Roots rapper Black Thought looks back on 10 years of ‘The Tonight Show’ — and three decades of hip-hop impact: ‘We changed the game’
For Roots rapper Black Thought, the pastoral pleasure of playing SummerStage in Central Park is a no-brainer.
“It’s classic New York — or old New York, as people sort of refer to it — in its energy and the vibe,” the 50-year-old frontman told The Post about the Rumsey Playfield concert series that the Roots will headline on Friday night as part of their Hip-Hop Is the Love of My Life Tour (with openers Jungle Brothers and Digable Planets).
“Every time I’ve played SummerStage — even as a young person earlier in my career — it’s always felt just phenomenal,” he said. “It felt like performing from the heart of the city, quite literally.”
And it’s only about 20 blocks uptown from the Rockefeller Center studios where the Roots have served as the house band on “The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon” for 10 years. The legendary hip-hop crew followed the host over from “Late Night With Jimmy Fallon” when the former “SNL” player took over for Jay Leno in the earlier time slot in February 2014.
With the expanded exposure from “The Tonight Show” — where Black Thought goes by his real name, Tariq Trotter — the band he co-founded with drummer Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson has gone bigger with the Roots Picnic, a festival in their native Philadelphia. Nas, Jill Scott, André 3000, Babyface and Shaboozey — the country upstart behind the summer smash “A Bar Song (Tipsy)” — were among the loaded lineup at the two-day affair over the first weekend of June.
“We were definitely influenced by SummerStage,” said Black Thought of the Roots Picnic, which began in 2008. “We wanted it to happen in Fairmount Park, which is Philadelphia’s Central Park.”
And the festival keeps them rooted in where they came from — even as they are playing to homes around the US every weeknight on “The Tonight Show.” Black Thought says that bringing hip-hop to late-night TV on the NBC juggernaut has flowed as smoothly as his bars.
“That just proves how transcendent it is,” he said. “I’ve never had to rap a different way. I mean, if there’s profanity involved, you have to sort of censor yourself. But I’ve never had to, you know, speak differently, behave in a different way … That’s a blessing.”
No doubt — having the Roots as the house band has given “The Tonight Show” more music credibility than any of its late-night competition.
“We’ve definitely revolutionized the game in that way,” said Black Thought. “To really weave ourselves into the fabric of the show in a way that no band had done before … we sort of changed the game. The way that we do it, you have to acknowledge our model.”
But the Roots have been breaking new ground since they made their independent debut with 1993’s “Organix” LP, and then their major-label breakthrough, 1995’s “Do You Want More?!!!??!”
Indeed, they served as a bridge between old-school hip-hop and neo-soul, working with everyone from D’Angelo and Erykah Badu to Common and John Legend.
And all along the way, they have been freeing minds as well as bodies.
“It’s always been important to us to make some level of social or political commentary,” said Black Thought. “For me in my writing, I spent the greater part of my career putting myself in a position where … I actually became a voice for my city Philadelphia, for the greater community of black people, for the concept of black thought.”
In fact, the Roots were instrumental in a 2017 episode of the ABC series “Black-ish” that broke down the reason we celebrate Juneteenth. Their “Schoolhouse Rock!”-inspired musical number, “I Am a Slave,” was a hummable history lesson four years before the date became a national holiday.
“That’s how my kids sort of learned about Juneteenth too,” said Black Thought. “I’m really proud of that.”
