It’s a full circle moment for the Roots, who early in their career relocated to London to record their 1993 debut album, Organix. Often referred to as their “Hendrix moment”—a nod to Jimi Hendrix’s move to London in 1966—they built their fanbase in the U.K. for roughly five years. That period ultimately led to a record deal stateside with DGC/Geffen Records.
“What got us over there was really a whim,” Questlove tells SPIN. “We felt like we needed to be in an environment that embraced musicianship.”
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That doesn’t mean it wasn’t scary. Questlove refers to that cross-continental jump as one of the “biggest risks” of their career. Coming from Philly, they were used to struggling. Money was hard to come by, and Questlove—the self-described overthinker—worried about how they’d manage.
“It’s wholly different when you’re broke and you have the mentality that we had,” he says. “Do I have to hustle over here as well just to survive? How do we survive day to day? There’s real things to worry about, like this apartment we’re in, can we get heat on? Can we get electricity up? But it’s also like, when’s our next gig coming?
“I’m the member of the Roots that would overthink and analyze everything. Our brain is our GPS. The job of our brain is to case the place out, figure out the safe points, see where we are. Are we safe? Are we not safe? Where are the exits?”
Their time in London was transformative. There, they learned the power of jam sessions and would frequent them often. But while their band made significant strides, personal relationships between members began to unravel.
“Moving to London allowed us to be in a place where you’re in a whole new continent that believes in musicianship still,” he says. “It was also a very tense field. The one thing that eroded—the business thrived—was the friendship. To be honest with you, a lot of us are older and we both know that hip-hop is filled with stories of arrested development in terms of people expiring way too young.
“The only way to truly still be here in good health is if you evolve with the times. One of the things that I had to work on—not just in my career as Questlove but as a human being, Ahmir Thompson—was to really take assessment of all my relationships and have a ground zero moment and a check-in point.”
The Roots eventually regrouped and got back on track. Following the release of Organix, the Roots went on to find insurmountable success with subsequent albums Do You Want More?!!!??! (1995), Illadelph Halflife (1996), Things Fall Apart (1999), and Phrenology (2002).
Things Fall Apart, in particular, catapulted the Roots to astronomical heights. The collaboration with Erykah Badu, “You Got Me,” netted their first Grammy Award in the Best Rap Performance by a Duo or Group category and opened them up to a wider audience. In 2011, they won two more Grammys for their joint album with John Legend, Wake Up, and the single “Hang On In There.”
The Roots have also been the house band for “The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon” since 2009, and Questlove is now an Oscar-winning director for his 2022 documentary Summer of Soul (…Or, When the Revolution Could Not Be Televised).
And to think—it all started on the gritty Philly streets.
“We were a group in name only in high school so we could do a talent show and get some girl’s phone number—that was it,” he remembers. “We weren’t going to do this for real. Then there was a moment that hit us in 1992, in which we go busking on the streets and we make $120 in a four-hour period. We felt rich. Like, ‘Wow, $60 for you, $60 for me. We’re definitely doing this next week, right? We’ll make more money next week.’
“That’s what kept us going. To go from busking in the summer of 1992 to going into the studio exactly six months later to make what will eventually be our first album…at the time, we were just doing a song, but bands are faster than traditional hip-hop, so then it was like, ‘Let’s do two songs.’ Then it wound up being like 18 songs and that leads to a record deal a year later.”
Thirty-four years later, Questlove’s new film, Earth, Wind & Fire (To Be Celestial vs That’s the Weight of the World), is getting rave reviews, with a rare 100% on Rotten Tomatoes. Perhaps even more importantly, the Roots are back in sync.
“We’ve been together for 35 years and I’ll say just really starting last year or two years ago, we got back into that place again where we’re friends and we love playing with each other again,” he says. “That’s something I never thought I’d see. I thought it was like marriages. You’re all in love for the honeymoon period and that’s it, but it doesn’t have to be that way. I became more hyperaware of human dynamics. That’s the one thing I took away from Earth, Wind & Fire—how to preserve and save myself in terms of a spiritual practice.
“I’m not big on organized religion, but I am big on spirituality. That’s way bigger than man-made organized religion, but I also believe that relationships are everything. As a leader, I wanted to make sure that I’m doing right by my guys as well. So we’re just in a way happier rhythm now than we ever been in the history of this band.”
Though the Roots haven’t released an album since 2014’s …And Then You Shoot Your Cousin, they’ve had one in the works for the better part of a decade. The 2014 death of their longtime manager Rich Nichols—who they describe as their Brian Epstein—slowed the process to a snail’s pace, but they are inching closer to its completion and hoping to have it out by the end of the year or early 2027.
“We just don’t want it to become Chinese Democracy, which is the long-awaited, 28 years in the making third Guns N’ Roses album,” he says with a chuckle. “So the joke is don’t take three decades making your record.”
For now, Questlove is focused on delivering the best Roots Picnic to his British audience. Performances include Nas and the Roots, Common, Floetry and Musiq Soulchild, and a special J. Period Live Mixtape Set featuring Benny the Butcher, Yasiin Bey (Mos Def), and Black Thought as well as a jam session with Questlove and jazz pianist Robert Glasper. Find more information here.
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