- 3 months ago
Black Thought and Redman meet up for a lyrical summit in New York City as part of Rolling Stone's seventh annual Musicians on Musicians series. The Roots frontman and the New Jersey rapper trace their parallel Nineties ascents, talk loss and life lessons, and nerd out over the art of lyricism.
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00:00your skydiving hobby like you you you're certified right yeah definitely so that's crazy like you've
00:05been able to convince anybody to do this i told snoop i said yo snoop would you you know he's
00:10like yo i gotta think about that first of all first of all yo i i know we talked about this
00:24before right remember i questioned you about the verse that i did you said it's coming yeah
00:28before that yeah i did a verse for the roots yeah and i was like yo and i ain't never tell you this
00:36i was like damn i did a verse from the roots and i never heard back from you guys i said damn you
00:43know what i was cursing a little bit too much i might have said bitch i might have said bitch or
00:48something that they something derogatory that they probably didn't like nah and yo i was actually
00:55hurt from that bro no you know what happened rich rest in peace you know i'm saying who was you
00:59know very much the brains of the roots operation he ran such a tight ship like it was hard for me to
01:07place verses on the roots album like you know i mean he would just he would shoot down every submission
01:12wow and there was something about that verse there was something that rich didn't like about that
01:16i can't remember what it was i'm gonna find that verse and if i listen to it then i can tell you
01:21why rich didn't rock with it i was over the moon i love that shit but um yeah i could tell you why
01:27rich didn't rock with it if i listen to it but then so most recently which has now been five years
01:33ago it five years have passed of that verse of the new verse i got a new joint from you for this new
01:41album that streams a thought buying four which is still unreleased which is i mean in many ways i feel
01:46like it's my it's what it's my opus you know i mean it's got the most features the most elaborate
01:52beats crazy samples and you know part of that is the problem is trying to get all this stuff cleared
01:56um but yeah your verse on that song and on that record um is definitely coming out and it's um and
02:04i think it's super powerful and i think uh you know that verse represents you know uh like part of
02:09your growth right but i mean it represents like it speaks to your mentorship your activism you know
02:15i mean just like where you are now based on where you were earlier on in your career you know just
02:20talk about the similarities between philly and newark well another one of the things that you know those
02:24two cities have in common um is the crime you know amongst you know the young people i think about
02:30all the time man and it's something that i've always going into the studio wanting to speak to
02:35but it's also a delicate balance because the the second that somebody feels like you're they being
02:41preached to then they shut down right i mean it's like so you really you know for every jewel you
02:48drop you almost gotta like you know hit them with two joints that ain't necessarily a jewel so that it
02:53keeps it holds people's attention you know i mean yeah yeah when did our paths first cross
02:59well i know my path started when from y'all from the roots album like y'all was uh in in my cd player
03:09y'all was part of my growth of dopeness and and caliber of how i should be spitting especially you bro
03:19like especially like songs like desperado
03:21you know those songs resonated up across my path and my journey of being an mc yeah and you you held
03:36the high bar of what a mc should be and how they should rap and one thing i admired about you was
03:45that you and still admire don't get me wrong still admire to this day is that you out on stage
03:53body and shit without a hype man or someone to back you up i'll be like yo how did he do it like
04:01where you get the breath but then again um from mc to another mc it's how you write your rhymes you
04:10write you write your bars with that breath so you can't do it yeah you're not over stacking it you're
04:16not overlaying vocals where you would have to have somebody come in for this line you know how to write
04:22with precision yeah to give you that breath yep to have that uh uh mc control of the whole rhymes
04:29being said without a hype man i mean i guess they say you know still sharp and still sort of thing um
04:35because i was like me and malik who you know rest in peace was the other mc um earlier on in the
04:41roots uh we went to college together and in college like you know all we used to listen to was like
04:46your shit right you know it was um but i mean it's like there's something in it that you sort of
04:51recognize that uh you know that um it's almost like one skill informs the other and always like i had
04:59a suspicion that you know that you were sort of a roots fan um it always you know felt a connection
05:05with newark like between philly and newark you know what i mean there's so much so many different
05:09similarities um but yeah when you drop that line uh i love the burn to the roots i mean that was it
05:16you know i'm saying like absolute i love the burn to the roots i told y'all i told you that's right he
05:22said it you know what i mean it was uh yeah i really i felt like um you know that was validating you
05:28know i'm saying like every time i go overseas or whatever i'm i roots is my first cd i'm popping
05:33in crazy for that excitement for that hype i need to get before a stage i'm bumping roots and if you
05:40listen to do it do what you feel and i'm gonna follow with me and meph you gonna hear your your
05:45your your little fabric of flow in there plus i always admire it too like how the fuck do you
05:51remembering all these rhymes bro like yo yo your brain is like crazy with remembering rhymes like
05:58i gotta spend like two months with the headphones on in the gym or something trying to go over songs
06:04remember them so you know i was born you know i'm a little bit younger than y'all i was born in 73
06:09right so i was like in october so i was born like you know maybe two months a couple months after
06:14they said you know hip-hop right came along you like maybe were three or four years old though
06:20right so do you remember as a young person like what it felt like when hip-hop sort of came because
06:27i i have no memories of a time when it didn't exist you know it was it was when i heard uh grandmaster
06:35flash and nefarious five when i heard because i was i always wanted to be a dj yeah and uh when i first
06:42heard the adventures of grandmaster flash uh i was like wow what is this and then it moved on to
06:52run dmc oh yeah and when i first seen them not just heard them but when i seen them with the black
07:02leather yeah and the no strings and adidas and the godfathers i i literally thought they were
07:08like i thought they were the new god yeah you know i was like what is this going on i gotta be a part
07:17of this this music this fabric this this uh it was something that changed my life yeah meaning
07:28i don't care about the money i don't care about the fame i just want to do this the rest of my life
07:36for the love for the love yeah when i started seeing run dmc like you said like you know with
07:41the godfather had some with the with the superstar like they that's what i felt um was representation
07:46i felt like that was you know they was the corner boys you know i mean it was dudes right outside
07:51just like run dmc so yeah and it's like wow you see them on soul train on tv and it's like you know
07:57that's when it really kicked in for me it felt like i yeah you know there are people from the
08:02same place that i'm from who look like me like us experience you know i'm saying the things that
08:07we've experienced who now have a voice who was your like inspiration artist that helped molded you
08:16cool g rap big daddy k krs1 rock him you know run in dmc on any given day right ll back in the day
08:25right you know definitely a young ll uh man but y'all listen back to some of your earliest stuff
08:31you know who blew biz man one time blew my mind playing a joint he was like yo you ain't up on this
08:38played this tape for me it was like you and biz freestyle who biz marking yeah oh rest in peace
08:44yeah big bro you and biz freestyling i think it was like yeah montebello yeah yeah montebello or
08:50montebello or parking please yeah yeah yeah that that that was a crazy freestyle yeah shout out to
08:57biz he wasn't selfish feel me absolutely he wasn't afraid to make connections with people
09:04without being in it without trying to orchestrate it like you know oh you got to call me first
09:10before you call him he would just connect about him right yeah he would connect you and then check
09:16yo you called so and so or did you reach out to them and he would leave you be just like you said
09:21it was up to you yeah to come to that pond and drink the water absolutely if you will he can bring
09:29you to the water but he couldn't make you drink and that's what he did for a lot of people very
09:33unselfish like let's consider how the ways in which hip-hop has sort of changed since we got into
09:41the game but then the ways that it hasn't changed one of the ways you know just off top is the way
09:48people receive music right the way you know folks receive just all media right now right outlets yeah
09:54they to cut the middleman out right it's direct ascender you know i'm saying like we we come from
10:00the era of you gotta have you gotta partner up with a distributor you know i'm saying like to get
10:06your joints in the stores and to get your joints on the radio and all that and um i think that you
10:11know that's definitely changed yeah it did it did i actually still to this day you can deal with a
10:18distributor if you're independent feel me um in our day it was more label driven which labels back then
10:26had to be on the a game to compete against each other um and the outlets changed of how our music
10:34came out like we had mtv bet and ralph mcdaniel's right yeah exactly video jukebox yeah shout out
10:40shout out yeah and then this radio stations for for us for me because being an underground dude like
10:48i'm an underground artist like i'm very transparent of my career myself right so my main outlet for
10:56people hearing my music was college radio stations yeah college radio were just as important and if
11:05not bigger than major radio stations in my in my era because the major radio stations listen to college
11:13radio to see what was hot yeah and then they would play it i mean new york city stretching by beat all right
11:19right that that dictated what was you know at what you would later hear right on the hot 97s and the
11:25in the bls's the difference now is like there's so many outlets right and people are a lot of fans
11:33and a lot of the hip-hop culture fans that listen to hip-hop are spoiled with so many outlets they can
11:40they can just get their album overload yeah they can get the album right there and don't have to
11:46listen to everything they can go right to their favorite song keep it on repeat on their phone
11:50so that that limits the thoroughness of you wanting to hear your favorite artists like they have a gang
11:59of artists on one playlist it's no more just one album yeah yeah it's hard to you know to engage
12:05someone's attention span for as long as it takes to listen to a whole album right but now um with streaming
12:12you know being actually a culture there's some artists who are doing the right and who understand
12:16the value and actually giving music away for free so like what's your what's your take on that how do
12:22you feel about just giving the music away and then you know building your brand on the residual effect
12:30of that you know what i'm saying the streamer left you kind of with no choice but to play along
12:37there are a couple of platforms that you could just direct your music to to buy but are you willing
12:43to take that choice right that chance feel me like with this album money what is 2 like money what is 2
12:48got like close to 70 million streams and that's good for og artists like me right yeah but the money
12:54that comes with the streams is horrible yeah so it's like do i bank on trying to get the money or
13:02just bank on the awareness of it's being spreaded through spotify through itunes in a roots capacity
13:09we've always banked on the awareness you know we've always just been like we put and we talked about
13:15this like off camera right um we would record a record you know because that would support us being on
13:23tour and we would go out and we would tour to sort of you know to so we would do the new songs but we
13:28never recorded or put out an album with the intention of oh this is gonna go double triple
13:33platinum you know what i'm saying like we just weren't that sort of act we weren't selling that
13:38sort of you know we weren't doing those numbers and so yeah i think there's something in sort of you
13:43know just doing music to sustain your career as a role warrior right you know which is in you talk
13:49about that balance that's what you know we definitely struck that balance right is any of your kids uh
13:54uh in hip-hop or doing bars you know yeah well i think well my youngest son who's only 10 he seems
14:01to be the most musical none of my kids don't want to do music oh she want to do like more acting and
14:07you know behind the camera stuff and i'm fine with that how about have any of your kids taken to uh
14:13you know uh your skydiving hobby like you you you're certified right yeah definitely yeah that's crazy
14:19you've been able to confess anybody to do that i tried yo i i know meth wasn't gonna do it i said
14:31it in an interview about little wayne i know he will love it i told snoop i said yo snoop would you
14:36you know he's like yo i gotta think about that get out of your when you're gonna do it oh man
14:42you know i was hoping that you didn't think i was asking just so you know well i'm asking when
14:48you gonna do it man i don't know i'm gonna lay out the red carpet for you man you know i what i've
14:53done is the one where it's air yo me and jimmy uh fallon went to puerto rico and we did this um
14:59the zip line that at the time it was like the highest longest zip line right um called like the
15:05beast or the monster or something that's the closest i've ever come i guess to skydiving because you
15:10though you're connected to the you know the cables um you're connected laying flat and like the arms
15:16are like sort of behind your back and your legs are out so the thing um that's the closest i've
15:21come to doing it now really yeah it was an adrenaline rush that i didn't think i was gonna love but i love
15:27it right how did you guys land like the jimmy fallon being on the show because honestly when he
15:33announced yo i remember the day he announced it he said yo the roots will be my band part i remember that
15:39day i was watching that show like everyone was tuned in bro and when you guys got that job
15:47it was like a win for our culture honestly and we looked at y'all and we applauded man the way we
15:54got the gig jimmy was uh you know he was always a huge music nerd you know i mean just into you know
16:02like real music and live music bands who were you know popular touring bands and stuff and he's a huge
16:08huge beastie boys fan that's like his top tier wow and um that's the first band that took the roots
16:14on tour so the beastie boys short sort of you know showed us how to be on the road yeah jimmy came
16:19around and he said i'm you know thinking about doing which was at that time going to be the late
16:24night show and uh you know i need a band and you know would you guys be interested in doing it and
16:29we just thought he was sort of like bullshit and until um he kept coming around you know so for
16:35maybe a year so you guys didn't y'all didn't grasp it the first time not at all like it was a year a
16:41year and some change that we would show up at a gig and he'd be in our dressing room and be like hey
16:46anything what's up you know i was serious about you know the thing like what we talked about you
16:51know what i mean and you know we just started taking him seriously like over time because he was
16:56dedicated he was really you know like he showed up a bunch of times sort of pitching it and this
17:01was around the time that we uh we just got done working on um on dave chappelle's show again like
17:07it was just time and it was you know so much uncertainty at that time that um yeah it sounded
17:13good like to have sort of a day job the consistency of like uh quote unquote nine to five right it made
17:20sense and then you know when again you talk about life being what you make of it and you know
17:25opportunity being sort of you know what you do with it um we knew that if we took that opportunity
17:31we didn't want it to mean the end of the roots or the end of us you know putting out music or like
17:37we wanted to use it um as as much of a springboard as possible so that's you know what we did
17:42because i was like roots is so experienced that they can freestyle a show they just be like quest
17:48will be like you know we're going to do this or whatever right before y'all go on or whatever
17:53that's what he does you know we all have you know the in ears and quest has two mics he has a mic that
17:59if he speaks into it only the band hears it then he has a mic that you know is you hear his voice in
18:06the audience right and so he's always able to give us cues you know um play something this length or in
18:13this key or just you know play anything in you know c you know i mean we don't have enough time to
18:17sort of figure it out and the band is played together enough um that yeah it's so it sort of
18:23meshes you know what i mean all right like for red and meth right we we did the movie how high like
18:29that was like yeah an epitome of our career of showing us together on screen and we were blessed
18:37if you will to still have a career in music because you know how it is in hip-hop once you
18:43get on that screen people like oh he ain't doing you know he ain't body in the mic no more whatever
18:49but we were still blessed that people still accepted us on a screen but still accepted us as
18:55those underground dudes that still got bars and we were still uh able to hold a a career in hip-hop
19:03still which a lot of artists didn't make it from feel me did any of that like happen to the roots
19:10like i don't we know it didn't but you guys were able to be on tv still but still be respected
19:16as that roots band in hip-hop that has a cornerstone yeah that never sold out or anything i um it was a
19:24concern it's definitely something that we thought about and it was like you know just what what would
19:30our move our transition into late night tv mean for you know the band like what would it mean for our
19:37music and what would it mean for our credibility it's not like we said okay here's what we're
19:42gonna do you know i mean but what we wound up doing like what we sort of all arrived at was just
19:47to lean into the seriousness the gravitas of the music that much more so if you listen to the roots
19:54albums from um how i got over on right like the last three or four roots records they get
19:59like i said progressively shorter but more densely packed and more conceptual and more um you know
20:07again like we were dealing with some heavy stuff so i feel like that's you know represented it's
20:12reflected in the music too but um yeah i feel like just over time um yeah that's sort of been the
20:18evolution of it you know i mean yeah yeah we all have our ups and downs but you will always when
20:25people think of black thought is always controlled it's always you wouldn't you would never see me
20:33sweat kind of thing feel me and i know that's a part of healing because that's the level i'm on now
20:39like self-healing self-awareness self-love it took me a while to get to where i'm at right now
20:45i think that's paramount you know um talk about you know again rich nichols who
20:51was the roots long time manager he was uh like my entree into that world into like the spiritual
20:59uh the the space of spirituality and sort of you know self work like working on oneself he came at
21:07a time when i really needed that sort of guidance and discipline um i'm i met rich maybe two or three
21:13years after i lost my mom you know i'm saying so i lost my father at a super young age like one or two
21:19and then my mom passed away when i was in high school and uh and you know we were already the
21:24roots like quest and i were partners at the time when i lost my mom so i think rich came along and
21:30you know sort of filled a void and i mean i i say father figure because you know he was a man but he
21:37was almost like he filled uh part of what i lost and you know having lost my mother and and what he
21:44brought uh to the into the picture was that uh level of awareness and discipline and he was just
21:50like an og who was already up on all those things you know what i mean so he really instilled it within
21:56us um within me and quest and kamal and you know all of us who were sort of around for the earlier days
22:02of the roots um he changed all of our lives in that way right and i feel like it's dope to see
22:08that sort of thing sticking and you know i mean artists still like coming around to it you know what i
22:12mean right yeah i think it's i think it's dope man that's why i asked you that because you've
22:17always been a gentleman that i respected that you know besides like the music but you always
22:22carried yourself as a man of integrity yeah oh my god great conversation yo it was you know what
22:31besides the rolling stones this was something i needed from you like i i really appreciate the
22:36convo i appreciate you building with me and letting me inside no i'm saying thank you brother
22:41i appreciate that thanks for holding space for me this is this has been awesome this is a dream come
22:45true yeah yeah man thank you brother thank you brother fuck that yeah
22:49you
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