The Roots

After making music for the past 14 years as a group (an honorable feat on its own), The Roots have proven to be one of, if not the, most dynamic groups in the history of hip-hop.

    Conceived at the Philadelphia High School for Creative Performing Arts by who we now know as vocalist Black Thought and drummer ?uestlove, The Roots have seen faces come and go, but through nine albums have managed to stay fresh and not falter-another amazing accomplishment considering hip-hop's ever-changing atmosphere. Time and again they have shown to be inquisitive and willing to explore the seldom-visited outer realms of music, only to come back and show there are no boundaries to be confined within. Able to adapt to the times, and create a multifaceted offspring, The Roots are the definition of artists.

    During our conversation, ?uestlove raised a plausible question: How many groups are as eagerly anticipated after nine albums as they were for their first and second? The answer is very few, and that stretches beyond any one particular genre. For their latest effort, Game Theory, the buzz has intensified exponentially, as the album marks their first for Def Jam and the man who signed them, President Carter aka Jay-Z. Amongst all speculation there lies a justifiable level of comfort, knowing that they have yet to deliver anything within reason of sending back. They've fought for years to bring a perceived alternative sound to hip-hop's forefront, and now closer than ever, they've been called on to be themselves-the undisputed Legendary Roots Crew.

Your album titles have always been very significant and a statement of the group at the time. There was a lot surrounding your last record, The Tipping Point, and I'm curious if you feel as a group that with that album you crossed that "tipping point."

In naming it The Tipping Point, I think people mistook our use of the term like we were at the finish line, or like our version of Get Rich or Die Tryin'. The story of The Roots is unlike any story I've ever seen in modern Black pop music. We, as a band, aren't based on image. We don't have that identifiable hit where, three seconds in, everyone knows who it is; and there isn't a particular member of the group that is of celebrity status and hip-hop is truly celebrity-driven and single-driven. But somehow we've managed to survive. Because that has happened, I felt like this is the tipping point, especially in light of Phrenology; two weeks after Phrenology was done MCA shut its doors down and we managed to sell 800,000 units without really having a label to sell it.

    That told me okay, this is our tipping point. That was my particular definition, but as far as what actually happened, that was an album in which we were so kit and glove with it that we sorta lost ourselves in the process. We were so eager to please our president. He showed an intense enthusiastic excitement towards one single, and we decided to build that album around the single. I guess it didn't work. Now we have the opposite. On one end you have Jimmy Iovine saying, "Yo, give me my single or don't come to this office," and on the other hand you have Jay-Z like, "Yo, give me my art album. Fuck trying to get on Hot 97, and give me the album you want to make." That alone was like, "Oh shit, how did we wind up in a situation which the spiritual center in the epitome of hip-hop is now asking us to make art records?" I thought we had run out of challenges, but this was a challenge we were up for. We didn't cash in on the hyphy movement, we didn't cash in on the snap movement or any of the down South stuff. We didn't screw the music, or use any chipmunk soul, we tried to make a straightforward original album without any of the cushions that could catch us if we fall.

It's crazy to me because I've read in other interviews you guys sort of downplay and express your dissatisfaction with The Tipping Point but you know...

I'm not gonna pull an Electric Circus a la Common, denying it like Peter to Christ. No, I'm quite the opposite. I just think that somehow people mistook the first single from that album and made that the whole record. It was like wearing a white suit with a smear on the front lapel-it's hard to ignore. I'm not distancing myself from it, but I'll be honest enough to say that was the one time that we sorta said, "Okay, we made this record with the label in mind."

I was gonna say, I still think it's a great album. Do you think that because you guys have set the bar so high with your previous albums and because your fans are so passionate about your music that they are overly critical?

Oh absolutely. People don't judge the music at all, they judge the romantic situations of it. Half the people who embrace it, well, I know for a fact that our demographics are made up of opposite scenarios and sides of the spectrum. Just to give you an idea, I just did a show in Indianapolis last night, and this girl started crying like we were the Beatles. That alone disturbed me already like, "What have I done that makes you wanna cry?" We were getting down to the end of the conversation, and I reminded her you know August 29th, don't forget. She was like, "You're coming back?" I said, "No, that's when the album comes out, our ninth record." She was like, "Ninth record?" She thought Phrenology was our first record. I'm like, "Yo, you just put this show on for me, had me thinking this is the beyond end of all Roots fans," but then I realized we're all things to all people. There are some people who just like us because we're not what the establishment is, which I don't know if that is a cool thing or not, like I don't want to be someone's contrary fantasy just because you have a problem with Lil Jon. Then again there are some people who just like the shows and not the albums, or like the albums and not the shows. To me, I can see how we are our own competition, and you're always competing with your last product, but I guess in the public's mind they're thinking like, "Aw, these guys are rich fucks now, just holed in their mansion and they don't even care about hip-hop anymore." I don't know, we just became the piñata for underground hip-hop in 2004. But you know if there was a misstep, that was probably it. It might have been a misstep, but it's still a B-.

I wouldn't even give it the minus, I'm thinking at the least a B .

Well thank you. A B is still a passing grade. I think coming from the straight-A students of hip-hop, you set a bar for yourself and you just gotta live up to it. This album surpasses that, I will say that. I really feel that this is our best album-yes including Things Fall Apart.

One thing being touted with this record is the return of longtime Roots member Malik B. You guys addressed his situation on "Water" off Phrenology. Did that song do its job and help a friend?

Honestly, no, but that didn't stop Charlie Parker from doing his best work, so...Actually the way he got on the album was kind of by accident. We never planned on him coming back, but that's the kind of mythical figure Malik is. What happened was we had a new engineer who had no clue or history about Malik, period [laughs]. Malik was like, "Yeah, put this song on, give me a microphone." My manager called me like, "Yo, you'll never guess this shit," and he played me "Here I Come." I was like, "Oh shit, what the fuck? Where did he come from," because I haven't seen Malik in a year-and-a-half. He said out of the blue, Malik came down to the studio and the engineer didn't know anything so he just would rhyme. All of a sudden it became a thing sort of like E.T. or like when you leave the cookies and milk for Santa, like you'd leave these tracks lying around to see what happens, and sure enough he'd lace 'em. He actually participated without us physically seeing him.

You have described this as your darkest record to date but the general consensus has been overwhelmingly positive.

Dark is good. I know R&B fans who say Ask Rufus by Rufus and Chaka Kahn is their best album, which is definitely a dark record. I know many Radiohead fans who say Kid A is their favorite album. Although not my favorite, I do like the direction of Beck's last album and it wasn't really at the hype level of Midnight Vultures. Game Theory is like part Portishead, part Kid A, part Pet Sounds. I decided to make this album very cohesive and keep it focused in some sort of textural feel, and yes it's very dark, but still very good. Think Sly Stone's There's a Riot Going On.

That darkness is definitely implied on the cover, with the stick man hanging from a noose like a game of Hangman. what exactly does that represent?

We titled it Game Theory instantly, and it's funny because you say that because it wasn't until recently where I was like, "Whoa man, we just redid KMD's Black Bastards cover [laughs]." Honestly we went through like nine album covers. The one I really wanted to do was sort of a motif of a Russian Roulette game, that image was a little too violent and Blue Oyster Cult-ish. For me, the album cover has to be arresting and a conversation piece on its own to prepare you for what we're about to do. The message behind it is the study of strategy. Is there a formula for winning and losing? For me, you know, hip-hop is in a dire emergency state, and we're either gonna win or lose, and with The Roots it's the same thing; it's either gonna be a winning situation or a losing situation.

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