Questlove
Questlove
Ahmir Khalib Thompson, known professionally as ?uestlove or Questlove, is an American percussionist, multi-instrumentalist, DJ, music journalist, record producer, and occasional actor. He is best known as the drummer and joint frontmanfor the Grammy Award-winning band The Roots. The Roots have been serving as the in-house band for The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon since February 14, 2014 and is the same role he and the band served during the entire 969-episode run of Late Night with Jimmy Fallon. He...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionMusician
Date of Birth20 January 1971
CountryUnited States of America
It's funny, I can see the science in how music is made with other artists, but it's hard for me to dissect my own thing.
It's easy for me to say, "Oh yeah, that's the self-saboteur move that most artists pull whenever they're afraid."
Working with the artist elite can be like banging your head against the wall.
In the 2000s, I became an artist. I started preserving and educating. I became more obsessed with making iPod playlists for people.
Kurt Cobain represents a very legit, realistic outlook. Before that, in my head, to be a white artist was to be privileged.
I feel like the downfall of any person is the second an artist starts celebrating their work themselves, that becomes problematic. And you know, I don't sit there, I don't bask in the awards I've won, you know, read my bank statements, I refuse. To me, that's how you start losing the hunger. So for me personally, I just don't celebrate it. I'm happy, right now.
I want the 'Roots' biopic to be animated - I see Charles Schulz drawing us. I think it would be more hilarious with the voices of children.
You know the greatest thing about working on 'Fallon?' I get so many anonymous gifts.
I would love to have some sort of 'Back To The Future' Delorean time machine travel device so I could go back to 1981 to see that very first Jackson 5 concert I went to, back when I was a kid.
I do secret stand-up shows around New York. I announce and tweet this to nobody - I get onstage and I do a quick five minutes.
You can't live off of just greasy fatty foods and stayin' up till six in the mornin' just partyin'. You gotta take care of yourself.
My theory is that nine times out of ten, if there's a depression, more a social depression than anything, it brings out the best art in black people. The best example is, Reagan and Bush gave us the best years of hiphop.
My life's goal is to find a happy medium for sampling to be not only legal but for the right parties to benefit from it. There have to be sampling laws. The survival of hiphop is based on that.
I don't believe in good music and bad music anymore. I'm through with that phase of my life. Sometimes I just wanna feel good, so I put on a good record. But mostly I'm more of a businessman than a music fan, so I'm listening to music in terms of, is this effective or not effective?