I can only describe it, maybe for black households. It was like, if you ever heard someone of age describe when they were a kid and first heard Orson Welles' War of the Worlds on the radio and how they thought like aliens were going to land. It was a real, it was like a live broadcast. Yeah. They thought it was real, like aliens are coming to get us. And so I just remember us sitting in front of the stereo for all four sides and the 45 and just, and, and the 45. Wasn't that a, wasn't that a trip? The fact that it's like, there was so much music. Do we need to explain to our listeners what a 45 is? Yeah. It was extras. Basically, it was a box set. It was a box set, but it was a smaller, it was a smaller record. A smaller disc with four songs on it. Weird enough, I'll say the element that really attracted me were the liner notes. It came with a, a 17 page booklet. I lived with those. I mean, I just sat with them. Read it like a book. Read it like a book. So you took them to the bathroom when you went to the bathroom. Oh, thank you, Craig. She did. Dude, bathroom, every, every book I've ever read in life, I promise you, 70% of it was in the bathroom. Thank you. Thank you. And I've written 10 books and I won't TMI you any further, so. No, the bathroom is the best office ever. I will, no, I will say that probably when people ask, like, what's, what's Stevie Wonder's biggest influence on you? The first one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, first seven Roots albums, volume wise, probably had more liner notes than like lyrics or facts about the albums. Like, yeah, like pretty much the, the, I would not only give you the credits of who played on what, I would keep a small diary from soup to nuts, how these songs got created. So, yeah, that, that was my experience. For you that your, your deep dive into music came from your, your personality and what you preferred and your obsession. And for me with that came like the whole setup of how you learned to take in music when you were little. Like there was always a music setup in our households and rights and rituals and do's and don'ts because it was also my father who was a collector, my grandfather who was a collector. I'm just wondering, what did you have that same thing growing up? I was going to say, I want to dispel a myth and hopefully it'll reach the biggest ripple on this platform. Cause I, you know, I don't want to do the revisionist thing where like I want to leave you with under the impression that I came out the womb with this mental level of, oh man, you still listening to Duke Ellington's, you know, fifth movement of da, da, da, da, da. When you said do's and don'ts, I was like, oh, okay. That's where I come in because, you know, the number one thing the number one rule in my house was don't touch my stereo. Okay. So that part's normal. Ellipses. Yeah. Or else. And never wanting to test what or else meant. You know, I will say that for at least the first, until I got my own turntable, like at 11 or 12 or whatever, like, yeah, I lived 11 years of patience, but I didn't mind it. You know, yeah. I will say that kind of remote control culture kind of ruined us in 83, like once we all got VCRs and once CDs came to play and you can start skipping. Yes. But I wanted to ask you, so to get back to Misha's point about how you thought as a youngster, because I'm fascinated because I'm trying to think about, so if your parents had been scientists, would you have been a scientist? Like, did you ever, you know what I'm getting at? I believe I got tricked into the family business. Now you're touring with your parents because babysitters aren't allowed. And then you're out there in this interesting adult world, you know, steaming your dead suits, playing the drums, moving an amp, staying at, like you even knew hotel culture. Yeah. As a young person. Yeah, man. Like the ice machine and all these things that nobody in West Philly was living. Yeah. And you had to learn that the hard way. Yeah. Can you talk about that? Yeah. My mom, I think my mom noticed early how to save me. Like no one likes a know-it-all snob. Yeah. You know, and what six-year-old knows about like watercress, sandwiches in first class or, you know, you know, like when you fly over and you go over and the kids are looking at me like, what are you talking about fly? Like, you know, we went to Puerto Rico last week and we experienced this and that. You're just talking about your life. Yeah. And I didn't realize, I didn't realize then how, you know, there might be some kids that might not get off the block. Right. Right. You know. Right. Let alone be here in two years because, mind you, I also grew up in the crack 80s. So that was something to, you know, to survive and escape through. We're heading to Tokyo this winter, and I'm so excited. I was there once before, but only for about 24 hours, so I feel like I barely scratched the surface. This time, I really want to experience Tokyo beyond just checking the big sights off the list. I've heard the best way to take in the city is to slow down, wander the neighborhoods, find the local ramen spots and markets, and just see where the day takes you. I'd love to see and feel the people and places like the locals do. That's been true for me wherever I've traveled. I want to see the big sights, of course, but what I really remember most is the stuff that happened in between. The little hidden restaurants you stumble into, the people watching, it's all part of what makes a city unique. And if you're lucky enough to be doing some traveling yourself, remember that your home doesn't necessarily have to sit empty while you're gone. You can list your space on Airbnb while you're away. It's a pretty cool way to make a little extra money that you can put toward your next trip while also giving somebody else a place to stay and a chance to really see your city. Thank you. They can get out, walk around the neighborhood, find the spots you love, and experience the place the way you do. Because honestly, that's when you really get to know a city, when you experience it like a local. Your home might be worth more than you think. Find out how much at Airbnb.com slash host. This episode of IMO is brought to you by our sponsor, Midi Health. I remember it was first term in the White House. And they just would come. And I talked to my doctor about it. It's like, oh, you're in. That's what's going on. And I wasn't sure. I didn't feel like I needed to start taking hormones. I wanted to feel it out and see what it felt like. But these hot flashes were happening every 15 minutes. And it's this rush of a feeling. I mean, the minute I started replacing hormones, it was like back to my old self. And you think it's magic, but you're losing hormones. And you need them replaced. But there was so much confusion around the pros and cons of hormone replacement therapy. Hormone therapy is safe for most women, actually. But I want to be clear that hormone therapy is not for all women. And it's also not the only answer. Like menopause care is a much bigger thing. It's about supporting women in a multitude of ways. And that's really why I helped found Midi and why we treat all these women at Midi Health. Midi Health is a telehealth clinic made for women. And we really were founded to really. We meet the huge care gap for women in perimenopause and menopause, which means we can help guide women through the hormone conversation. So you can go to our website, which is joinmidi.com. That's joinmidi.com. And really, the website helps you navigate. You can book an appointment right there. You start your journey there. I feel like every year I tell myself I'll get ahead of the holidays. I'm going to have the gifts figured out, the decorations up, everything handled nice and early. And then somehow the holidays still sneak up on me. So this year I'm starting early. And it's so, so easy to do it with Amazon. All year I've been making little notes for myself about what I think each of my friends and family might want. And that's trickier for some than others. Like I have maybe 10 ideas written down for Kelly, but only one or two for my sister. I think she'd like a Kindle, but I might want to do a bit more research before I lock it in. Meanwhile, my kids are the easiest ones. I just get them whatever video game accessory nonsense that they're dying for right now. And Amazon makes it simple to get a head start on gifting without spending a fortune. Even something small can bring joy. The way I get excited to find a new ornament each year that represents something special from that year. You can find low prices across everything from fashion and fitness to toys, electronics, holiday decor, groceries, advent calendars, you name it. Get a head start on holiday gifting with Amazon's low prices. Shop now at Amazon.com slash holiday. What were the drums always your instrument? Was there, you know, I mean, you talk about it. You were drawn to the circles and the spinning things and the, you know, that and you're now, natural rhythm. You know, I got a toy drum kit when I was three. And then I believe the story is one of my dad's drummers kind of went AWOL and left his drum set. Greatest Christmas ever. So I inherited that drum set when I was like eight years old. And yeah. And they let you play all day, all night. They insisted I play. Like I. I would pretty much. Because that was. That wouldn't. That wouldn't. Craig wanted to play the drums. And that. That's a tough story. That restriction of timing. It's too loud. It's too. You know, so when a kid is ready to play it, you know, it's like you got to be ready within some set rule time. And a lot of kids, you miss. They miss that period. They were willing to endure all the inconvenience. And some of the neighbors, too, were willing to endure it if it ensured that. He might make it. Yeah. Out of here. Yeah. And so. Parents, let your kids play the drums. Yeah. Or let them explore. Yeah. You know. But, you know, that's what I mean. Let them. Let them try stuff. Yeah. So your high school, Kappa. Yeah. I mean, that sounds like a pretty fame like place to be. I'm going to live. Were you all dancing through the. Okay. I got to tell you. Like I wanted. To do something creative. So I like beg my family, like, can I go to public school like regular kids? And I want to go to a regular performing arts school and everything. And that was like a thing because I always went to private school. And it's like, does he know how to navigate and a regular school atmosphere? And I got there. And yeah, literally it. When I walked in the hallway, like they were. Breaking out in the. And yeah, literally like boys to men or what will become boys to men are like harmonizing and the urine infested bathroom with good acoustics and everyone sort of has has a gang story in school, either literal or in this case, like what click you're going to be with and, you know, with the with the jazz cats, you you had to know. And I was weak on jazz during that period, like you had to devote your life to jazz in order to do that. Or then there's, you know, people are trying to make me a progressive musician like, oh, man, forget that music from the 40s. You need to be listening to Frank Zappa and Montevideo Orchestra and all this progressive stuff. And, you know, hip hop is hitting at that time. And I will say that the cool kids let me sit at their table because they need somebody to do. Yeah, OK, while they rhyme back and forth and so, you know, my partner, Tariq, he and I basically like I'd never seen someone that knew how to play the dozens. Yeah. And rhyme at the same time. Oh, yeah. Yeah. And talk about how dingy your jeans look and how just off the top of his head. Yeah. And so it was like a thing to witness. And, you know, I think. And basically, like, I'd lie to a girl like I was like the cutest girl in school. And, you know, I inserted myself in the conversation like, no, no, that that was the wrong Prince song. It was this song from 1940. No, no, no, no, no, no. You're coming in with your little nerdy. Yeah. They're like, oh, no one asked you. And like one of them finally bit the bait like, well, what do you mean? I said, well, we we we sampled it last night. Who sampled it? Oh, you know, me and my. What group? What group? Him. And, you know, Tariq was just like sitting by himself eating a bagel or whatever. And I went to fourth period class, which is in the basement. And mid rehearsal, I was like, I better cover my lie. And it's seven. It's seven flights up with no elevator. So literally run upstairs. And I just told him. If you want. If anyone asks you, we're a group. And he was just like. OK. And that's how the roots. And what were you? You called yourself radioactivity. Oh, God. I was afraid you knew this part of the story. Yes. Every group goes through metamorphosis of name changes. We started off. You had a few. Yeah. We started off as radioactivity. I was known as a sample. You were always creative with your name. Yes. I was a sample radioactivity. And then that didn't work. And then by 89, we morphed into black to the black. the future okay and that's when i was tarik namey divine technician of the drumsticks which didn't have a ring to it and then you think and then uh after we graduated school we became the square roots and i love that name i love that day objects well that was our i mean by that point you needed you know there were not only were there groups but then there were groups of groups yeah so the foreign objects were sort of like our the clique of other neighborhood groups but really it was we it was enough on our hands just doing dealing with the roots not like with 18 other people although we're a very community-minded organization so yeah someone else had the name square roots uh and uh so right before we signed our contract we just became the roots very apropos but at the time i was i was depressed that we had to lose the square what what about quest love the origins of okay so yeah after failing at a sample and divine technician on the drum sets the drumsticks on the drumsticks yeah yeah remember the divine intervention yeah and so uh i decided that all hip-hop monikers are way dated and so i just said look i let me just be this guy like just a question mark symbol um the riddler well i mean just i wanted nothing i wanted to be like and your name like i imagine on soul train yeah and me like and then they were going and so what wound up happening when we started doing like local press everyone's like so mark you would i was like why you call me mark he's like question mark yeah okay and i was like that's not what i wanted right i didn't want that to happen so then the second album vision yeah the second album i was like all right it was real pretentious but i was like all right i'm gonna be brother question it will stand for beat recycler of the rhythm and then people were just like brother and so that didn't work so then by a third album i was like okay i got this i'm gonna go for an old school name so if you were like in the origins of hip-hop you would be like oh my god i'm gonna be brother question and it would stand for beat recycler of the rhythm and then people were just like brother and so that didn't work so then by a third album i was like okay i got this i'm gonna go for an old school name so if you were like in the origins of hip-hop you were either rock ski or love so i was like my quest rock or quest ski and then quest love had a better better ring to it but it sure did for this next album i still want to go back to just nothing just because it just proved what i just want to be i am i feel like every year i tell myself i'll get ahead of the holidays i'm going to have the gifts figured out the decorations up everything handled nice and early and then somehow the holidays still sneak up on me so this year i'm starting early and it's so so easy to do it with amazon all year i've been making little notes for myself about what i think each of my friends and family might want and that's trickier for some than others like i have maybe 10 ideas written down for kelly but only one or two for my sister i think she'd like a kindle but i might want to do a bit more research before i lock it in meanwhile my kids are the easiest ones i just get them whatever video game accessory nonsense that they're dying for right now and amazon makes it simple to get a head start on gifting without spending a fortune even something small can bring joy the way i get excited to find a new ornament each year that represents something special from that year you can find low prices across everything from fashion and fitness to toys electronics holiday decor groceries advent calendars you name it get a head start on holiday gifting with amazon's low prices shop now at amazon.com holiday i think everybody has had that moment when they go you know it'd be cool if there was something that did this or that and most people probably let that idea sit on the shelf but some people follow through on it 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juilliard and tariq was with me and the the side note is that the real answer was yes did my classmates boys to men put me in their motown philly video the answer is yes so the world's most it was like somehow a great coupon commercial this girl on the train coming back to school and she's like i'm gonna go to juilliard and she's like i'm gonna go to juilliard and she's like i'm gonna go to juilliard and she's like i'm gonna go to juilliard and she's like i'm gonna go to juilliard and she's like i'm gonna go to juilliard and she's like i'm gonna go to juilliard and she's like i'm gonna go to juilliard and she's like i'm gonna go to juilliard and literally it was like we looked at each other like the eureka moment like it's like it's you you're me i am you well she thought that was us so why don't we just you know it's just like all right i got drumsticks we got a a white bucket somewhere all right meet me on south street at four o'clock and we'll see what happens and um pretty much that entire summer of 92 we went from busking and then and busking is playing in the streets yeah being a street musician being a street museum and uh by the next year uh we were in a like a crazy bidding war so what was what were your parents thinking during this period because you did you did not go to juilliard yeah i i ended up doing that so my dad found out about the roots on our second album because it's kind of hard hiding like his first question did a whole album and he didn't know about it he didn't know was this while you were still living under his roof absolutely yes you were living at home did one album and he had no idea yeah it was always you know i i i had gotten a job selling insurance so that i could save for college you know eventually and yeah i'm going to college yeah you sold insurance yeah that part oh the things you'll know yeah all the things you'll know oh man and um yeah he's like so and he shows me like the sunday paper like our you know we make criticism claim music so yeah he's like uh what is this and also like we're on mtv by this point and wow i was like yeah you know you know the little thing that i do with tariq like we you know while i'm selling insurance we just got yeah we got a deal whatever so he curse that yeah he again i think you know oftentimes we unknowingly uh transfer our feeler our our fear onto our kids oh yeah he was like that my mom was absolutely supportive of it um but my dad not so much at least outright then but once we got a hit and he got a car and a house out of it he was like oh my son you know like he he understood but um yeah it it i don't know like we we had such a tortoise and the hare journey like i don't even know if there's a point in my life where i actually felt like we we we crossed this like chariots of fire finish line of like we finally made it you know it's it's just living in the present like even now and can you talk about that part of music and rap and the challenges of what you were trying to do with what the industry was becoming yeah you know also some of the hits you took you know i knew hip-hop as uh an inclusive thing that i can do it too yeah and by the time we got past the uh the the gate if you will the entry gate um the rules had changed and it wasn't the same community idea that's just thing yeah made it enticing so the thing is is that when we lived in london there's a couple things that we learned that we never gave up one uh we learned that there's way more music festivals in in europe yeah there's then there were in the states in the states there was just lollapalooza and farm aid maybe a bonnaroo but you know over in europe which is why we moved there's like 600 festivals to choose from all over europe and we were like yo when we make it we're gonna throw a festival one day so that that was the seed planning for that the other thing was we noticed that uh they would have jam sessions everywhere so the jam session is what we learned and once we eventually came back uh to the states to really like live in philly like and gave up the apartment um we kept those things to heart and we started doing these jam sessions so friday nights we would have these jam sessions in my living room from like 6 p.m and i would never say hey we're having a jam session yeah i would entice them with food but we're talking jill scott jasmine sullivan i mean this i mean balal i mean it's like everyone was on zoom yeah before they weren't before they were known right like the thing is is that the thing is is that the thing is is that if you build it they will come um the only thing i think that none of us planned on was like everyone made it so eventually we were running out of well at at its height um at its height uh name the person like janet jackson would come and then suddenly him him him him and suddenly seven musicians aren't there anymore yeah and then oh that's how somebody else would they just come like adam if you know the name adam blackstone and and omar edward like i'll be the people who run music now uh-huh if you are on a concert stage i promise you that the md is at least from the tri-state area or half that band's from philadelphia so i will say that a good 90 musicians based on you know the jam session yeah the jam sessions that we had and the environment that you created and and that that incubator that is which is what it feels like you said initially you started it by feeding them was was that the start of your culinary interest or because i i'm still thinking about those cheese sticks um only after the fact that i realized um that food is the perfect social adhesive i mean we all have yeah sunday oh yeah right mom and them's house or aunt somebody's house like every sunday after church or something like that yeah um yeah there there was a a cat named terry that used to um uh he was like the best chef um i don't know if he was at lebec finn or like one of these like before we knew what james beard or like restaurant but we struck a deal with him and it's basically like can you cook at my house every friday and people heard free food at questlove's house and then ah surprise guys grab an instrument two three and and then once everyone got successful then we ran out of musicians so there's i mean there's always musicians in philly so at at some point you start differentiating yourself from the roots um can you talk about what you think you got right and wrong in that process as far as i was concerned like we saw the roots kind of as a an open marriage situation and as long as you come back home to you know to keep this growing you could do whatever you want and so around uh 96 or 97 is when like you know the buzz are sounds very unique for music at that time and you know erica badu is like i want you guys to work with me and then common's like well i want to do the same and then d'angelo and so there was a period between like uh 97 to like 2003 where i'm basically like playing both sides against them again it's just like high school i'm more yeah yeah whatever gang's winning i'm on their side you know um so electric lady studios which is the studio that jimmy hendrix built in new york became the hub of what we would call the the soul querion unit and um pretty much making like d'angelo's voodoo took four years to do um he would have studio a on lockdown common's like i want some of that magic too so then common would take over the b room and erica would take over the c room and then you know a blau a most def or whatever like it just became a for a good four or five years like that was the epicenter of like left to center soul music and um and that movement starts and so um yeah as long as i came back to the roots like we were still a 150 200 day out the year on the road band and then the remaining 100 i would just pre-op you know fill it in with the side projects and um you know there's that work ethic again because you i mean when were you sleeping i wasn't i don't know it's just that i there was such a feeling in the air like it's hard to know when it when it started but i i know when people ask like when did you know it was over that movement was over um it's hard for me to watch dave chappelle's block party yeah because that's literally that that felt like that documentary to me is the end of that movement that's the last time like everyone in that film we would spend the night each other's cribs and work on projects together and all those things and you know then we turned 35 and we had lives and families and you can't do the same things that you were doing at 20 21 22 when you know you're brand new in the game and so um by that point also for us um just having a personal life was hard like i couldn't keep a girlfriend for more than like six to seven months um kids are now crying because like they don't understand like why do you have to go to australia for two to three weeks and you know they're crying so we were pretty much like just begging for like like is is if there's a way we we would always look at the celine dion method like that was new like you could do you could stay in one place yeah and get paid the same money for one place yeah and um out of nowhere the most unlikely person came like right in the nick of time that was like jimmy fallon yeah yeah which was he a fan i mean did i mean okay so the the deal is that um one of my side gigs was um dave uh dave and neil brennan hired me to do most of the music for the classic season two of Chappelle's show. So the Rick James stuff and the Prince playing basketball and all that stuff from season two. We did the music. Of course, when season three comes, we know what happens. Dave goes AWOL and then there's like no show left. And once we realized it was really over, Dave's writing partner, Neil Brennan, was sort of trying to figure out what's his next move. And it just so happens that Conan was going to get the Tonight Show and someone needed to take the late night show over. And Jimmy had asked Neil Brennan, hey, can you partner with me on this and direct it? He's like, well, I won't direct it, but I'll at least give you recommendations. And when it came to music, Neil Brennan's quote was, well, yeah, ask the Roots. They know the best musicians to recommend. And Jimmy's like, you're right. I will ask the Roots and forget the other part. And so it just so happens that we were in USC doing their Spring Fling or something like that. It's like 2007. And he came, the show's over. And, you know, Jimmy's excited, always excited. And always excited. And I had to do an interview with like the school papers. And when it was over, I come outside and Jimmy has somehow convinced the other eight Roots to get into like a human pyramid. Like it's like bring it on or you might know the eight is enough reference if you're of a certain age. So we're on a human pyramid. But that's not the part in which I knew where the next 20 years of my life was going to be. Um, Tariq, my partner in the Roots, Black Thought, who he and I are kind of, even though we're very much alike, um, fashion wise, we're the opposite. Yes, yes. He is an immaculate dresser. You know, whatever pants he's wearing, it prompts you cost five figures. Like it's a very rare, delicate material from Egypt or something like that. And he's on the bottom row. Oh, and it's good clothes. Yo! Yes. I was like, yo, his denim. He's on the bottom and his Japanese denim. And I looked at my manager like, yo, we're never getting rid of this guy, are we? And he's like, I don't think we are. And that's how I knew. Wow. Because I wanted to know what did he do to disarm them? Yes. To make them do that. And he did this all without having talked to you yet. I mean, it was out there. You know, he put it out there. But I think we at the time were just like, of course, we're not going to do it because we're making all this good money. But let's at least be in good standing with him so that when we go on his show, he'll be like, yeah, you guys can play. Yeah, I remember you guys, yeah. And, you know, I got to admit to you. It was the best thing ever for us. Okay. Because number one, um, for all the Roots kids that are in an organization, finally, there's normalcy. Yeah, yeah. And stability and balance, which is needed. Yes. So there's that. Those that want to pursue longer than seven months relationships, like consistency, that part is being covered. Um, but also, one, it taught us to be better songwriters because, like, you have to do these challenges where you write these, like, seven-second jokes, jingles. Oh, yeah, yeah. Oh, okay. Well, there's so much you're doing in a show and on a daily basis, producing like that with all this different music. But we never, we never bonded as a, as a band. Mm. And somehow, Wow. doing this made us even closer. Yeah. Made you a team then. To where we, like, like, like each other. Yeah. Wow. Like, you can be with someone in a private, whatever. And there was a scary period in which, like, okay, we'll just show up and do the show and go our separate ways and that sort of thing. I love this time of year, but hosting during the holidays can be a bit of a challenge. So Kelly and I have collected a few hacks to make it a little bit easier. One of our favorite moves is an extendable dining room table. It's this great walnut color, and it's mid-century modern, so it looks awesome in our space. And it even has extra storage in the legs. When we don't need the middle panels, we just slide them out and our space is back to how it was before. For all things hosting, Wayfair delivers high-quality, customer-trusted products for your home so you can host and celebrate without distress. Use filters, customer photos, and more than 20 million verified five-star reviews to confidently find the right fit for your home. When refreshing your home this holiday season, Wayfair delivers exactly what you need. Head to wayfair.com to shop all things home. That's W-A-Y-F-A-I-R dot com. Wayfair, every style, every home. You know, and we've talked about this, your passion for assuring that Black music, that music legacy is kept. Yeah. You know, I want to spend some time on that because that's important work. And I want you to talk a little bit about your passion for that and why you think, you know, Summer of Soul, the Earth, Wind & Fire special, the Wonder of Stevie, Sly Stone, like making that happen for these artists, why is that so important? You know, part of me was always wanting to be an educator. I don't, when I DJ, I'm literally doing CSI charts on how to figure out how to connect this bridge, this song, and da-da-da-da-da, and trick you into education. And this starts with, in 2017, someone tells my, well, she's my manager now, but my assistant, Zara, is like, hey, we own this, like 50 hours of this Black, this mythical, I've heard of this mythical Black Woodstock that allegedly Stevie Wonder and Staples saying, everyone performed that. We've heard about it, never seen evidence of it. And these guys own it. And immediately I get suspicious because, of course, if a blessing comes, it's like me to self-sabotage it. Yeah, whatever. And, you know, they talk about it and I was like, well, why don't you get a real director? Like get Ava or Spike or somebody. And they're like, you know, you're a natural storyteller, right, Amir? And I'm like, ah, no. Didn't you think? And that's the thing, like a lot of us live in, am I? And we have to own our I am. I am. And so, I resisted it for eight months. I didn't want to do it. And finally got worn down because the thing that I want all my projects to, to come across. I want to bring our humanity. Oftentimes people forget that we're human. For me, camera four of Summer of Soul, in which you just get to see everyone's faces as they're watching it. That to me was the most important capture of that whole festival. And we just, I mean, with 50 hours of footage, it's ours. It's, it's, it's, it's ours to drop the ball. We just had to find a compelling story of why this was needed. You also talk about the fact that it's hard to get our artists to understand the importance of telling their story and legacy, which we've found, you know, challenging. What is, what is going on with that? Why, why do we struggle to own our history and tell our story? What are your stories? It's, us and history is really weird. I also work for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. And I can't tell you the amount of times where I've gone to, we've gone to black artists and be like, congratulations, you made the da-da-da-da-da. And instantly, the ageism thing kicked. Well, you know, I'm not old yet. Like, I still got a ways to go. Like, I'm not. It's not an honor. It's an insult. Yeah. And I was like, dude, do you know what it means to get in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame? Are you kidding? And so, it's just. People not confronting mortality or wanting to review the past. Not at all. And I think, hopefully, with this canon under my belt. That's what I'm hoping. That people will see that history is also beautiful. And that you're a trusted source of that. I mean, we've talked about, for example, I mean, There's such a big hit list of people, Diana. a Ross. Yeah. If you're listening. Yeah. And these stories are needed. Like to me, Summer of Soul is where I discovered why joy is important. And I know historically we've had a really sort of, we had a kind of a very slow embracing of anything to do with joy. Like the good thing about post pandemic quarantine is our willingness to start to get therapy for the first time, starting to communicate with our partners and like to do the work, what they call doing the work. Um, but you know, before 2020, the idea of being happy or vulnerable or all those things were seen as like demerits or weak points. And the way that people embraced and saw like why joy is actually needed for you to survive was always the point of Summer of Soul. And then with, with Sly Stone, I wanted to sort of send a message out to my fellow artists. Yes. About staying present and not self-sabotaging your, your life's mission. And I think with, um, with Earth, Wood and Fire, um, which I meant the short version of it was I always wanted to know how did this band, particularly Maurice White, trick their audience into eating their veggies. That was always my thing. Like, I want to use these stories, uh, to, to, to entice people or at least to give them, uh, to seed plant for them to, to see it themselves. I want to hear about your, how you're dealing with your Black genius, you know, and how, you know, you know, how are you, uh, doing, helping yourself to. You know what? Um, this is, this year alone is probably the most transformative year of my entire life. Um, which is me, you know, at first I think my excuse was like, well, you know, I'm a, I'm a creative and I'm a curious person. So of course I want this job and that job and this job and that job and this job and that job, not knowing that I'm being avoidant of, of life. Yeah. And, um, you know, oftentimes we will have a, uh, like all of us have lived through a trauma. Yeah. And we also have that never again thing. Like I will never again be in this position of da, da, da, da, da. And so my answer was always like the next job and the next job, more achievement, more achievement, more achievement. And, you know, after a while, um, I realized that I have to like, we, life gives you an opportunity. And unfortunately, most of us believe that we have to hit rock bottom first in order to like, all right, I'll, I'll, I get it. I'll change. I'll change. I actually wanted to do that without hitting the rock bottom part first. Yeah. Um, and this means that you have to say goodbye to certain things. So yes, before 2019, uh, in the food world, had my own publishing imprint, had my podcast, was doing our merch and had a hoodie store, uh, was DJing, had the roots, the tonight show was directed movies, scoring. Like I, I legit had 13, um, jobs. Yeah. And then after the pandemic, I whittled it down to six. But then after the Oscar came, then like more things came and I was like, well, okay, I'll, I'll go up to eight at least. There's a fear of vulnerability that we have to, to, to put our guard down because of the experience that we went through. And for me, um, like literally just, just starting over again and saying goodbye to the things that, and I'm not saying like, oh, I'm, I'm never drumming again, or I'm never doing this and that, but it's, it's not necessary for me to take everything. And so I've been implementing the word no. And guys, I really will love, you know, cause I'm also like getting over the whole, like, I have to people please. And I want to be likable and I don't, I want to make you mad because I said no, whatever, but I've probably said no more this year than anything. And how does it feel? It feels, it feels foreign because, you know, I know as, as human beings, we are conditioned to, we are conditioned to what we're used to. And even if you're used to struggle and like, at least it's familiar, like, oh, you know what this is. Um, for me though, it's, it was a hard adjustment because every, do you know what it is to have everything work out in your life and be worse? I don't even know what it is to have everything work out in your life and be worse. Um, and like, so every victory I get, my first thing is always like, I can't tell nobody. Dude, even before they said, and the winner is West Love Summer of Soul. Like I was literally sitting there like, all right, this person's not going to be happy for me because then this person's not going to be happy for me. Oh man, I'm not going to be friends with this person. This person's going to have jokes. And I'm like, I'd started making a, I'd started evidence sorting why I don't deserve it and who's not going to be happy for me. And oftentimes when good news happens, I'm here. You'll never guess what we got. And I'll be like, oh, great. That's cool. But I will have a panic attack three seconds later. Yeah. And it's, it's so just allow myself in the, in the space to, to feel is a hard thing to do. Um, but I'm going to get there. Cause I know like, that's, if I got to lead by example, like that's what I want to be. This is wonderful, man. I, I, you know, there's so much more that I would love to talk to you about. We really appreciate you taking the time. I have like 12 other projects coming down the pipeline. So I'll be back next time. We don't want to pile on, but we got to make sure folks are, uh, if you haven't caught earth, wind and fire, uh, where is it streaming? Uh, it's on HBO on HBO. Yeah. To be celestial earth, wind and fire streaming on HBO, the SNL 50 documentaries on Peacock. Um, Hulu has the slide stone and the summer of soul Disney Hulu has. And the wonder of Stevie. Yes. The wonder of Stevie. Of course. Anywhere you get your podcast. Yes. Yes. Thanks, man. Well, I think you guys appreciate it. Thank you. Great to spend time with some real time with you. Yes. This episode is brought to you by Cola guard. I knew that I shouldn't delay screening for colon cancer and Cola guard has made that process 1 million times easier for all of us. I just answered a few questions about my age and medical history. I'm going to talk to you about my age and medical history. And once their licensed clinician determined I was eligible, they issued the prescription and the Cola guard plus kit was sent right to my home. No doctor's office visit necessary for me. There was just immediate relief in getting it done. It cost me $0 with my insurance. 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