Make some noise! Ahmir "?uestlove" Thompson and Tariq "Black Thought" Trotter of the Roots
(Credit: Chago & Brian)
While checking into another hotel during the inexhaustible group’s latest tour, Roots drummer Ahmir “?uestlove” Thompson debriefed us on his band’s secret formula and confessed an inability to stay awake during video shoots.
Artists tend to not like to be called formulaic, but do the Roots have a formula for success?
Yeah, we’ve got a formula, which is basically called make ‘em guess. Which sounds easy when you’re on your fourth album, because then the sky’s the limit. When you start getting up to album number 10, 11 and 12, then it’s like, damn, what’s next? We’ve made a master list of things that we’ve never done before, and the challenge is how to do a full album where we’re doing things we’ve never done before, even if it’s small challenges.
Can you give an example?
In this case, for instance, the main identifiable instrument that identifies us as a group, besides the drums, is the Fender Rhodes [keyboard]. So we didn’t use it at all on this record. And subject-wise, we talked more about first-person political situations and tried to keep it interesting. Now, for the next record, we can’t do the deep, dark political record because we’ve done that, so what’s left? There’s the singing record that we never did, there’s the all-instrumental record that we never attempted, and maybe we can do the all-sample album that would be the anti-Roots record. There’s a host of challenges: shock ‘em, make them ask, “Is this the Roots?” And make them like it.
There’s so much to take in on “Rising Down,” because you cover so many important topics that tend to get sanitized or swept under the rug. It’s easy to feel the weight of the project. Do you worry that there’s too much for people to absorb?
Well, sometimes you have to give people some guidance so they get it. But we really put a lot of work into this record and I think, if anything, that’s what I want people to walk away with after listening to all of our music. We put a lot of work into it, and you can feel the sweat. Lazier people complain, “Oh, you’re such a downer. Can’t you make a happy-go-lucky record and call it a day?” But I can’t go out like that. Some people only see hip-hop being good for rocking the party. But hip-hop, to me, is more of an informing thing. At least when I grew up, hip-hop was supposed to inform. Chuck D called it the “CNN of black America,” and now, it’s more like the UPN of black America.
That’s a great point. It felt like Public Enemy was delivering us news, but now there seems to be a more superficial streak out there.
I call it neo-minstrelsy hip-hop, which is a dangerously offensive term, but sometimes I have to be extreme with my descriptions in order for people to understand where we’re coming from. And it’s not really even to take away from all that. Because I’m not gonna lie to you: if Soulja Boy’s “Yahhh!” comes on, then I’ll be the first one acting a fool, because it’s a silly song. My problem is more the lack of balance in the marketplace. I don’t think it’s a coincidence at all that an artist of substance has a [hard time] when it comes to nurturing his career, but an artist with pretty much no substance at all can ride on easy street and reach the masses.
You sure scared a lot of white people with that video for the first single “75 Bars,” what with that white dude getting kidnapped and showered in gasoline.
A lot of people were trying to figure out what that video meant. But actually, if you saw the two-part hip-hop witch hunt on Oprah last year, you’d see what made “75 Bars” such an angry rant. The director wanted to re-do “Reservoir Dogs.” So if you haven’t seen that movie, it kind of goes over your head.
Considering you’re the group leader, you’re not in it much.
The day we shot it, I didn’t know we were going to do it, but he had all the props and stuff in the trunk of his car, ready to go. I was really tired, I didn’t know the plot and didn’t even want to be in the video, and that’s why I’m in it for all of one second. He shot me leaning against the wall, and after that I fell asleep in the abandoned-ass warehouse [where we were shooting]. I was asleep for probably 95 percent of that video; they woke me up to drive the van. He also shot the video for “Get Busy,” and I fell asleep at that one, too.
