00:00:00 Speaker 1: Quest Love Show is a production of iHeart Radio. 00:00:17 Speaker 2: Open Mic. Man, How are you today? 00:00:19 Speaker 1: Man? I'm showing man keeping these plates spinning as usual? How are you? 00:00:24 Speaker 2: I like that. 00:00:24 Speaker 3: I never added to my repertoire, but I'm spinning a lot of plates myself. 00:00:30 Speaker 1: That's what we do these days. That's what we do is people who work in creative industries, you very rarely get to just focus on one thing. 00:00:37 Speaker 2: Man. 00:00:37 Speaker 3: Yeah, and it's perfect because you know, it's funny. We're talking about Thundercat on this mini episode of The Questlove Show and his new album is called Distracted, And you know, how do you handle distractions? 00:00:49 Speaker 1: Oh? Man, I'd like distract myself from work with like other work. Like I tend to have, you know, two or three very big things, any constant attention, and then a bunch of little stuff and admin it pops throughout the day and it's like sometimes my treats to myself. It's just the work that I want to do first, the work I have to do. 00:01:12 Speaker 2: That's well said. 00:01:13 Speaker 3: Well, let me ask you this then, like what in your repertoire if you can say, like, what is your favorite work to do outside of I'm gonna say, you know, recording and making music your your impetus hum. 00:01:25 Speaker 1: So, my favorite work to do is not what pays me a lot, and I think that's typically how the correlation goes. My favorite thing to do is technically work, is making beats. I'm honestly just making a piece of art for myself that's not attached to any expectation, and it feels a little more creatively fulfilling because of that. 00:01:48 Speaker 2: How long into your vocal career have you been making beats. 00:01:51 Speaker 1: I've been making beats the whole time. 00:01:53 Speaker 2: Whole time. 00:01:53 Speaker 1: Wow, I started making beats well before I started recording. 00:01:57 Speaker 2: I did not know that. Okay, wow, you came in on the production tip. 00:02:01 Speaker 1: I mean when I say I was making beats, very few of them were worth hearing about other people. And even to this day, the vast majority of my beats nobody hears. And it's because I am I have access to so many really great producers that you know. I don't try to force the issue on my stuff, because you know, I don't think my stuff is quite that good. But like I said, oftentimes it's stuff that I hear in my head that I want to hear, and it makes me feel good for having done it, even if it's not gonna be my next song. 00:02:37 Speaker 3: You know, well, I have to imagine too for somebody that loves all music as much. 00:02:42 Speaker 2: As you seem to. I mean, you and I are still good to know each other. 00:02:44 Speaker 3: But like I always thought, like in my rapper fantasy camp or and my musician fantasy camp, one of the best things would be like picking beats from other people like that. 00:02:53 Speaker 1: Because yeah, I mean, you know what, this is the thing. It is fun. But what I have found because I have been doing some group stuff with my group previous industries with video David Steel Rift, and the act of picking beats with other people is very different than the act of meat picking beats by myself. And so in the fantasy camp situation, I'm like, oh, that could be fun. It could also be a little tense, depending on what people's tastes are. 00:03:29 Speaker 3: Yeah, my best like musical friend, my best friend that I can talk week to week about new music with. 00:03:34 Speaker 2: We always laugh at the fact that a. 00:03:36 Speaker 3: New album will release and it could be in any sub sector of genre, but especially in hip hop, and we're always picking different favorite sections of it. And so that's funny. I can only imagine when you have a band. 00:03:47 Speaker 2: Made a groupmate that that creates I won't say acrimony, but dissidence, you. 00:03:53 Speaker 1: Know, yeah, yeah, it's it's just really interesting how something can be a complete, you know, absolute smash for one person and another person is just like I hate this, you know, it's this is really fascinating. 00:04:09 Speaker 2: Yeah. Absolutely. 00:04:10 Speaker 3: And since we last spoke too, and when this comes out, you know, you have new music on the way, a new single out which I truly dig. So I appreciate that everyone who's listening to this, And you know, I get this sense from reading the comments. So many people are very well versed and open mic Eagle, but let this be a reminder to do your dsp Googles and check it out. 00:04:29 Speaker 1: Oh for real? Yeah, I mean, I think, especially when it comes to my podcasting exploits, my music is often not front and center. So I certainly couldn't blame anybody for not being aware if this is how they came to me, because I'm typically not talking about my stuff. But yeah, there's a lot of legacy, a lot of catalogs, so if people are interested, there's a lot for them to dig into. 00:04:51 Speaker 3: So, you know, I live on the East Coast. But one of the things that fascinates me about the LA music community period, especially of the last twenty five years, it's just that, you know, walls don't seem to exist, like so many folks have worked together, have shared studio space together, done all these different things, and you know, you and I are here. It kind of as a supplement to the recent Thundercat episode of the Questlove Show, and I happened to be there for the taping and we're running it with our kind of slate, which is something that started years ago with Quest Love Supreme of Black Music Month. And you know, I'm curious being that he's an LA guy and you've been in LA. I mean, damn near thirty years. You shared with me recently. Is there a relationship? Have you guys shared air? Is there like you and Thundercat? Is there anything you know in that dynamic? 00:05:42 Speaker 1: Well twenty years when I said. 00:05:47 Speaker 2: You didn't move there, I got you. 00:05:49 Speaker 1: But yeah, yeah, yeah, me and him have been in a lot of rooms together. We famously, in my world, performed together once on Hannibal Bursts television show. I was sort of making my television performance debut and it was in collaboration with Thundercat and Flying Lotus when I performed on that show, and we didn't know each other super well then, but we got to know each other quite a bit after, and it run into each other quite a few times since we have a lot of shared interests. When he took that deep breath and started talking about comic books, I was I was right there with him. 00:06:28 Speaker 2: And him in the room. 00:06:29 Speaker 3: I thought of, youmic because that was about I think we Yeah, we did. We taped that episode in April about fresh off of coming into LA the first time you and I were in the room together and hung out with you, Amir, Brittany Nick, the rest of the gang, and you know, I got a sense of listening to you talking about comic books and wrestling. 00:06:48 Speaker 2: So when I watched his take a deep breath. 00:06:50 Speaker 3: And then just kind of micro machine man yes through it, I thought of because that's a passion I don't have. I've actually never owned or read a comic book in my life. 00:06:59 Speaker 1: You've never read It's really interesting. So the only reason that's really surprising is because we're around the same age, and when we were young, there just wasn't a whole bunch of stuff to do, so I'm amazed that you never found yourself. Yeah, comic book was your only option. 00:07:18 Speaker 2: I grew up in a household that didn't. 00:07:21 Speaker 3: It always sounds like a religious thing, but like my dad would never like watch anything science fiction, with like one exception like the mad Max Road Warrior cannon. But like like I didn't see Star Wars. I haven't still not seen it the whole way through, like. 00:07:35 Speaker 2: I am now okay, okay, yeah, and so car was part of that. 00:07:38 Speaker 3: The funny thing is is like I watched the Robert Crumb movie back in the day, and I watched I remember when American Splendor came out, and I was like, Harvey Peak, like this looks like a comic. 00:07:47 Speaker 2: I can get behind, like indie comics. 00:07:49 Speaker 3: Yeah yeah, but even still all these years later, I'm sure promo wise, like people have sent me, like when Czar Face or somebody would do like an item and I'd said it, aid, I'd give it to somebody would appreciate it. 00:08:01 Speaker 2: But yeah, man, I still got my comic book Virginity and tact. 00:08:04 Speaker 1: That's what's up, man, Uh you know that's that's I'm like, On one hand, Oh, it'd be a nice thing to introduce you to. On the other hand, it's like, you know, let him cook. Yeah, you're like and you're not missing that much, you know. 00:08:21 Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean I have personality. 00:08:23 Speaker 3: And the funny thing is is like as a kid, I think the other alternative was like, in terms of tangible media, it was like baseball cards. Yeah yeah, you know, not not in a collector way, but I just loved looking through them, learning the status. 00:08:37 Speaker 2: Yeah. 00:08:37 Speaker 1: Same here since that, like I have I have a collection of comic book trading cards from that era. But in that era, it was all trading cards. It was basketball, football, baseball, everything, and the same experience you discussed of just reading through and trying to understand the stats and all of that. 00:09:01 Speaker 3: I think of every time my mom, you know, must have handed me a five dollar bill to try to like be a cool. 00:09:05 Speaker 2: Mom or like she knew that, Like I had waited in the car for three or four hours, and. 00:09:10 Speaker 3: I wish I wish I had now at this age, Like it brought me delight at the time, but I wish that I had done other things with that money, you know, let alone, let her keep it, you know, But you know, getting back to your point, like comic books is one thing also, you know, and it's right at the top of the episode. 00:09:28 Speaker 2: You know Thundercat. 00:09:29 Speaker 3: You mentioned him in Flying Lotus, you know, working with you on the Hannibal Show. Also just his he walked up at iHeart and I'm not a I don't pay attention to jewelry and stuff like that, you know, but he came in with a Doom medallion that he talks about at the top of the episode and then elaborates on his profound appreciation and collaborative. 00:09:52 Speaker 2: Plans with Daniel Dumalay. 00:09:55 Speaker 3: And I thought of you as well, because I know he's a north star in your life. 00:09:58 Speaker 2: Hopefully I'm not miss speaking. 00:10:00 Speaker 1: Oh no, that's that's absolutely the case, not only creatively historically. I have a lot of Doom art here in my home. People send me a lot of stuff like that, and I tend to put it up in the house. 00:10:14 Speaker 3: Did you I mean similar question when I asked about Thundercat. 00:10:18 Speaker 2: I mean in your career, did you have any interactions with Doom? 00:10:21 Speaker 1: Not directly, I mean we have we got two songs together. 00:10:27 Speaker 2: I'm on. 00:10:27 Speaker 1: You mentioned zar Face earlier. I'm on a Zarface song it features Doom. And when I had my show on Comedy Central The New Negroes. Part of it was that we had an original song for every episode, and we did a collab with each one, and one of them was done. We were able to get him on a song for our Comedy Central show Wow Wow. 00:10:50 Speaker 2: So but did you, I mean at that point in Doom's career, I know he was abroad a lot. I mean, you never got to give him a pound or anything like that. 00:10:58 Speaker 1: I never did. I never did. By the time I was in the even the beginning of having a career, he was already out of the country and not allowed back. 00:11:08 Speaker 2: Yeah. 00:11:09 Speaker 3: I mean to me, when I think of the pandemic, and I think of the ugly side of the pandemic, which you know, from a health standpoint, was all of it. And you know, Amir talks about this a lot, but I think of sort of what you and I were talking about, the lack of distractions that we sometimes have gotten back to. But I think of the one battle after another emotionally of twenty twenty into twenty twenty one, and I think, you know, the loss of Doom learning it and then learning that it was kind of after the fact, at least for me, with the general public. You know, that was that was one of the hardest blows ever, you know, in terms of just mourning your heroes. 00:11:42 Speaker 1: Yeah, I was. I remember that that was a New Year's Eve when the announcement came out and I hadn't heard it either. I remember I took a nap that day so that I would be ready to hang out that night, and I woke up from the nap to people texting me that they were so worry about the Doom news and I'm like, WHOA. So I'm like disoriented coming back into consciousness and getting this terrible news, and it really it put me down for like three or four days. I feel like I feel like New Year's Eve was like a Thursday that year or something like that sounds about right, And I feel like through that weekend I was just really in a bad, bad space. But that was when it sort of occurred to me that for the first time of my life, I needed to directly and in real time wrap my way through something in order to process it. And so the song that I have that that is an elegy for him is called for Doom. I wrote and recorded it like that weekend. It was like four days after he passed where I sort of was rapping about my feelings of being a fan of his my entire life, how privileged it was I felt to collab with him, how nervous I was about it, how it felt to hear that news. And it's sort of culminated in me realizing as I was writing this rhyme that this piece of doom art that I have in my house that's a photo of him is not really him. 00:13:17 Speaker 2: Oh wow. 00:13:17 Speaker 1: Yeah, And it was like the perfect code to the thing. 00:13:21 Speaker 3: And that's very open mic ego of you two. Just to kind of pull the rug at the end. That's so interesting and it's funny, like, you know, I've worked over twenty years kind of in the hip hop media side. I don't the word journalists is weird, but you know, I led hip Hop DX for a number of years back in the. 00:13:35 Speaker 1: Wow hip Hop DX man. Yeah, speaking of rest in peace, like all. 00:13:41 Speaker 3: Our work, but the work that you know, for my seven years, they're gone off the internet. 00:13:45 Speaker 1: That really bothers me, like a lot more than people might understand. 00:13:49 Speaker 2: Yeah, I hope it comes back. 00:13:51 Speaker 3: I was gonna talk to some of the folks that are now at least own it. You know, try to understand the logic behind that, but. 00:13:58 Speaker 2: Yeah, it breaks my heart. 00:13:59 Speaker 3: But all that to say, you know, in DX and then I spent for the last thirteen years I've been part of Ambrosia for Heads, and I've known over the time that you know, when we've cut still images sometimes, especially in the later years, once there were glasses involved, it's not always actually Doom, and that messes with you. And I think that only adds to the legend. 00:14:22 Speaker 2: You know. 00:14:22 Speaker 3: I always think of like the Internet being shocked that Humpty Hump was shocked G, but sometimes wasn't shocked G. It's like Andy Kaufman and Tony Clifton. But I think it adds like when you see both in the same room at the same time and you're just like what, Yeah, I think that contributes to that effect. 00:14:41 Speaker 2: Whatever. 00:14:41 Speaker 1: It's just me a while to get to the point of being able to appreciate Doom for being able to pull that off, because I had the misfortune of being at two of those shows okay where he wasn't there. I went to one show that he actually he was there in like four five, and then I'd say, like, oh, six oh seven. Maybe I was at two shows where it was not him, and that did not feel good, just to be like a paying customer coming to see him perform and you can tell very early and easily that it's not really him. Yeah, that was not a good feeling. And I came away from those events feeling like, oh, that's kind of messed up that he doesn't care about his audience enough to actually show up and perform. But that is also before any of us understood what the circumstances were behind that as well. But you know, he also didn't put that out there so right. 00:15:44 Speaker 3: You remember on the second time, was that when he was on the Loop a Fiasco Food and Liquor tour as the opener. 00:15:49 Speaker 1: No one was I want to say, it was rock the Bells out here. And another one it was a New Year's Eve show, a big, huge New Year's Eve show here in LA that had a bunch of rappers on it, and he was the headliner, you know, with the with the countdown and all of that, and it just was not him. I talked to I'm homies with John Robinson, who was a first collaborator of Duns, and John Robinson was on the stage that night, and he without saying too much of what he said. He was telling me that the way that it went down it was also a surprise to him. So yeah, it was. It was levels of theater happening. 00:16:35 Speaker 2: Man. Shout out to John Robinson when I'm in New York. 00:16:39 Speaker 3: He and I had lunch one time, I mean tour in two thousand and seven and eight at this vegetarian spot on west Ford Street, and he was always cool. 00:16:46 Speaker 2: I'm a big Signs of Life fan, and. 00:16:48 Speaker 3: Yeah, aside the stuff he did with Doom and then he had that whole album. One of the cool things about Doom, and I think Dyla and Mad Live have the same kind of mythology is that before producers were talking about loaning beats, a lot of those productions just felt like they because they would appear different places, and especially with John Robinson and never he made that whole album over Doom production, But it felt real because I knew he was always inner circle as I understood it. 00:17:16 Speaker 1: You know, it is different when you know that those artists have a connection versus you know, the label has these beats, yes, paring them with somebody. 00:17:23 Speaker 3: Yeah, somebody trying to get on wrapping over dilla beats. Yeah, I'll share my little story. I never met Doom face to face, but I interviewed him in two thousand and three. 00:17:43 Speaker 2: There's a lesser known thing that you remember back when, like Sandbox. 00:17:46 Speaker 3: Automatic and hip hop Site, the early online retailers of the hip hop that you. 00:17:52 Speaker 2: And I love. 00:17:53 Speaker 1: Oh yes, I spent I spent hours on him sites. 00:17:55 Speaker 2: I spent not only. 00:17:56 Speaker 3: Hours, I spent wages from Burger King, wages, all sorts of jobs. And there was an exclusive kind of mashup thing that was authorized by Doom called Nostradomas and it was two thousand and three, and it was when NAS had put out. It wasn't just the Nostradama stuff, but it was recent, you know. I am and kind of the early two thousands. Nas a cappellas put to Doom and Matt Conaway veteran emir, and I just worked with him on booking DJ Muggs. 00:18:24 Speaker 2: He offered me Doom. I was at the. 00:18:26 Speaker 3: Time an editor at all hip Hop dot Com and I spoke to Doohim for half an hour on the phone. 00:18:31 Speaker 2: And it's similar to kind of I think his music like. On one hand, he. 00:18:35 Speaker 3: Was super lucid and super he remembered things that really shocked me. But on another hand, he was kind of one take Jake and just like some things he would talk about some things he wouldn't, and that added to the mythology. But what always kind of blew me away about that is I asked him at one point, I'm like, you know, KMD comes under the third base story, you know, as you've covered with your podcast and sodas Nas and you know, as I understand it, you know, Pete Nice was a big cultivator of CAMD and Doom and Search obviously you know, signed NOAs to the production company and you know, had a strong hand in the business side of Illmatic. And it's so wild that at that point, which was about ten years later, you know, after Emadic and around, you know, the same time as the second km D album, you have these guys interfacing. 00:19:23 Speaker 2: In a way they might not even know about. 00:19:25 Speaker 3: And Doom had memories of meeting Nas, being in the same room, sitting in the same studio sessions. 00:19:30 Speaker 2: And the cool thing. 00:19:32 Speaker 3: Is is that was three which a year later, Doom really starts to occupy that amazing spot, you know, with multiple. 00:19:40 Speaker 1: Albums, Victor Vaughn and Mad Villain and Food all dropping into danger Doom. 00:19:46 Speaker 3: Yeah, all of that stuff exactly, so you know, and it lends itself to a question. And obviously we're talking about Thundercat talking about Doom, but you know, to me, he's always hip Hop's like greatest reinvent It's the one that if I was explaining this stuff to my son someday and why it means to me and why it might be like comic books or it might be like a great movie. Doom is that story? And you know, I want to ask you, being a fan that you are, like, can you speak to what that reinvention means to you as an artist? 00:20:17 Speaker 1: To me, it's remarkable because it's such a difficult thing to do when you have your business hat on, Like it's one thing, you know, we're all creative forces. We all have this creativity we have access to and that tends to always perpetuate. But it's difficult when you have stacked attention and notoriety and you've really nurtured a name, You have people invested in that name, You might have companies that invest in money to promote this name, and for you to choose to walk away from that in order to reapproach the business from a different creative lens. I think think that's so risky, and I think that like, it is a really powerful move because you're walking away from everything. But I've also seen it not work because it's such a difficult thing to do. You're an essence, walking away from all of the work you've put in, and unless you're arming people with the tools to tell the world that this guy is now this guy, then you're truly starting over from scratch, and it's really, it's really, it's a really difficult thing to do. I always applaud people and commend them, and I think there is something to be said for how it helps rappers specifically age more gracefully and rap because I feel like, oftentimes, you come into this business seventeen eighteen years old, and you have a particular sort of creative ethos that you're coming at it from, and you have your experiences in the industry, you have your experiences in life, and you come out of at a different person. By the time you're thirty, you're probably not very much like you were when you were seventeen eighteen, and that might have been when people were promoting you the hardest. So it makes sense that you might want to step away from that and come with a different perspective, a different direction. And so I think that when you look at long careers in hip hop, oftentimes you can point to, oh, there was a reinvention there, there was a reinvention there, and that helped them adapt to the different eras. 00:22:41 Speaker 2: Yeah, that's a really good point. I think Doom exemplifies that. 00:22:45 Speaker 3: Like I it was funny, like I try to, I meet people sometimes that only know the hits of the Beastie Boys, and you know, like, and that speaks exactly to your point. 00:22:52 Speaker 2: Who they were in the eyes of. 00:22:54 Speaker 3: Def jam as eighteen seventeen eighteen year olds is vastly. 00:22:58 Speaker 2: Different who they were at twenty one, you. 00:23:00 Speaker 3: Know, And then how do you manage that image? How do you reconcile that catalog and talk about it and maybe disappoint people when you're not that One thing that I've learned in the process of this Thundercat journey with this conversation, which I truly love and I love the fact and I'll call him Steven because that's how he, you know, introduced himself to me too, Like I love it when an artist it just enters the conversation to talk about anything. I mean, very true of your your quest love to show conversation last year of just like Hey, I'm gonna meet the combo where it's at. They talked a little bit about Distracted and you know, a dedication to mac Miller, but it was also just I'm gonna be human. And one of the things he spent a lot of time talking about was mentorship. And he spoke about a figure that I'm always curious about, Reggie Andrews, and I learned about. You know, it's funny, like I own some dazz band records that I've listened to and I didn't know that name. But years ago I was watching The Farside early in their career, an old interview where they were talking about how this very musical person came into their life and really kind of honed them and cultivated them. And it was Reggie and they were laughing because it was ten years past the Dad's band, and they were making fun of his hairstyle and you know, this pass a thing. But to really hear Steven, to hear Thundercat drive home, how this one educator changed generations of musicians at Loch High and other places in California. 00:24:30 Speaker 2: I thought it was just super illuminating. 00:24:33 Speaker 1: Yeah, you know, and it would have illuminated to me specifically. I've been in this town, like I said, twenty years. I didn't meet Thundercat till like I moved here in two thousand and four. I don't think I met Thundercat till like twenty fifteen, sixteen or something like that. What it made me really understand was, Yeah, we've all been here and we're all part of this grand creative community. But the relationships that they have over on that jazz side are cultivated by those years they spent in the trenches, running around the city, playing stuff out of the fake book and being mentored in this case by that one person. And to me, it illuminates the sort of distance between the different creative communities here. Like I was in I was on the rap side. So you know, we were doing stuff over a project blode and which were the descendants of the people from the Good Life Cafe, and so we were very rap heavy, to the point where even the producers involved in our circle split off and started doing the low end theory thing. And then that became a whole other thing, and it's funny I ended up, you know, connecting with Thundercat through largely through Flying Lotus and the beat scene which developed over there. So to me, it was just an interesting peak into a history that was happening while I was here. But it was like over there in a community that I wasn't involved in. I thought that was really fascinating. 00:26:04 Speaker 2: Yeah, I think that happens a lot, like, you know, similar to you. 00:26:08 Speaker 3: I moved to Philly and O two and it's funny, like I just went to the roots picnic and spent most of it. We taped content, you know, taped interviews Saturday and Sunday, so I wasn't out there mixing up. But there are so many people in Philly that folks will always but oh you must know so and so, and. 00:26:24 Speaker 2: I don't you know, I've heard of them. I've heard of them. 00:26:28 Speaker 3: But you know, I spent my trenches were not in studio, you know, they were covering, they were listening, they. 00:26:34 Speaker 2: Were working, they were one to one, they weren't. 00:26:36 Speaker 3: Necessarily communal, And it was always fascinating to learn that there are so many times you were in a room with somebody that you don't even realize and then years later you form a bond and you realize, you know, and ThunderCats that I really dug his energy. 00:26:49 Speaker 2: I also just appreciate. I'm a big fan of just self deprecation. 00:26:54 Speaker 3: And I love the way I found it inspiring, the way he leaned into, you know, handle kind of being bullied or being teased or being ostracized in school, and also yet coming from an environment that I feel like, you know, the environment that he described of Compton and other parts of Los Angeles was very much the John Singleton, you know, Hughes Brothers. Like literally he said his house was shot at, and I thought that that's wild, because he doesn't lead with that in his public facing persona. 00:27:23 Speaker 1: You know, I mean, you know, that's that I want to say, is that unfortunate? Something like that, But it's partitive course, like I know, I know that story all too well. And so one of the things I was connected with that he was talking about was how people he was around, like in school, didn't understand or had no awareness of the music he was listening to. Because to me, that goes right along with that. It's like you're all in school with these people, you might have grown up with these people. Some of these people are in the streets doing street stuff, and then some of us are in the house learning how to play an instrument or I was, you know, somewhere learning how to break dance or doing graffiti like and so my experience and interest would take me away from what my homies were doing, and my homies would be in the streets, creating the stereotype people understand my neighborhood by you know, But I'm having this whole different experience and it's like, yeah, I've throughout my life, I've just known so many people who like myself, kind of have that experience where you know, this environment, this environment is in you, but it's just not a part of you in such an overt way like it can be with other people. 00:28:34 Speaker 3: Yeah, And I'm just curious to you, like, what do you think. I don't the term weird, especially in this political climate, is such a loaded adjective all of a sudden, But you and I are just meaning like alternative, different, out there music. But what do you think, you know, raising yourself on that diet, what do you think it did for you in those formative years of being an adolescent, regardless of you as a creator. 00:28:56 Speaker 1: I mean, I think it was. Actually it made my life feel tougher at the time that I didn't have the same sort of common touchstones that other people have. And we would sit around and talk about music, and you know, they'd be talking about mcavelly and I'd be listening to MF. Doom's first twelve inches, you know what I'm saying, Like it felt. It used to often feel like socially, me and my friend group was on another planet compared to everybody else because we weren't you know, in my high school it was do you like Biggie or do you like pop? Right, and we were like, we don't care about either of these people because we're over here spinning on our heads and listening to diamond D And you know what I'm saying. Like, So it didn't feel good at the time socially to have a different set of interests. You know, we liked what we like and that was cool. But when I think back on it now, it's like, oh yeah, right, Like that's like following our interest to that degree and finding these sources of other me music. This made us who we were, And oftentimes I get tickled sometimes when I'll you know, see something on Facebook and it's somebody I knew from high school talking about how they just, you know, bought a Doom album or something, you know what I'm saying, And I'm like, that's cute. 00:30:17 Speaker 3: You have a vivid memory of you coming in, you know, playing something, or you couldn't talk about it then, you know. 00:30:25 Speaker 1: Yeah, or not feeling like I could a lot of times when I think back on it too, those the distance between me and other people oftentimes was more stark in my mind than it wasn't real life. Sure, I just didn't feel a lot of license to discuss what it was I was into with people because I didn't feel like there was enough common ground. 00:30:46 Speaker 2: When I would go. 00:30:46 Speaker 3: Into a record store in ninety nine two thousand, I was in my teens and I asked, you know, hey, do you guys have the Black Delicious aided you know eight a GEP? 00:30:57 Speaker 2: And they, oh, you like that? 00:30:58 Speaker 3: And you could have a conversation with somebody who spoke your language. It meant like the world got real small and it was fun. It was so exciting, and I I don't get that same joy in connecting with people that way. I mean, do you find that it's different these days with that I don't know, Like, maybe it's because of just the way we access music. 00:31:21 Speaker 2: I'm just like, oh, it's cool, you got it loaded iPod or but like it just feels different. I don't know. Maybe I'm being cynical or jaded about it. 00:31:28 Speaker 1: Well, I think that part of what you're describing is the effort that it used to take to find stuff that wasn't on the radio. Like just that alone, the steps you had to take to find music that wasn't just being served to you on television on the radio. You know, the people who were willing and interested in taking those steps, they felt a kinship with each other. And now not only do we all have every genre of everything at our fingertips, we also all live under a different algorithm that's giving us a different digital product line of music every day. So now it's just so much more fractured. Yeah, and it takes so much less effort that I think it's hard to tell how much you and this person are alike now based on having a shared interest in a particular piece of music. 00:32:23 Speaker 2: That's real. Your point is valid to like, the algorithms that be are forcing me right now to get really into Tom Mish. It might be working, it might not be. 00:32:31 Speaker 3: But like I appreciated our discussion in LA and it's in one of these mini episodes where you kind of spoke to the effect of XTC's Mummer and you were like, that's what I'm listening to right now. And I still try to do that, whether it's a CD, it's an albums I'm streaming, like play it, play it again, play it some more. 00:32:49 Speaker 2: And yesterday Amir was talking about, you know, he's very. 00:32:52 Speaker 3: Much on a Steely Dan journey right now, because he was like, yeah, I feel like we're always all of us are always on a Steely Dan journey. But that is a habit that I'm trying to keep an integrate and that way, the person I run into or meet that we get to talking and they are talking about what's currently in my ears. 00:33:09 Speaker 2: Then it means a little more. 00:33:10 Speaker 1: That's real. 00:33:11 Speaker 3: That's real, yo, man, Thank you. I encourage everyone. I mean, certainly if you got this far, you probably checked it out Thundercap. But it's a great episode, it really is. Yeah, absolutely, and more many episodes coming. The Roots have a lot of dates this summer. I tried to get a mirror on one yesterday. Our guest showed up early and sometimes that throws things off. But he will be back in the mix soon come. 00:33:33 Speaker 2: But in the meantime, I'm having fun wrapping with you. 00:33:35 Speaker 1: Might Awesome Always A Pleasure Question Show is a production of iHeart Radio.