WTF with Marc Maron Podcast - Episode 1666 - Questlove

Episode Date: August 4, 2025

Questlove was drumming for his dad’s band by the time he was 12. Since then, he founded a prolific hip-hop band with his high school classmate, became a chronicler of popular music history, came into his own as a documentary filmmaker, and more. So why does he still feel insecure about being an artist? Questlove talks with Marc about the origins of The Roots, the decision to become a late night house band, winning an Oscar right after the infamous slap, and why he had an underlying motivation for making his recent documentary about Sly Stone. Sign up here for WTF+ to get the full show archives and weekly bonus material! https://plus.acast.com/s/wtf-with-marc-maron-podcast. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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Yeah, let's do it. Lock the gates! ["Lock the Gates!" plays in background.] Alright, let's do this. How are you, what the fuckers? What the fuck, buddies? What the fuck fuck nicks? What the fuck wits? What the fuck oh crats what's happening? I'm Mark Maron. This is my podcast welcome to it. How's it going out there? How is it going out there? Oh?

My god, New York was fucking crazy. I did so much shit there, so many different media hits, old timey media hits. I went to CNN in the morning and it was almost like there was no one there. It was kind of depressing. The building was kind of empty. Then I went over to the Hearst building and did a thing for Esquire and a

thing for Men's Health. Same thing, the building just seemed empty in these offices. Just a lot of empty desks. It was just, I guess that's just where things are at was kind of saddening. But oddly that Hearst building is pretty amazing. And that Hudson Yard building too, where CNN is and some other stuff, I think HBO is down there now too. Pretty stunning buildings. I've gotten kind of, sometimes I lock in to buildings. I walk into public spaces.

And I got to tell you, man, I can't shut up about Kit Kemp. Yeah, I will tell you about it, I guess, in just a second. But today on the show, I'm gonna talk to Questlove. He's the co-founder of The Roots. He's a six-time Grammy winner and a Best Documentary Oscar winner for Summer of Soul. He's nominated for three Emmys this year,

including one for his documentary, Sly Lives, aka The Burden of Black Genius, which I watched. And I gotta say, which I watched. And I gotta say, it was great. It was great. You know, Quest is one of those guys that you're like, where do I start, where do I go? But he kind of goes.

You just kind of sit down and he'll take it from there. But that Sly Stone documentary was mind blowing. You know, Quest just used him as a portal to explore an entire time period and the impact Sly had on all of music. And you know, as time goes on and a guy gets the reputation of being a fuckup or a guy that just burned it all down, which Sly did,

you forget that the phenomenon of Sly Stone was much bigger than the few songs you might know. And the way Quest kind of goes into his work, his psyche, his time, the people around him, it was kind of amazing how big he was. And everything just kind of goes by the wayside you know everything becomes nostalgia everything becomes just a YouTube video everything becomes I don't know just sort of like hey that's behind us I guess a lot of comics are doing this re-add comedy festival. Brought to you by the people that brought us 9-11.

Okay, I guess that's nostalgia, getting their check signed by the guy who buzzsawed a journalist and put him in a piece of luggage. Yeah, I mean, you know, look at, right? Money's money, right? I don't know. Does anything matter anymore? Back to business, folks. Back to business. I was talking about KitKamp. First of all, I can't shut up about KitKamp.

Sometimes I get kind of connected to public space or private space or whatever, but I guess she co-owns the Ferndale Hotels. I stayed at the Crosby in New York and I love that fucking hotel It's a little pricey for me but we got the HBO rate and they help you know, they kind of picked up part of it and I just the times I've been There one time Dreamworks put me up there and I stayed at a suite and I never understood interior Design until I stayed at that place.

I mean, it was just everywhere you looked, it was just mind blowing. I feel like I've talked about her before. And I don't know that there's any reason to talk about her. I mean, she doesn't need promotion. But every time I stay at one of her hotels, like the Crosby, I just wander around going like, look at these chairs. It's a totally different fabric on this one than the other one. The walls, the wall treatments have fabrics.

Everything's different colors. It seems like it wouldn't match, but it's fucking genius. The aesthetic is like totally unique, but grounded in something kind of traditional, almost English, but the colors and the fabrics and the wall treatments and the things on the wall and the chairs and the fucking table, like I'm having people go over there.

I swear to God, when I was over there, Bo and Yang came by because I interviewed him. You'll hear that. But like after we talked, I'm like, let me show you around the hotel. Like it was like my fucking house. Every room is different. The headboards, the wall treatment,

the, you know, the fabrics on the couches. I can't even, look, I'm not telling you to, the fabrics on the couches. I can't even look. I'm not telling you to stay there. Just look her up. Look up Kit Kemp hotels and just look at those interiors and tell me that your fucking mind isn't blown. Just tell me that. Would you tell me it?

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I watched my special again on a big screen. Obviously, the special is out now on HBO and HBO Max seems to be getting a lot of good feedback, which I'm happy about. I like hearing about it, but I do like, I like when real critics assess my work. People have really a depth of analysis and thought and reference. I enjoy reading it. Even if it's not good, I generally learn something. There's a difference between a piece of criticism and a fucking review.

A review just picks these points. It's usually slightly stilted or not at all to the writer's point of view, but it's usually only a few paragraphs. And you can you kind of tell what their angle is, even if it's a relatively good review, if they're just kind of, you know, going through the paces. But I will say this, the New York Times Jason Zinnerman did a beautiful piece, not just about the special, but sort of about the weaving of the special with what I do on the podcast. And he's been sort of on top of my shit for a long time.

He knows what I do. He knows my work and he's been there for a long time. He knows what I do. He, you know, he knows my work and he's been there for a long time. But this is a, it was a beautiful piece and a real honor to read it. Catherine Van Aarondonk over at Vulture. She also did kind of a sweeping piece about me and the special, but knowing my work, going back and sort of like making me even look at things a little differently. That's what I like about a good review. And The Atlantic did a very nice piece, Vikram Murthy.

Again, people who know my work, who think about my work, who can assess it over sometimes decades, I'm not just tooting my horn about good reviews, but these were thorough, so I can, learning someone else's point of view when it's kind of laid out there and thoughtful, it's helpful to me. I don't know how it lands.

I don't know how people frame it. I know the way I think it should be framed generally, but by watching it for the upteenth time, well, not that many, but probably the fourth or fifth time in a live audience on a big screen, that's when it starts to break down for me. I'm like, then it gets nitpicky, you know? But I think it looked great. But afterwards, after the screening, Jim Gaffigan moderated a conversation with me, and that

was fun. It was fun. And I believe, if I'm not mistaken, we are going to put it up for Thursday's show. So thanks for watching it if you watched it. I know that the Theo von clip has gone viral. I love that bit. I imagine Theo can take it. I don't know.

I thought it was pretty good. I thought it was a solid, kind of acute busting of balls, but it was a joke and it was funny. So we'll see. But that seems to be getting out there to the right and wrong people. But all in all, when I got home on Saturday, I was wiped out. It was a long bit of press and a long week of press.

And I was just kind of beside myself starting to re-obsess on my life, on whatever's under my toenail, which I think is just a bruise, but I'm probably gonna go in and look because people make me paranoid. But now I'm looking at it right now. I'm pretty sure I dropped something on there, but I always think cancer.

Yeah, and my cats, and my cats. That's back to life. Pick your anxiety. Why not just enjoy it? Why not come home the day your fucking special premieres, that's on Friday, and not be a fucking anxious, exhausted, fucked up wreck of a person? Huh? Why not do that?

Well, that would be a nice way to treat yourself, Mark. Why do that? Well, that would be a nice way to treat yourself, Mark. Why do that? As summer winds down and the chaos of back-to-school season ramps up, are your healthy eating habits slipping? Are you doing more takeout? Are you overdoing it on the unhealthy options? Home Chef delivers fresh ingredients and delicious meals directly to you so you can end the summer with a simplified routine that results in flavorful meals everyone will love. Users of leading meal kits have rated Home Chef number one in quality, convenience, value, taste, and recipe ease. And why wouldn't they, with more than 30 options to choose from each week across a variety of different dietary options? Just this week alone there's spinach and artichoke cream sirloin, sweet chili salmon with spicy mango salsa, Dijon pork chop and mashed cauliflower, and much more, much much more, huh?

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He has done a lot of stuff, and it's hard to find an entry point. But like I said before, we just, he kind of just got going going and I just went there with him. And, but I'll tell you one thing, that Sly documentary is great and he's nominated for three Emmys this year. Best documentary or non-fiction special for that one, Sly Lives. Best music direction for SNL 50, the Homecoming concert. And best direction for a special for ladies and gentlemen 50 years of SNL music. Man, that's a lot of uh, it's a lot of weight. But exciting. This is me talking to Questlove. Looking for a community that has it all? Welcome to Crossings, the urban hub of West Lethbridge. At Crossings you'll find a vibrant village designed for living, working and connecting.

With top-notch schools, a state-of-the-art rec center, retail spaces and parks, it's more than a neighborhood, it's a lifestyle. Enjoy NHL-sized arenas, an aquatic center, an accessible playground, a 55-acre sports park, pathways and a library with enriching programs. Learn more at crossingslethbridge.ca. This is a full circle. I don't even know if you know how much of a full circle moment this is.

For you? Yeah, for me, because, um, I'm a fan of the This is a full circle. I don't even know if you know how much of a full circle moment this is. For you? Yeah, for me, because your obsession with the SNL ecosystem, I kind of rode your wave into that, even though like I believe you're, you're this particular part of your podcast started like 2008, 2009. Yeah. Yeah. So I think between, between the, uh, oral history book and you know, a year before your podcast comes on, of course, like I'm

getting lured into the world. Yeah, I'm getting lured into. The world? Yeah, I'm getting lured into what I call 30 Rock University. Yeah. And yeah, I'll say that your podcast was a really major, major part of my, it was an education, it was a crash course

that I needed. And it helped? Oh, in ways you would imagine. Like if I'm really honest about it, I think the first person I wanted to know once I was done my part of the doc, you know there's six docs done for SNL. For the music part. Yeah. Is that nominated for an Emmy too You know, there's six docs done for SNL. For the music part.

Yeah. Is that nominated for an Emmy too? Yes, it's nominated. What was it, like 50 years of SNL music? I did 50 years of SNL music. Also got nominated for the Friday night music concert they threw at Radio City. What's my third one for?

So why? Oh my god yeah they'll kill me. Dude that's... Sorry Disney. Yeah Sly. That thing is so good dude. Thank you. So yeah but I when I was finished I even more than trying to impress Lauren and the and the anyone in the 30 Rock ecosystem. I'm a part of your world, which are the people that are affected by the 30 Rock ecosystem. So I think in my mind, I wanted to create something that lived up to the lore and the standard. Because all the obsessions you had,

like no one was happier about your finally getting to Lauren than I was. Because I feel like this is even way better than you getting chosen in 95. So. Sure, oh yeah, no, the journey was something. And like you, if I'm honest with myself, I mean of course I'll say that in 2008, because of the way the roots operate,

the roots are essentially hip-hop's version of fish or the dead. We were a 290 year tour bus living hip-hop jam band. By our 18th year. I always joke that if you can navigate through the Japanese subway system by yourself without a label, like you've been around too much. That's how much we traveled the world

where we could just show up by ourselves like it was nothing. Then around that time we were just wondering like is there anything else for us so when Jimmy had approached us about coming to 30 Rock I kind of think my willingness to risk it all because by that point, year 18, we just got to a nirvana place, if you will, like financially and, you know, doing all right. You have money on it. Right, exactly.

And why would you, as soon as you get to the mountaintop, want to turn your back and try something untested? And I think my decision was a very, very slow cook game to just be a musical guest on a show that I've been watching since I was five years old. But none of my, I played none of my obsession cards with, the only thing that gave me away was when, the first thing I did was I arrived at Lauren's office with a giant bag of popcorn. So instantly Jimmy's like, oh he's a comedy nerd because he knows about the, if you know anything about Lauren's atmosphere during SNL

season, you know that there's a popcorn machine in his office. So I brought him a bag of popcorn which which was instantly thumbs up from Jimmy, like, oh, you belong here. But in my mind, I figured, okay, we'll come here for a little bit, and eventually gotta figure out my way to get up on the eighth floor. So it's kind of weird that I've been a part

of SNL's whole system in every way possible, except for the one way I wanna be. Which is what, performing? Which is just a musical guest on the show. Like we've backed three acts on there. I mean technically I guess you could say, yeah technically the Roots were the musical guests for the 50th anniversary, but I've been a punchline,

I've been on a sketch, a weekend update, I've been part of at least two Lonely Island cancel bits or whatever. The Roots have never played, the Roots. Yeah, that's just, only because I, you know, I was raised in a really weird household that didn't want me to watch television, but. What was the reasoning on that? Oh God, all right, so, television but what was the reasoning on that oh god alright so you know I was I

was impressionable as a kid you remember the old Hawaiian punch commercials sure where punchy yeah the Hawaiian native yeah who would go up to some poor sad sucker of a tourist guy. You know, hey, how about not just wearing punch? And he just punched the shit out of him with a bunch of fruit. I love that commercial a lot and unknowingly asked my mom to participate with me as punchy and her as the, I was like, mom, bend down.

Okay, now I'm gonna say, how about not just said, why don't you say, she said, sure. And cut to them taking the TV away. However, because my parents were musicians, I wasn't allowed to watch TV, but I was allowed to watch PBS, any educational shows. And if it were music, they would wake me up. This is how liberal they were. Before the 80s, they did a total Flanders Christian turnaround by 82, but from birth until 82, I was born in 71. RG They became born again?

AC Yeah, well everyone did. You know, like Donna Summer became a Christian. Like anyone that, my parents were like hip... RG It took a lot of coke to. Donna Summer became a Christian. Anyone that, my parents were like hip. It took a lot of coke to get Donna Summer's there. Well, yeah. Yeah, I just think that once you're turning 40 in the early 80s, they believed in the original make America great again.

We need to atone for our sins. Everyone became a Christian. Once you're a, I'm saying secular, I hate that term. Once you're a pop singer, you know, BJ Thomas was on it, Donna Summer was on it, like the 700 Club or the PTL Club, and now I'm a born again Christian. So there was a uncool shutdown period.

So I was called the post disco repentance. Well, my parents were part of that. And so, but what they would do was, in the 70s, like, they wake me up. I, you know, I'd have to go to bed every night at eight. However, if The Temptations were on The Tonight Show, The Jackson Five on The Tonight Show, and most importantly, like,

Midnight Special will come on at 12.30, on Fridays, Don Kirshner's rock concert was on at 1 Show. Most importantly, like Midnight Special will come on at 12.30 on Fridays, Don Kirshner's rock concert was on at 1 a.m. Yeah. Most of Soul Train was a 12 in the afternoon experience for most of America. Yeah. And Philly was a 1 a.m. experience. And so they'd wake me up at 12.30,

so I'd go and turn on SNL, which Weekend Update was like a two segment thing in the 70s, and then Jim Henson's Muppets, and then the musical guests would do two songs. I'd watch those religiously. Soul Train comes on at 1, 2 a.m. back in bed, up for church at seven. That was my life for the first like eight years. So I remember all those SNL. Sure, the early ones. Yeah, like I just watched everything,

religiously from 75 on. Yeah. Yeah, I will say that next to you, I was probably, your fandom for that institution matched mine, that's why I felt like I have to come on this podcast just to. Get closure?

Just to bond with you, exactly, and get closure with you. But when you took the gig over there, like given that you guys were at the top of your game, I mean was there sort of a band discussion that got heated? It wasn't heated, the thing is that, you know, the roots, Tariq and I started the roots in 87. And we were group and name only. And the thing was, like, at our high school was like fierce competition. Right. Which high school is that?

The Philadelphia High School of Creative and Performing Arts. And this is what year? I came in 87, graduated 89. So by this point, boys to men. So hip hop was competitive as hell. Oh, very much so. Yeah. Very much so. Like, for me, that was one of the first public schools

I went to. Yeah. Like, previously before performing arts, my parents had me in these like college prep, you know, future Jeopardy! contestant type of schools. Because you showed proclivity in the memorization area? Exactly, I was, you know, the kid that uses the nine syllable word and then gets tossed in the trash can like a second later, like nerd!

Yeah, yeah. I, no, that's, and da da da, and I get taught. That was me. So at the time, like anyone who's running jazz right now like went to my school. Boys to Men were pretty much at the, came out the gate as stars. So Tariqa and I really didn't make noise

until maybe two years after we graduated. We were buskin' on the streets of Philadelphia, got a deal. Buskin' how? Like what were you playin'? Uh, so, okay, so my dad's plan was for me to either go to Curtis Institute in Philly or Juilliard or the New School for jazz.

And when I did my Juilliard New School audition, I took the train up, Tariq came with me that weekend. I had a friend that lived up there, so we spent the weekend in New York. And when we came back home, this is like the black version of the Bugle Boys Jean commercial. The world's most beautiful girl comes up to me and says, excuse me, are you the drummer

in the Spike Lee Levi's commercial? And my dumb ass said, no, I'm not. And she was like, oh, okay. She walks away all sultry and Tariq's looking at me like, why would you tell her that you wouldn't like, you know, like, why don't you get her number? No, she, okay. Because boys to men had chosen me to be in their very first video. Yeah.

They had their first single was Motown Philly. So I was in that video playing. Right. What I should have said was no, you're thinking of, I had a very distinctive hairstyle, similar to what the kid wore in the Spike Lee thing. So it was easy to get the two of them mixed up. But what she wanted to say was,

are you the German, the boys, the men, Motown Philly video? And then she could have been, you know, wife and kids or whatever, but. Whole different life. Right. Instead, And then she could have been, you know, wife and kids or whatever, but whole different life. Right. Instead, um, she, I said, no, she got off the train and Tariq was just like ragging

me all weekend. Like dumb ass, dumb ass. So the next day, uh, crashed out at, at my crib. Next day, soul train comes on and that commercial comes on and we had the Eureka slow motion discovery like Why don't we do that? And so literally two hours later, I grab buckets and my drumsticks and we go to South Street in Philadelphia, which is like the East Village or

What's the beach in California where everyone... Venice? Yeah, like Venice Beach, like a place where population is and counterculture, and... So you're playing the buckets. I play the buckets, and he rhymed for about an hour straight, and if we don't make $120, then that's the only time we'll ever do that. Then it becomes, hey, remember that time we-

Yeah, we did that dumb thing. Yeah, we went on South Street and made 40 bucks each. But we made $120 and it was like, we're rich. That was date night money. So then it was like, do we do this next week? And the difference between doing this next week was, I told one of my friends in jazz class, like, yeah man, I went busking and whatever.

He's like, whoa, you did, can I join you? I said, yeah, I don't care, cause he had a car. He had a, Josh Abrams, he's like a big deal in the jazz world now. He had a large, I think I saw him, what's he play? He's a upright bass player. Yeah, I think I saw him. What's he play? He's an upright bass player. Yeah, I think I saw him up at the, at Dizzy's Lounge.

He, yeah, Josh is a thing. Yeah. He's a thing. So, um, he shows up to my house with his upright bass. Yeah. And I grab my buckets, he's like, whoa. He's like, why are you bringing your buckets? Get your real drums.

And I'm like, ah man, my dad's gonna kill me. He's like, well your dad's away for the weekend. He's not gonna know. I was like, yeah, you're right. So then I took my drums out, and that's when the roots, as you know it now, really started to exist, because the second we did that,

then suddenly the doors were open, whereas like, you mean guys who want to play? Yeah, like we, well for the most part, we would play on South Street for four hours. Yeah. And then it's guaranteed that somebody, there's five colleges in Philly, so somebody from Temple or UPenn or Drexel or St. Joseph

will come to us, give us a card and say, hey, play Art Kegger for 75 bucks. A lot of- For jazz? Well, a lot of, and this is the part that's sort of cringey, we would get a lot of, well, I don't like rap music, but I like you guys. So, it was kind of like a reverse Rudolph

and Red Nose Reindeer where we got to, the odd guy out gets suddenly to play, So it was kind of like a reverse Rudolph and Red Nose Reindeer where we got to, the odd guy out gets suddenly to play, like our flyer for J.C. Dobbs, I looked at it, Nirvana will come to do, and this is a club, this is like pre-teen spirit Nirvana. Like, bleach. Yeah, and like literally the lineup is like

the future of music right now. We got to play clubs that your average Philadelphian, especially in hip hop, like there was no outlet. So playing on the corners was like YouTube for us. About a year of that, then we get into the craziest bidding war ever, and we wind up choosing Geffen Records in 93.

For the first record? Yeah, for our, well, I mean, but our first album was our demo. Our second album was like our major label debut. The demo was, that was Organics? Organics, yeah. Organics, and that was, did you want that released? We didn't know. Like we made a single and we had like an eight hour

session in the studio. We made the single in 45 minutes and it's like well what else he got? Started making up songs and next thing you know we just had an Almsworth. From our busking days a gentleman named Jamal Ateen Takuma. He's an avant-garde, he's part of the, kind of the Black Rock coalition of Vernon Reed, Living Color, progressive jazz. He did some festival in Germany and had a budget which allowed him to bring musicians from around the world. So he's like, come to Germany.

So we decided to really capitalize on this and turned those sluice songs into our first CD which also turned into our demo for labels. So once we get back from Germany, it was just one gig, we made it like it was like oh. How many in the ensemble initially? I'll say that core roots, by this point, we were a foursome. It was like a bass player, a drummer, and two MCs. Eventually became five people, a gentleman named Scott Storch,

who pretty much wrote all the hits for the 90s, for Eve and everyone. He was our fifth member. So from that demo alone, got the attention of like eight record labels. And then we chose Geffen. And then something catastrophic happens in April, which is the death of Kurt Cobain kind of pushed

us into panic mode because we chose Geffen one for the at that time they had like an unlimited budget you know it was like Nirvana yeah Guns N' Roses Aerosmith yeah they were making billions and so they started a black label division and first Aerosmith that went back to Columbia and then was that like Multi, you had that billion dollar deal forever And then it was obvious like Guns N' Roses wasn't gonna have a follow-up to use your illusion yeah, anytime soon and then

April Kurt Cobain happens, and my manager was like, I get the feeling that they're gonna drop the entire black department before this thing even starts. If you remember the movie Ghost, the way that Swayze convinces Whoopi Goldberg to go to the bank to close an account, they had so much money that we basically controlled our budget.

Like we didn't have a staff or anything. It was like three or four people, not a full staff. So we had the credit cards. And so basically when we turned in our album, we closed our account and we stole our own money. And we decided we were going gonna pull a Hendrix, and so we brought eight one-way tickets to London, and we lived in Europe for about two years. We wanted London to be our hub. You were trying to avoid them coming after the money? Well, no, we, like, by 93, the venue structure for bands had completely shut down yeah, like bands were becoming a novelty

It's not this I mean by then, you know 93 there was still like grunge and rock was still Active but you know by the time we got a deal the the Roots were one of five black bands left. In the 70s, there were hundreds. And now we were one of the last five with the deal. Because it all shifted to hip-hop more? Well, one, economic-wise, it's easier to control a solo artist. Really, for black music, the downfall

had it happen in the 80s. Michael leaves the Jacksons. to control a solo artist. Really for black music, the downfall had happened in the 80s. Michael leaves the Jacksons, Lionel leaves the Commodores. Cameo started off as a 17-man group, now they're a trio. The point is Sisters whittled down a set of four or three members and now they're doing pop music. So there was something that happens in the 80s in which all the funk groups all the soul groups

all the all the captains of those teams go solo and They go pop and so and the idea of a band just wasn't an appealing thing and Economically, what was the model for that though? What was the pressure on them to do that? Who started jet was that a post disco thing too? like to separate them, okay started, was that a post-disco thing too? Like to separate them? Okay, so in a kind of Malcolm Gladwellian explanation way, I'll say that a lot of our 80s icons were born in the second half of 1958. Yeah. Yeah, Madonna Prince Springsteen Jackson all

You know in 1958 born I Will say that Michaels probably the perfect example where once Jackson five hit in 69 He's 11, but they're playing it like he's eight. Yeah, so he's Precocious and smart enough to be an eight-year-old that has the wisdom of an adult. Yeah. But he's also innocent enough to not be threatening. He's not hide your daughters.

Yeah. Threatening. So basically the Jacksons were the first group to truly enjoy the accolades and whatever was denied to whoever came before them because of, you know, like again, Chuck Berry's not able to sleep in the hotels or eat in the restaurants. A little richer. Right, exactly. So the timing of Thriller coming, when people speak of Michael's Off the Wall album, it's

the quality of it. Oh man, this is an amazing record. When people speak of Michael's Off The Wall album, it's the quality of it. Oh man, this is an amazing record. The productions and Quincy Jones just da da da da. When people think of thriller, they talk about the quantity. How many wars did he win? How much money did he make?

How many copies did he sell? And that sort of starts the wheel turning and everyone that, oh, I can make money and make a living da da da da. So. Without these guys? Yeah, and there's a diminished return thing. And I'm not trying to paint Thriller as, Thriller's, you know, in hindsight,

even though Thriller changed all of our lives, I would almost be in the middle and say, it did more damage than good. Yes, it was revolutionary and changed everything. Changed videos, changed marketing, but then it became the carrot on a stick that even he himself, Michael, couldn't try to outdo. Right, and then we'd see how that ends.

You know what I mean? And so, I'll say for the most part, the idea of black musicianship really just started not to matter as much in the late 80s. Isn't that crazy? Because when did you, but starting out in jazz, and I know you started out as a kid,

but I mean, was the destination, like how you did start with your dad right so I started out in doo-wop right my dad my dad was a doo-wop legend that was on a chess records so he had his his group was Leander's in the hearts they they were they had like three regional hits doo ops made a big impression on a lot of people well I meant that's the thing. By the time the 70s came around, the first wave of nostalgia period. American, graffiti, shanana playing, Woodstock, Laverne Shirley, Happy Days, Grease.

So my dad was instantly on the bandwagon of, he retired in 1965. He met my mom, they opened up a clothes boutique, and then his old manager called back, he's like, Lee, you'll never guess this, the 35 year olds today still like the music from when they were 12. You can go back on the road.

And he was like, get out of here, I can't do that. Once there was enough safety for him to shut down his clothing business that he had with my mother, then it's like, oh, I can actually make a living as an adult doing the stuff I was doing when I was a teenager. Being exploited, probably. Well, yeah, I mean, not exploited.

It was a singles business, right? Well, it was a singles business. But he pretty much, his market was, for the Northeast, that was very big for do-op. So we always had the Catskills. There was a big market in New England. Well, it kinda started in Philly, right? Yes.

Started in Philly, but then there's also New York, Catskills, New England, Atlantic City, especially. So any place where there's legalized gambling, Puerto Rico, Vegas. And occasionally, Dick Clark would throw these extravaganza's at Madison Square Garden. My dad and 14 other acts doing three songs each. songs each and so that was like from 72 to 75 and then, then my dad sort of nuanced his way to a nightclub act. And that's where I came to play so, babysitting really wasn't a thing until the late 80s. Meaning, my parents didn't trust any stranger to watch me

so you had to be a part of the act. In order to get into the club. Well, just to keep an eye on me. So they made up jobs. So I'll say that around seven or eight, my dad kind of trained me and my sister. Like I was, it was very normal for an eight-year-old to come into a nightclub establishment with some measuring tape, ask for a ladder, I pull out a razor blade, cut out light gels,

place light gels, put electric tape down, ring the monitors out, I'd run the sound. I was the richest like nine, ten year old ever. I'd make about a hundred and twenty dollars a week between like seventy nine to eighty three. And then one day my dad's drummer got sick. He had a motorcycle accident. We were at Radio City. My dad was like, well, you know the show. And he's elated because he doesn't have to pay a drummer and a bandleader like 650 bucks. But had you spent time on the drums? I started drumming when I was two.

Oh, okay. I got my first set when I was seven. But I didn't know that my entry was gonna be Radio City. Radio City Music Hall, like we in a full orchestra. But he's like, you know the song already. Like it's 20 minutes out, go ahead. So I did it.

And then he, my first gig with him was at Radio City. My last gig with him was at Madison Square Garden. And then the next day I got on a plane and we moved to London. You know, it's weird about Doo-Wop, but I think Doo-Wop had a profound impact on Frank Zappa. Oh, absolutely. I mean, it's like all the humor in Zappa,

it's all Doo-Wop. Yeah, absolutely. See, even I thought it was, I thought it was more novel than anything. And then when I was working on my first film, Summer of Soul, which at the time we were calling Black Woodstock, my first bout of research was I watched everything about actual woodstock

before I did my film. And I found out the story was that And I found out the story was that Sean Anah came as a recommendation from Jimi Hendrix. I was like, really? Is he a serious artist like Hendrix? He's like, no, man, these guys do the music just like the 50s. Like, I couldn't rap that.

So once I've played with the Ice Week brothers, so like, he knows it. Yeah, but in my mind, I think I was looking at my dad and his peers kind of the way that like Roots kids look at us now. Like I know they're backstage watching like, man, this ain't NBA Youngboy, look at these old rappers on, like.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, sure. But I didn't realize like how heavy nostalgia culture was. And that was the first wave in nostalgia. But also, so rock and roll starts what, 57, 58, depending if you believe it's Bill Haley or Ike Turner. And then it was invented in their lifetime. So whatever came out of that momentum profoundly affected them.

So it's almost like a childhood, it's part of you. It's not even nostalgia, I would think, for Hendrik. Yeah, looking in the rear view mirror is everyone's favorite pastime. Yeah, but it moves you. The music kind of brings back something. I guess that is nostalgia.

But I mean, a lot of Jimmy's stuff, you know, kind of grew up in that that early R&B stuff, right? Yes, absolutely. Play with. Yeah. Matter of fact, the story of him sleeping on the the Isley brothers, I guess, discovered him like on a park bench. Yeah. Sleeping out Cafe What and heard him play guitar. Yeah guitar and bring him home to Jersey and then he becomes their... So that gave you a new respect for your dad? It did.

I mean, at the time when I was doing it, I wasn't looking down at it. I think maybe the first time I had questions, like my first day of school, my first day of school music class are our homework. So what I remember about my first day of school was that this is the week that Stevie Wonder releases songs in the key of life. Like album releases were like an event. And when this album comes along, it almost felt like, I would say it was almost akin to like black version of War of the Worlds. Like we brought the record, we all sat as a family

in front of the stereo and just sat and listened to it from start to finish. I've never seen a book, I'd never seen liner notes before. Pictures. Some reading the liner notes and everything about, what's a harp? What's a synclavier? Ask my mom what's this word,

and reading all the musicians. That was our homework. We had to purchase that album, bring it in the next day for further instruction. And I believe the next homework assignment was Bring In Your Favorite 45. Where were you going to school then? This was the private version of the performing arts school in Philadelphia. And you bring in your favorite 45? And so I brought in Frankie Lyman and the

Teenagers Why Do Fools Fall in Love. That's a good song. Right, but here's the thing though. So when I submitted my 45 in, my teachers, a little perplexed, like, oh, this was a hit when I was a kid. I was like, huh? I thought all doo-wop music was like new. Yeah. No, my parents were just hiding like,

Disco Duck by Rick Dees from me, and he was born to be alive. Like all those disco songs. They did a great. Actually, I believe my keyboard player now still hasn't broken the news that Michael Jackson is no longer with us to like one of his youngest kids. So it's like I even see my band members like,

and I'm saying, yo man, you're gonna do them a disservice like this Nas album came out 35 years ago yo like what he brought his kid to a Wu-Tang show and his kids like seven years old I'm like dude you are you ever gonna tell him the truth that this song is like 30 years old like his kids think that the hip-hop they're listening to is brand new. But that's what got him, so he wants to make sure it gets in there. Yeah, parents are dirty like that. So yeah, when I was young, once I got into school, then suddenly someone drew a timeline of like, this is old music, and this is new music. But I was too late, it was too late then. And- You missed a chunk.

Yeah, but then also I became, I pretty much, I'll say that I was Lester Bangs by 11. And especially because I was reading periodicals. Like I was reading cream at 10. You know, I was bored at home. There's nothing to do but read all these billboards and Rolling Stones and stuff. And so, like, I had.

Did your dad have them? Yeah, because my dad had them. Industry magazine. Yeah, I'd read them all. Billboard, Cream, Rolling Stone, all those periodicals, cash box. And so, I'll say that I had an adult's knowledge, or at least adult music snobs, knowledge of music

by the time I was like 12. And I was trapped. Like he had successfully raised a clone. Yes, a music snob clone. Well, where does jazz come in though? OK, so I went to private school up until the 10th grade. Yeah. 11th grade, I begged my parents like, I want to go to a real school where kids are playing instruments and acting and yeah, I wanted to go to the public school version, the Philadelphia version of fame.

I wanted to go to that performing arts school. Yeah. To be honest with you, there was a girl school version, the Philadelphia version of Fame. I wanted to go to that performing arts school. To be honest with you, there was a girl who danced on a very popular local television show. The same show that Kelly Ripa danced on before she became famous. It was called, what was local, it was called Dancing On Air. It got syndicated to Dance Party USA.

So it was a popular local dance show. And there were two girls that me and my best friend were into, so we wrote them letters in the summer, like, dear, would you go on our junior prom with us, and da da da da da, whatever. And my girl responded, his didn't, and that was my further motivation to make the sacrificial friendship bond. I said,

you know what, I'm going to transfer to her school and then I'm gonna hook you up for your junior prom. But really I just wanted to go to that school to go to, you know, private school. He never got hooked up with that girl, but I got into that school, and that's how I went to performing arts, and literally it was like, it was like fame. Kids were breaking out in the production, boys were singing in the bathroom,

testing the acoustics and all that stuff, and there was a Jets and Sharks or Bloods and Crips version of gangs in my school. And the conservative side was Christian McBride and Joey DeFrancisco. And these guys were like, like typically Miles Davis would pull Joey out of school for like two months to tour with him. The Marcellus's would use Christian Mc, these guys were like 15, 16 and already like young lions. So, in order to get their respect, I had to learn their language.

But then, on the left side of things, there was a cat named Kurt Rosenwinkel who is also just, he's on Verve Records, like a genius musician. And he was more Zappa, Cap and B-Far of experimental. So I'm like serving, I joke that I was on the side of whoever, whatever gang's winning. Like Richard Pryor once had that joke, like I joined two gangs and whoever was winning, that's the side I was on.

So just to fit in, I had to crash course jazz. But on the other side of that during lunch breaks, the cool kids table were the rap kids. And they were all the ex graffiti artists of Philly that got arrested and had to, you know, when you got arrested for graffiti in Philly, you had to like paint walls and do respectable art. And then maybe one out of eight would be like, wow, you have a really good eye for art. Hey, why don't you go to performing arts school?

So Tariq Schrader, Black Thought, my partner in The Roots, was a graffiti artist that got caught and was a really brilliant, gifted visual artist. And he goes to performing arts school. So all the thug kids are in hip hop and so when you're looking for what's my table in the lunch room, I was allowed to sit with the cool kids because I was willing to beat the lunch table with spoons and my fists so that they could freestyle for like hours at a time.

Yeah. I didn't have to say nothing as long as I just kept the beat going. Yeah. They would just rhyme all day. Yeah. So that's kind of how, you know, that's kind of how the roots got started. But you weren't ever a jazzhead?

My dad was big into respectability politics. You know, there's always that adults like, tuck your shirt in and, you know. Stop showing your boxing underwear and thinks that every rap song you listen to is something I think bitch and whatever. Phil Florn, he sort of looked at hip hop that way. And so he wanted me either in classical music

or jazz music because that's respectable. And of course, his thing is he's thinking about my survival. But- and of course, his thing is he's thinking about my survival. But, uh. As much as you can when you've agreed to let your son pursue a musician's career and support it, it gets a little tricky, given that there's no security in any of it, to find a place for him. People think I'm joking, but my dad didn't find out

about The Roots until our second record. Was he okay with it by then? Once? Well, no, it was like, I think my cousins gave me away. They're like, Uncle Lee, you know, our version of the New York Times, which was the Philly Enquirer, you know, comes in with like, you know, I made the front page of the Sunday paper, and he's like, so what is this? And I played it off like, oh, me and Tariq got some project. You know, whatever.

And I didn't break the news to him that I wasn't going to Juilliard or New School or whatever. But I'll say that, and again, his thing was always about safety and survival. And a lot of his fear. His family did not support his, as much as we talk about conservative movements in America, and I know most people think when

you think of the conservative right, you think of whoever's watching Fox News or whatever. I assure you, no one's more conservative than the black Christian family. And for him, it was just, definitely by our fourth album, The Things Fall Apart record, that's when he was like, okay, he's safe.

Number one, it's like, well, here's your keys to your car and here's your new house, dad. You know what I mean, that. But mostly, yeah, he just. That was one big hit on there? Well, that's where we won our first Grammy. Like, Geffen, we were probably the last group that had the system of like, slow rollout,

and you know, we will work this slowly. Of course, we wanted success instantly, but it took four albums for us to build, you know, like our fan base. Yeah. And a lot of blood and sweat behind that, but it was the right move. Like if you ask me now,

was it better to take this tortoise and hare route? I'll say that yes, it was absolutely. Well, you were getting all these other skills. Yeah, but I mean, at the time, it was the tortoise and the hare. Like, you're watching the Fuji surpass you on the racetrack, and then you're watching Al Kass surpass you on the racetrack, and then you're watching Kanye

and everyone else, and you're like, oh, we're just never gonna make it. We're slowly gonna get there, but I will say that we're still actively here, still acknowledged and literally better than we were when we first started. Most people peek out, you know, every group, so it's like, oh, I like the first five, Akram.

Well, it's kind of interesting, though, given your father's sensibility around security, that that must have played into the decision to be the band, you know, to, when, to make the business decision around being this, you know, the, the show band. Oh, for the tonight show. Yeah. So yeah, after 18 years of just 200 gigs a year, and you know, we, it wasn't joking,

you know, Celine Dion had managed to figure out like a residency, like we were always like, man, just, there ever was a way for us to just make the living we're making now, but just in one place and not having. Reasonable hours. Well, yeah, like I'm the only non-married member of the group because you can't have any sustainable relationship.

Yeah. You know, you can't have a sustainable relationship and really be an effective member of this life. You know what I mean? And so, when this opportunity came up, Neil Brennan, co-creator of The Chappelle Show, had said to Jimmy, quote, Jimmy's like, well, what about music? Who should I get? And Brennan's quote was, well, ask the roots, dot, dot, dot, dot, dot, because they know

all the great musicians and the best musicians around. And Jimmy just cut it off at the ellipsis. Ask the roots, dot, dot, dot. So he asked us, and I mean, I'll be honest with you, we just got into the mountaintop of really good money. Like the idea of touring and having maybe five to six figures in your bank account when you get home was a new idea. I didn't think we were going to take it.

And then Jimmy did something miraculous once, which was he came to see us in UCLA and I had did some college interview inside my trailer and 20 minutes later I'm done the interview and I come out my trailer and I see Jimmy and the rest of the roots and a kind of an eight is enough bring it on human pyramid. And the fact that Black Thought was on the bottom row, getting his like $2,000 Japanese denim dirty, I looked, I was like, what did this guy do to disarm the roots? That, like, I've never seen someone disarm us

in record time. They're all smiling and joking. And I'm like, looking at my manager, like, we're not getting rid of this guy no time soon, right? He's just like, nah, I think we're stuck. So we definitely weren't gonna accept the gig, but he just, you know, people ask me all the time, like, is he always like that?

Is he always on 100? He is always on, he's the spike in any punch. I think he's, I like doing his show more than any of them because he's a great audience and he's like engaged. We're still, we're still, I feel like we are the talk show of we're the pop culture offspring that grew up watching Letterman, and you know what I mean?

That sort of thing. And now we're the generation after. So for me, it's still, like you would think that we would slightly, maybe perhaps, like, yes, is it new like the honeymoon was, your first three years? No, everything was exciting and new. And sure, oh my God, dude, Bruce Springsteen's like,

right there, oh my God, Prince destroyed your guitar, dude. Wow, no one caught it when it hit the ground. Like all these things are happening. But even now, like 16, 17 years later, I still find it, like I love coming to 30 Rock. I still find it, like I love coming to 30 Rock. And especially now that I can sneak up to 8H and just sit there and watch that whole world. Like that's, and you mentioned that,

like just watching how the whole place operates. That's the only, like, you know, most people come, they wanna hang in the green room or in Lawrence's office. But also you like do all those other stuff too. Yeah, I take it in. I do. You're a filmmaker, Grammys, producing, all of it. And I want to say that, you know, I watched the slide doc.

I thought that like, you know, you did an amazing thing to just sort of, you know, honor and almost establish that guy's legacy publicly. And you know, because I don't, you know, I know the songs and I know him. But we more or less know of the fuckery. Right, a little bit, but I knew he was great. But you know, for you and the way that you put it together, you used him as a portal to sort of like

explain the expansion of music through this one guy. And it's all justified. I think most of the time, and I go through this myself where, often times when people talk about the hard traveled road of successful people, a lot of the times you're expecting a defensive response like, oh, the world's tiniest violin, oh, well, who's me, the rich successful.

The big star got fucked up, yeah. Right, right, and the thing is is that in my career, especially with my canon as far as the artists that I'm associated with, as far as many of the acts whose records I've been on are produced or drummed for or whatever, they kind of have one thing in common, which is a tendency to subconsciously or maybe purposely self-sabotage.

And I'm often asked, well, why is this person, you know the term, you only have one job, like all you have to do is show up, and why is this person like, you know, the term like you only have one job, like all you have to do is show up and why is this person always later? Why is this person, why is this person day? Why is this person on drugs? Why is this person always fucking up? Why is this person? And I really, I got tired of answering that question and I figured this is probably the closest way that I can explain to you what a person feels like. If they are a successful, unwilling participant. And my main goal was to get

all of these artists to sort of be a proxy for Slided to answer these questions. How'd you frame it, the burden of black genius? The burden of black genius, yeah. And first of all, one of the hardest things, the one thing that isn't clear in the doc is the staggering amount of nos That I got from the music community in terms of being a talking

At the end of the day. Yes getting Andre 3000 D'Angelo now Rogers like getting the the talking heads I got was enough, but there's at least 15 other artists that either agreed and stood us up or last minute because vulnerability is such a hard, hard thing to be. And I know it's one of those easier said than done things. hard, hard thing to be. And I know it's one of those easier said than done things. Like if you're on the outside looking in, you're just saying like, wow, I would do anything

to spill my guts and show the world my insides and be a goldfish. But for a lot of these artists, there's nothing normal about this level of of stardom and sly was the first even though I spoke earlier about the Jackson 5 being the first recipients really the reason why Thriller was allowed to happen was because sly dropped the baton on the floor in 1974. Michael picks it up in 82 with Thriller,

but Sly was the first person that out the gate, post-civil rights period, that had the freedom to do whatever he wanted. Every creative idea he had was like an establishing rule. Everything that he did 50 years ago, we're still using now. The first to use a drum machine, the first to really take advantage of multi-track recording,

the bedroom musician doing everything by himself. He was the pioneer that such an amazing poet, his pin game was out of this world. But also the thing you were saying before is that he was the eye of the needle in terms of the history of music up to that point. Yeah, he was. Because he was a DJ and because he took it all in and because he had this brain

that separated sounds and melded it into his own that... But it's all sourced. He, yeah, he started out as the classical prodigy and a choir church leader by the age of six. Yeah. Was by 19 almost to the level of Casey Kasem was like he was a popular DJ. Yeah and what's weird is that he, in 62, as a radio DJ, will basically raise the counterculture tweens that we will later know as hippies. So all those hippies that you see in like the Summer of Love, 67, 68,

they're, in 1962, they're 12 and 13, listening to Sly, in the same way that that Robin Williams was in Good Morning Vietnam. That's how Sly is. He's playing piano on top of Ray Charles and he's making his own commercials up and all those things. That's how his mind works. But the one thing that a lot of the world is unaware of is that when you are in

isolated success the first thing you feel is guilt that it's happening to you and not anyone else you know so it's hard to bask in the glory of comfort when even now, like what Sly goes through in this doc is kind of like what I went through after the Oscars in 2021, like literally just this insane amount of guilt that you feel and- What about the other guys that are, you know.

Yeah, when people ask me like, what did you feel before the slap happened? You know, my, right, my, and they thought, most people thought I was just like, you know, ducking, commenting on the slap, like oh, I really wasn't paying attention. Oh, because you were the Oscar right after Chris got hit. No, that was my Oscar.

And that's the... Let me tell you how my ex-girlfriend said, she said, congratulations, you got exactly what you wanted. And I said, what do you mean? She's like, for the last two years, you've been struggling inside your own body to accept this new life that you have and you made a deal with the universe and you said man if

there ever was a way for me to quietly win this Oscar and not make anyone uncomfortable with my success like what's the quietest way I could win this Oscar and it not bother anyone. And it's like, she says that you can. Will Smith, the slap, Chris Rock. She's like you can either manifest your dreams or you can manafuck your dreams. Yeah.

And she's like you chose to manafuck it and you got exactly what you wanted. Because sure enough when the slap happened, stopped watching TV went to their phones like what the hell happened came back commercial and it was almost like I'd never won the Oscar and so in that entire year like I I then knew how sliced don't felt it was just a level of guilt and at one point, I wanted to, like I wanted to, I think I'm the first person that prayed

that I would get canceled or just make the stop. I'm not used to this level. Well, did you feel like, okay, for you. It's been a real slow burn for me, dude. And I don't think I hit that level. Did you imagine that you get to this level of, especially because you didn't design this. Since the age of two, I was raised to be on a stage,

leading my band. I want my success to look like this. And then, if someone comes to you and says, when I'm busking on South Street with my friend with a bucket and drumsticks If if some sort of Jacob Marley figure You know comes up to me says hey, okay, so it's 95. Okay, you don't know this yet, but in 27 years

you're gonna be a Oscar-winning film director and documentary maker. I looked at you like you were crazy. And he was like, no, that's not the crazy part. You'll also be the next Doc Severson and Paul Schaeffer. No, I'm not doing that. I'm doing a band with my best friend. It's hard to own yourself. I feel that now, because I'm having a lot of anxiety, because so much is going on,

and I'm not at that level where I'm winning Oscars or anything, but it's uncomfortable for me, and I just talked about it for the podcast tomorrow, to acknowledge that I'm doing good, and I actually feel good about myself, but it's alien. Is it hard to feel good in

the worst times ever? Yes. Well, that's a whole other layer. So that's the way the universe is working with me. The way that I keep secrets. Like this is the okay, just maybe 20 minutes before I got here. Yeah. I got a random call that like, dude, it's your turn, like the Simpsons just called you. And I'm like, what the? But my whole thing is, I gotta keep it a secret. I don't feel, not that I don't feel comfortable. I've done enough work in therapy to talk myself off

of like many a ledge. But yeah, I mean, every day I kind of struggle with when something really good happens to me. There's such a gutted feeling and don't let no one find out about it. But what's that? Do you identify what the source of that is? um I realized so there was a point where I kind of had

I had a therapeutic breakthrough uh during the pandemic which Helped me complete summer of soul But then I thought I was just doing uh niche documentary that no one's gonna see anyway. So, you know, three months later, and then I'll go back to the Roots album that I've been working on for the last nine years. And then, you know, once Disney starts calling you,

like, you realize that you have a chance to get on that stage to accept that award, right? And I'm like, all right, get out of here, get out. you realize that you have a chance to get on that stage to accept that award, right? And I'm like, all right, get out of here, get out. So once those doors opened, which I totally wasn't prepared for, I'll say that maybe the first four months there was an anger feeling.

Because I'm like, damn, since the age of five, I've been prepping, like, I've studied every album, every engineer, all these liner notes, like, why can't I get success on the terms that I want? I wanna be a successful musician in a band with my best friend from high school. Okay, I know what you're talking about now.

And I'm like, I didn't even go to NYU. What the fuck? So there was that and then. I know that feeling because when I got the podcast and that became successful, I'm like, I'm a comic. And people go like, I really like your show. I'm like, my comedy? They're like, oh you do comedy?

And it's like, god damn it. I went to see The Weeknd at MetLife Stadium in New York. And his audience is Jen Alpha, Jen Beard, a bunch of kids born in 2003 or whatever. And these kids walk up to me and it's like, yo, you were the guy in the SNL bit with Pete with Pete and Timothee Chalamet, right? And I was like, yeah, I was I did that too Yeah, yeah, they're like cool, and then they just walk away and so sometimes I do feel like

Someone joked I think Chappelle told me is like a Amir is sometimes, BME is sort of like people only recognize and Michael Jordan for the Haynes commercials and nothing else. So there was one time where I got a lap dance. I was at a bachelor party in Vegas for a friend. I was getting married. And so girl walks up to me me starts crying and I was like wait what happened? She's like you just don't know like I grew up as a latchkey

kid and I'm like where's this going lady where's this going and she's like you know 27 she's like but man that song that you guys did on Yo Gabba Gabba, that came out when I was 12 years old. And when I seen you I just started crying because it made me miss my grandma. We used to always sing that song and I'm like, check, please. You know what I mean? Like, that's what I'm known for.

So now just stop fighting it. Well, I think it's hard to acknowledge that it's all you. It's all you. Because even if with the Sly Doc, is that you found a way to channel all of your, not just your sort of historical wisdom, but musically historical wisdom. And also confront the question

of the burden of black genius, which most of the guys didn't really know how to frame or what you were trying to say. But then, you know, the arc of Sly's career, you know, there's also that other thing where, you know, once you appeal to all these white audiences, and then you have to deal with that guilt of selling out or tomming or whatever.

So then, you know, you got, and then he comes back around, redelivers himself to the black community community and still holds on to all of it But I thought it was a way for you to channel all the questions about yourself and and and also to really place You know the impact of a very specific guy Who was fundamentally a black musician on the entire fucking world of music? Mm-hmm, but I think that in looking at yourself that the only way that I accepted is like, you know what? I I am pretty good at this other stuff My mom when my mom first seen it. She said I see what you did there

She's like you told sly story to tell your story. Yeah. And I was like, busted. Yeah, I used a story to tell my story because I figured we might as well show the first domino falling. And so it was hard though. I will say that unlike Summer of Soul, extracting that much pain out of people and telling those stories, there's a lot of... I didn't realize realize okay, so when I used to watch the Sopranos There's a moment where dr. Melfi Has to talk to her

Therapist yeah, and I didn't realize like how met it was like oh damn Even she has to have a therapist to get rid of all the baggage that she takes on from her clients and it was one of those episodes where like Tony may or may not have just admitted that he had to handle a situation and The stress that she but that's how I felt like there was one point where I got a second therapist just because The like getting a second therapist and subsequently working on SNL was almost like my joy space

of trying to wash the sadness of the three year sly period where you, it's almost like you take on all the pain that he went through just to tell his story. And so, yeah, it's not for the faint of heart, but you know. Beautiful work though. Thank you. I mean, like, you know, it's like one of those things where I'm like, thank you, you know, for planting this guy's flag,

and then for planting your own flag, and for giving me a new understanding of, you know, a fundamental of modern music. I mean, like, it's all there. But you know, a fundamental of modern music, I mean, like, it's all there. But you know, you do that with music too. I mean, that's the one thing about, like, I'm not a huge hip hop guy, but the integration

of the textures of all music's preceding you, I mean, everything is some sort of mashup of the history of how we got here musically. Well, yeah, I mean, literally hip hop is Warhol's version of taking everything that's before you and recontextualizing it. Yeah. You know, and that to me, you know, oftentimes,

I mean, people my age now are the establishment, so it's easier to convince them, but you know, the generation before, you know, when you's easier to convince them but you know the generation before you know when you're trying to convince like Led Zeppelin's lawyers that one snare drum sound you know from physical graffiti shouldn't equate 100% publishing especially in light of like, wait, didn't you guys steal this from this blues artist? Like the irony of you calling this out for stealing, but it's just, I think all art is derivative. And all, everything's just remixed and redone again.

But I've also learned how to be a suit. So that's the smart thing. And that's the thing I feel guilty of. When, before Biz Marky passed away, he, one of his last words to me was like, damn Quest, when'd you become a suit? And we were joking, but when I went home that night, I was like, ouch Biz Marky, like, am I a suit?

No, but it's in service of maintaining your, you know, the ability to manage your talent, to use it in different places. At some point you have to delegate, at some point you have to manage, you know, the situation. So you can execute how you wanna execute. And when you have a lot of things that you do, you gotta be a suit sometimes.

Yeah, but you know, sometimes it makes me feel like I'm not an artist or I might not be seen as an artist. Well, that's crazy. Well, that's a voice in your head that you somehow nurture and keep just to keep you in check. Do you feel like an artist now? Like, you're so responsible and you've done such a service in terms of conversation and communication.

Dude, I listened to that Robin Williams podcast at least five times a year. I'm actually working on a project right now that is kind of close to the storyline of Awakenings. And I think every person on this, I've played them the infamous, yo, Bobby D, like the Robin Williams story of Bobby D breaking character because of the guy.

That's my all time favorite story. But even for you, like, do you feel closer to Lenny Bruce or Carlin or are you the next Laura Michaels? Well, no, I don't have a business sense. So, like, I'm definitely not. Do you believe that? Yeah, well, I'm not a producer.

You know, I still work in the zone of immediacy. But if thrown into the river, would you learn pretty damn quick? I don't think so. And the thing, but I understand what damn quick? I don't think so. But I understand what you're saying, because I'm now on this Apple show, which is a cute show and families love it, and it makes me feel good. I've gotten to a place where I'm like, well, these people seem to really enjoy this, and

that's necessary. And the podcast brings people an intimacy with talented people that ranges the full spectrum of experience. And then I do this special that's coming out Friday that you know is the best comedy I can do and it's right up there you know with you know saying what I need to say and how I want to say it and you know they're just different parts of me that seem at odds with each other and sometimes I wonder it's like oh my god all these people that like the bad guys movie or like stick They're gonna watch the comedy and they're gonna make holy shit. Who is this guy and it's like fine. I I

Have multitudes is there an itch that you still want to scratch not really I Are you you're satisfied? I'm satisfied in in the terms of like my This output that I've done, you know the podcast, you know as a body of work. I'm proud of You know, even as we head out of it the comedy. I've done, the podcast, as a body of work I'm proud of, even as we head out of it. The comedy, I've never been better. So I've let go of this idea that I have to be singular. And it's helpful. That this idea of integrity or selling out or whatever,

I never sold out because no one was really offering me that much money, if any. So I've always been able to do it the way I wanna do it, and I'm doing most of what I'm doing at a pretty good level, and they are all parts of what I wanted to do, but they do seem separate sometimes. So there is a satisfaction destination. It's slightly, it's just starting to happen.

Don't ruin it. It's important for me to know this because right now, I am pivoting to scripted. I'm pivoting to production. I am going to attempt to scratch the itch that is, you know, does a world want a 17th Roots album? Like, nothing scares me more when I go to concerts like, and now, you know, here's a song from the new album, you know what I mean?

That's when it's like, all right, let me go to the bathroom or get some popcorn. But there's still a musical itch that I still, I don't know, it's like getting a bunch of walks and singles and maybe a double, and just like one grand slam. Like that's, but I also know that I'm insatiable by nature maybe a double and just like one grand slam like that. But I also know that I'm insatiable by nature and you know. I think you'll do the music if you wanna do the music.

You just gotta kind of temper your expectations if you're gonna put that out there and not beat yourself up about it. And the other stuff is new and exciting stuff. Are you in the space where if you wanna stop, you could? No, I don't know that I can stop. I do fantasize about it, but I do know that I can only do what comes to me in an organic way.

I don't put stuff on the docket that I can't handle, but I do find, like I've been playing a little music publicly, and I find that, you know, you get to a certain age where, when things are new, they're scary, and you wanna be good at them immediately. And, but you know, once you start to get a groove going, you're like, well this is as creative

as anything else I've done, and this is, you know, a new place for me, and I'm putting my heart into it, and I have a certain amount of control over it, so what am I gonna beat myself up for for not doing the other thing at whatever level? Wisdom, okay. I can take that.

Well, it's good to talk to you, buddy. I wanna thank you for, you know, this podcast has definitely been a lighthouse for me, and the way that I've just taken in every episode and learned from you. I thank you for, this is definitely a destination that I've been dreaming about. So now I feel like I made it.

I'm so glad we got it in, man. Thank you, man. Thank you, so good. All right. There you go, man. Weighs heavy on all of us. Just, you know, who are we? Do we deserve it?

You know? Again, he's nominated for three Emmys, including Best Documentary for Sly Lives. I highly recommend that. Hang out for a minute, folks. Searchlight Pictures presents The Roses. Only in theaters August 29th. From the director of Meet the Parents and the writer of Poor Things comes The Roses.

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45 year old Marc Maron think of on a couple things the success you've achieved The the whether it be the podcast, the acting career, you know, the you know the the the mean the stuff that happened to you at forty no no, but what what does do you sometimes look back at like what what does you know, but you and I also we connected on this anger thing. Like, people probably don't, but I was pretty angry. It was just like a, just a simmering cauldron of rage

when he was younger. Very frustrated. And so, but some of it is. But you're like, I was always like, ah la la la, and yeah, I was just sort of like, that guy's going to bust. And I was just, I just was the guy that like that guy's gonna bust and I was just I just was the guy like he's gonna murder someone And I did

But I wasn't caught no That's Thursday's episode of WTF to get every episode of WTF ad free sign up for WTF plus just go to the link in the episode description or go to WTF pod calm and click on WTF plus and a reminder before we go this podcast is hosted by a cast So So So So So so do So So Oomar lives. Monkey and Lafond the cat angels everywhere.