Amir Questlove–Thompson
Appearances
Fresh Air
Best Of: Sebastian Stan / Questlove On The Genius Of Sly Stone
Yeah. There is a nun in a new, new, new, new, new, new, new.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Sebastian Stan / Questlove On The Genius Of Sly Stone
It was risky. Yeah, it was risky because, again, this song is released right on the edge of the razor. There's always a time in American history, and today is no different. There's always a time in American history where we're just right on the edge, right on the precipice of a kind of...
Fresh Air
Best Of: Sebastian Stan / Questlove On The Genius Of Sly Stone
Explosive end result, you know, and for someone to sort of come in waving a proverbial like white flag, that's a risky thing because, you know, one, we do see the evidence of the abuse that's given. But it's also like who's going to be the first person to kind of come to half court, right?
Fresh Air
Best Of: Sebastian Stan / Questlove On The Genius Of Sly Stone
You know, to the 50-yard line, who's going to cross the aisle and, you know, start a kumbaya moment and sort of dismantles whatever conflicts that we have? And that's the role that Sly's music played. Whereas...
Fresh Air
Best Of: Sebastian Stan / Questlove On The Genius Of Sly Stone
know the messaging of his music was always encouraging always you know a cheerleader of of justice and a cheerleader of positivity um and unfortunately uh even though the music spoke of that optimism Inside, he was sort of falling apart at the seams because there is a pressure of or a burden, which is why we call it the burden of black genius.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Sebastian Stan / Questlove On The Genius Of Sly Stone
There's a burden when one puts themselves in that position where they often have to come up with the solutions or the answers to why society is the way it is.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Sebastian Stan / Questlove On The Genius Of Sly Stone
Well, whenever I do a press run, this is one of my favorite highlights. And, you know, I'm so glad that for the last 20 plus years, like this has sort of been like the springboard for my projects coming out. And I thank you for receiving it.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Sebastian Stan / Questlove On The Genius Of Sly Stone
Sly will invent the alphabet for which most of pop and R&B or black music will write from for, you know, the next 60 years. Like, we're still writing from his dictionary to this day. And so, okay, we have a four-minute song to make. How many micro-songs can we have in this particular song? In other words, a typical Sly the Family Stone song is... has a bunch of elements that will grab everybody.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Sebastian Stan / Questlove On The Genius Of Sly Stone
Like, most songs will just have one specific hook. Like, this is the chorus, this is my hook. Okay, here are my lyrics. Instead, Sly will do a four-bar part that's like earworm. You know, like, that'll grab you, and then he'll do another four bars that will grab someone else. So, you know, lyrically and melodic-wise, his formula is also... The world's funkiest nursery rhyme music.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Sebastian Stan / Questlove On The Genius Of Sly Stone
Look at Everyday People, his number one hit. Everyone knows Everyday People. Everyday People is basically the schoolyard version. The lyrics of that song, the melody of that song is basically schoolyard taunting. There is a black one who doesn't like the... And... His whole thing is like, if it can appeal to a kid, to a first grader, then melodically you have them. And rhythmically...
Fresh Air
Best Of: Sebastian Stan / Questlove On The Genius Of Sly Stone
His rhythm section, Greg Rico on drums and Larry Graham on bass. Specifically, Larry Graham's right thumb are probably the two most revolutionary aspects of Sly's music. And that's because Larry Graham is a bass player who used to play in bands without a drummer. So as a result...
Fresh Air
Best Of: Sebastian Stan / Questlove On The Genius Of Sly Stone
he would have to hit his bass in a very specific way so that you could feel the rhythm because there's no drummer there. And, of course, once he's in the sly system, he invents kind of a thumping, plucking thing, which I guess most of your listeners would probably be familiar with, the way that the Seinfeld theme sounds, or the way that Flea plays in the Red Hot Chili Peppers, like with his thumb,
Fresh Air
Best Of: Sebastian Stan / Questlove On The Genius Of Sly Stone
Larry Graham from Sly and the Family Stone, a.k.a. Drake's uncle. Oh, really?
Fresh Air
Best Of: Sebastian Stan / Questlove On The Genius Of Sly Stone
Yeah, Larry Graham is... Well, you know, Drake's name is Aubrey Graham. Drake's father is Larry Graham's brother. But, yeah, he revolutionized a way to play bass. And so, I mean, pretty much he just invented the idea of, like, ear candy. Like... a whole bunch of micro ideas inside of one three-minute song. And that's the genius of Sly Stone.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Sebastian Stan / Questlove On The Genius Of Sly Stone
So what people don't know is that Sly basically considered dance to the music like his sellout song. Sly had released this really intelligent debut album called A Whole New Thing, which is probably my favorite album of this entire canon. But yeah. It was way too wordy, way too smart, way too nerdy, just so ahead of its time that only a certain few latched onto it.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Sebastian Stan / Questlove On The Genius Of Sly Stone
And the rejection of that album kind of depressed Sly and his label said, look, You know, like you're doing way too much. You got to simplify it. People aren't as smart as you are. Like instead of you being the smartest guy in the room, be a relatable guy in the room. Like people just want to dance to the music. and kind of in a very bitter, scoffy way.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Sebastian Stan / Questlove On The Genius Of Sly Stone
He was like, all right, well, people want to dance to the music, fine. And so he did a very sarcastic thing. And so he's like, all right, well, people want to dance to the music, fine. I'm going to make a song, and I'm going to teach them how to dance to my music. And essentially, dance to the music is an instructional introduction on who we are. Hey, I play the bass. I play the drums.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Sebastian Stan / Questlove On The Genius Of Sly Stone
I play the keyboards. And literally, that's the song. There's no lyrics to the song. It's just a sing-along. But what Sly doesn't realize is that in his very sarcastic, bitter, middle-finger type of way, he includes everybody. And... people graphs to it. And so it dance, the music is one of those accidental number one songs that he didn't intend on catching on.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Sebastian Stan / Questlove On The Genius Of Sly Stone
It was more of like a, just a bitter here. You guys want, you know, regular food instead of this, you know, meal I cooked up for you. Fine. Take your sandwich and get out of here. And people gravitated towards it.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Sebastian Stan / Questlove On The Genius Of Sly Stone
Yeah. So what he includes is, you know, a very, you know, the drum beat that is played there is kind of a precursor to what we will call four on the floor. And 10 years later, four on the floor will just be, you know, whereas in the 60s, four on the floor means that the snare, the kick and the hi-hat are all doing... You know, it's teaching your body how to dance to it.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Sebastian Stan / Questlove On The Genius Of Sly Stone
Ten years later, they'll take the snare and the hi-hat away, and it'll just be the kick. Boom, boom, boom, boom. And that will be the disco rhythm. You know, what we call boots and cats.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Sebastian Stan / Questlove On The Genius Of Sly Stone
Boots and cats. So Sly will basically kind of give you the prototype of what... will be the disco pulse in the late 60s. But, you know, he's writing the blueprint of what modern dance music will be in 10 years.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Sebastian Stan / Questlove On The Genius Of Sly Stone
Yes. So, again, Sly believes in micro examples like, you know, another artist will make one hook, one melody, one lyric, you know, like just one thing. Whereas Sly will probably try to cram in seven ideas at the same time. Sly puts a lot of attention to harmony, which is a church thing. So that makes people feel comfortable like, oh, they went to church because they sing harmonious.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Sebastian Stan / Questlove On The Genius Of Sly Stone
But then Sly knows the importance of unison. Unison singing is where everyone sings in the same register. So like... Think of the idea of when Billy Joel's Piano Man comes on. That's the type of song that you hear in a bar and everyone sings together as they hold their mug of beer and sing along. So that's a very inclusive type of thing.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Sebastian Stan / Questlove On The Genius Of Sly Stone
So when everyone's singing in the same key without harmony, it's not intimidating. Like the worst singer and the best singer. can unify. So he knew the power of unison singing, which is included, and harmony singing, which is a spectacle and type of dance rhythms and innovative bass sounds.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Sebastian Stan / Questlove On The Genius Of Sly Stone
Just every new idea that was unexplored in 1967, 68, and 69, Sly was the pioneer and the first person to do those things.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Sebastian Stan / Questlove On The Genius Of Sly Stone
Sly's role, Vernon Reed of Living Color kind of paints it that way. You know, this marks the first time that a Black singer is kind of stepping out of the roles that we were traditionally playing. You know, before Sly was like, you were strictly singing about love songs, in particular about relationships.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Sebastian Stan / Questlove On The Genius Of Sly Stone
You really weren't giving any commentary about everyday life or things that are relatable in the present to the audience that you're serving. It's almost like... Music before Sly was almost kind of a fantasy, if you will, like a means to escape your present situation. And Sly kind of uses his music as a means to sell humanity and everyday people's a great example.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Sebastian Stan / Questlove On The Genius Of Sly Stone
Um, where he's essentially saying that, Hey, like I breathe air like you do. I bleed like you do. There's some things that we have in common. There's some things that we don't have in common, but we're all the same person. And sometimes, uh, especially, you know, during that period, during the civil rights period, especially with, um, that time in which, um,
Fresh Air
Best Of: Sebastian Stan / Questlove On The Genius Of Sly Stone
Martin Luther King has died and Malcolm X has died and Mecca Evers has died and the Kennedys died and kind of the dream of the civil rights period died. That kind of messaging at the time seemed very necessary for, you know, there was questions in the air, like, what do we do now? So Slide kind of accidentally inserts himself in the leadership position, kind of in the name of just...
Fresh Air
Best Of: Sebastian Stan / Questlove On The Genius Of Sly Stone
trying to find relatable content to his lyrics because a lot of his music is very self-confessional and very relatable, kind of in a way that Dylan was also affecting music with his songs at the time. And I guess Sly wound up being the unofficial spokesperson for black people.
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
I will say that, you know, the first five years was pretty much, you know, SNL. The role of SNL was that was our YouTube. That was our viral video channel. For me, that was the one place where I could watch. At the time, I think my all-time favorite artist was Bill Withers. You know, there really just wasn't a show in which you can see actual musicians playing.
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
I mean, you could watch American Bandstand or Soul Train where they might be lip syncing. Occasionally on Soul Train, they play live, but... Back then, it was slim pickings. Either Friday night, you watched a midnight special. Sometimes, a rock concert would come on Sunday nights. But basically, SNL was just a It was a rare moment in which you got to catch a really cool band.
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
So even like Devo coming on, like I was eight years old when they did the Jaco Homo song. Are we not men? We are Devo. And like me and my cousins minds were blown, you know. So practically any group that came on in the first five to six years, I was an instant fan of.
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
Okay, so Saturday Night Live is the first time that America and the world will get to see what hip-hop culture is. The very first rap performance on TV. is when Deborah Harry hosts the show in 1981 and brings on a Sugar Hill act called The Funky Four Plus One More.
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
And she took a liking to this group, even though there were other popular groups at the time, like there was Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five and the Sugar Hill Gang, both like platinum hits and really music and culture changing songs at the time. But she took a liking to this group because... it was similar to Blondie, a band that had a woman in the lead of it.
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
And so she took a liking to them. And for me, that's such an SNL move where, you know, those first 10 years, um, They weren't about, well, who's the most popular person to bring ratings in? It was always like the cool factor, like, okay, who's the most popular person now? Who's the person under that person that we could give a boost to?
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
And that's like a prime example of how cool, how SNL always had their finger on the pulse of ratings. you know, who's next.
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
And, you know, as a result come 20 years later, a lot of those first time acts, you know, your, your, your early hip hop groups, like, you know, them getting run DMC before run DMC was run, run DMC or them getting Prince before Prince was Prince or the talking heads or Devo, whoever, like a lot of those risks that they took in the first 10 to 15 years, those guys will wind up being like the household names and, and,
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
the fiber of the mainstream once SNL becomes the mainstream instead of the underground. But yeah, with Deborah Harry using her power to bring attention to a culture that no one knew about, that is a prime moment of the SNL effect and how it builds American entertainment culture.
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
He made the absolute right choice. And, you know, that's the thing about SNL is there's a risk factor involved. And usually it starts with no. Like Eddie Murphy talks about, I did not want to do Hot Tub with James Brown. Justin Timberlake goes on and on about trying to convince Beyonce to do the single lady sketch. Like everything starts at no.
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
And it's like, wow, like you almost talked yourself out of history. And I'm trying to get people in the mind state that, you know, oftentimes we we get in our own heads about why something won't work. And sometimes you just got to take a risk. And you never know. This might be part of the American fiber, the history of it. But also, I know people have so many questions about.
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
What happens on a live show if something goes wrong? Like for me, one of my favorite clips is the Ashley Simpson moment where you hear the directors freaking out because they don't know what to do. Should I go to a commercial? What do I do?
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
Well, you know, Ashley Simpson had a sore throat and was a little iffy about her singing, so she opted to lip-sync instead. And her drummer, who's controlling all the music, accidentally plays the wrong song for the second song.
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
Well, yeah, I mean, they could have just patiently just stopped the song and started all over again as if nothing happened. But, you know, she infamously does a weird dance and runs off stage, kind of humiliated, and they go to a commercial. It just so happens that Oz Rodriguez, my co-director of this documentary...
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
said that, you know, they also have the audio recording of the production room, like what was happening at the time. And for me, it was so hilarious to hear the producers and the directors inside of the control room.
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
You know, so I love showing, like, not how the sausage is made, but, you know, you get to see what's under the trunk. And that, to me, is the most fascinating part of SNL, like how it's able to happen every week without fail.
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
Well, the thing is, we went through this like 10 years before with Milli Vanilli. This is what I call the post-thriller effect of 1982, where suddenly your music video became the most important way to sell the song. And it came to the point where if you're in concert, Fans expect whatever you did on your video, you would have to surpass it.
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
Because Michael Jackson's introducing this whole idea of not only do you have to sing the song, but you have to sell the song, dance the song, act the song. For most people, it's hard enough just to sing it, but also to sing and perform or dance or whatever you have to do. Since the 80s, there have been options on how to sell the song without you giving up your voice or whatever.
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
Kind of the lip-singing aspect has been a thing since the early 80s, but for me as a musician, that's just a fact of life. But for a lot of people, they're There's a smoke and mirror aspect to it. And I guess with that Ashley Simpson performance, you know, most of America found out that half their favorites kind of do that. Like, it's just the standard. Really?
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
I don't want to pop any more balloons than I have to, but it's just, again, like, from the artists that I talk to, it's like they might get in their heads that, you know, if I move too much and I'm out of breath... then I won't be able to hit the notes like I normally do. I think people, again, the thriller effect is it must be perfect. And I'm kind of from the school of warts and all.
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
I love seeing the warts. I love seeing the pimples, the mistakes. To me, that's the human touch. And I think people need to trust that more. Things don't have to be Instagram filter perfect 24-7.
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
There's some people, you know what? There's a few artists that are smart enough that will maybe do eight specific takes of a particular performance so that you're under the impression that they are, you know, what's up Detroit? How y'all doing? You know, like they'll go that far. Like I know artists that will do like 10 or 20 versions of a song to sort of customize or not get caught out there.
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
But I think just in the name of presenting a perfect package, that's what people go through.
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
Yeah, in concert or most, you know, I'm on television. I'll say that 90% of... of, you know, it's very rare for a person to just go 100% live. Like, I'll say that on the Tonight Show, 85 to 90% of what you see is a perfected delivery. Like, in their minds, it's like, I must sell this song to sell my album.
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
And so they don't want to leave risk or to chance any, you know, any flub that would make you say, nope, that note was flat, so I'm not supporting that group. So... Yeah, that's kind of where we are now in entertainment.
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
Exactly. So pretty much it's just part of the course. It's always been that way. But when I go to SNL... Yeah, I'm entertained by what I see, but I'm not sitting in the audience just to watch Saturday Night Live. Like, for me, the best part of the show is what happens in the commercials.
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
Like, watching the Teamster guys and the crew guys, like, at furious pace, in two minutes, like, build an entire set while, you know, the artists are quick-changing in the back, and, well, they make it in two minutes flat, and... To me, that's the best part of the show, like watching the choreography of a well-oiled machine.
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
Absolutely. So even though Paul Schaefer was the first generation SNL late night band, when Paul went to the David Letterman show, which, you know, I will say that the David Letterman talk show, especially in its first season, 10 years. It was such a kind of 80s counterculture moment. My parents always felt that those guys were hip, even though they were like totally nerdy.
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
They kind of liked the irony hip, the nerdy hip of Paul and David Letterman. And so as a kid, I just—you know, Paul was just, like, the coolest guy ever. And so, you know, I mean, at the time, I didn't realize as a 10-year-old that, you know, someone were to come to me and say, you know, young man, in 35 years, that will be you on television.
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
Like, you know, like my version of, you know, a Christmas story, you know, like my Jacob Marley. But— To me, when I was offered the late night thing, when you're doing the pros and the cons of it all, Yeah, in my head, I was like, wow, you know, this is my chance to be the Paul Schaefer. But Paul's very unique. I'm definitely not the Paul Schaefer of The Tonight Show.
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
Like, you know, Paul and David almost have this Run DMC-esque finish each other's sentence kind of camaraderie going on. I'm not there with Jimmy yet, but, you know, I've made my mark still.
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
All the time. Um, I can tell what type of artists we're dealing with based on how late the camera blocking the rehearsal, the day of is, and, um, kind of a way that artists handle, um, that control issue is usually with time. Oftentimes we'll get an artist that will drag their feet. It's now 10 minutes late. It's now 15 minutes late. And the artists don't understand like,
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
blue collar and white collar office politics like, hey, we're a union group and we have to take an hour break at this specific time. And, you know, the things that they don't generally get, you know, artists are sometimes in their own ecosystem, their own world, their own bubble where they're not thinking like, oh, am I going over union time? Like,
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
We might have to do lunch and a half or, you know, like things that only office people understand. And I learned long ago, like this is why I'm really big on micro meditation and, you know, just sitting in a quiet room for like 10 minutes before I go on, because sometimes you have to. just calm yourself down so that you can really focus on what you have to do.
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
But a lot of times, um, artists are in their own heads and they often talk themselves out of, you know, the, the magic because they're, when you're worrying, you're almost praying for something bad to happen. Like that's my definition of worrying like, Oh, I hope I don't mess up. You're basically saying, Hey, I would like to mess up just subconsciously. So as a result, uh,
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
And most artists will stall, take their time, be an hour late, be two hours late, not show up at all, hijack their career in the name of fear. And as always, like once you do it, then it's like, oh, that's all it was. No big deal. But yeah.
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
you know, I'm used to it because I've been doing this for a couple of decades, but oftentimes I'll pull an artist to the side and just be like, okay, I want you to listen to my voice. I want you to inhale, exhale. I do that a lot to them, especially the new artists that are like nervous and scared.
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
No, see, people in their heads and, you know, it's a tightrope walk and I get it. Like, It's easy to think like, what if I fail? What if this doesn't work? What if no one likes me? But, you know, there's another side of that coin, which is like, what if this works out? What if everyone loves me?
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
You know, again, leading to the slide, Doc, one of the biggest themes is, you know, there's a fear of failure, but the bigger fear is actually the fear of success. Like, what if it does work?
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
You know, it's weird. I've been on SNL. In every configuration except for the one that I want to be on, which is actual music guest. Like I've been a punchline on Weekend Update. I've been part of a Timothee Chalamet sketch. I've been mentioned in monologues. I've been in like a Lonely Island sketch. Yeah.
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
But I guess one could say that my dream, one of the main reasons why I was excited to be on The Tonight Show like 16 years ago when we first got offered the position, I was like, great, this puts me within like one degree of the brass ring, which is, you know, doing SNL. So, you know, kind of funny how...
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
I'm a part of that ecosystem almost in every way, but the one way I want to be, which is like musical guests one day. But, you know, The Roots are working on their 17th album right now. So, you know, I'm still hanging on to my dream.
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
The very beginning. So my Saturday Night Live obsession really starts with, you know, the epicenter of my entire music world is Soul Train. And it just so happens that, you know, for most of America, especially with Soul Train in its prime form, You know, everyone has a Saturday afternoon, 12 p.m., cleaning the house, watching Soul Train Experience.
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
But in Philadelphia, kind of weird, my Soul Train Experience was always at 1 in the morning. And so I had parents that were very forward-thinking, very cool. And, of course, I'd have to be in bed at, like, 8.30 p.m. So whenever, like, the Love Boat theme starts, it's like, got to go to bed. Not with that deep voice, but yeah, basically got to go to bed.
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
And the agreement was that be in bed at 8.30 and then at 12.30, midnight, we will wake you up. And by 12.30, Weekend Update is over for SNL. And then their music guest does two songs. And so... I would go downstairs, turn on the TV, watch the two songs from SNL, whoever the music guest was, and then Soul Train comes on at 1 in the morning, and then I'm in bed at 2 a.m.
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
and up for church at 7.30 in the morning. That's pretty much my life from 5 until maybe 11. Then Soul Train started coming on in the afternoon, but... I never stopped watching SNL. So, you know, I was there from the very, very beginning. It was nothing like it. I know that's the cliche that you're going to hear a lot about this 50th anniversary, but there was truly nothing like it on television.
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
It's the most iconic, nondescript theme song. And kind of in my... That was my first realization back when I would... Pretty much any Saturday that the Roots aren't touring and they're taping, I'm in the audience watching. And... That, to me, is one of the most humorous things ever. Like, wow. Like, you know it when you hear it. You know that's SNL. But no one can—it's a feeling.
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
It's almost like it's the last theme that offers a feeling but not any evidence of it. I don't know. It's like trying to put water in your pocket or something like that. Like, it's abundant, but it's not—it's whatever you want it to be.
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
Well, the weird thing was it was by accident. You know, that theme for The Tonight Show, the infamous Hey, Hey, Hey, Hey song, was literally, we were kind of making fun of...
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
Santana's so cool and you know it was like we were just sound checking like we literally got there was like our first day on the job and they were like alright guys play something and we just started you know mocking a Santana song and just started singing a whole bunch of hey hey hey's and then attempted to write about 19 themes, none of which Jimmy liked.
Fresh Air
Questlove Digs Into 50 years Of 'SNL' Musical Hits (And Misses)
And at the end of the thing, he heard the song we were mocking. It was like, that's the song. We're like, well, no, we're just messing around. That's not a real song. He's like, yes, it is. And so that wound up being the song. It's ear candy. But I admire the fact that SNL for 50 years has been able to provide a feeling without necessarily melodic evidence to it.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
Yeah. There is a nun in a new, new, new, new, new, new, new.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
It was risky. Yeah, it was risky because, again, this song is released right on the edge of the razor. Like, there's always a time in American history and, you know, today is no different. There's always a time in American history where we're just right on the edge, right on the precipice of like, you know, a kind of.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
Explosive end result, you know, and for someone to sort of come in waving a proverbial like white flag, that's a risky thing because, you know, one, we do see the evidence of the abuse that's given. But it's also like who's going to be the first person to kind of come to half court, right? you know, to the 50-yard line.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
Who's going to cross the aisle and, you know, start a kumbaya moment and sort of dismantles whatever conflicts that we have? And that's the role that Sly's music played. Whereas... the messaging of his music was always encouraging, always a cheerleader of justice and a cheerleader of positivity. And unfortunately, even though the music spoke of that optimism,
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
Inside, he was sort of falling apart at the seams because there's a pressure of or a burden, which is why we call it the burden of black genius. There's a burden when one puts themselves in that position where they often have to come up with the solutions or the answers to why society is the way it is.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
Sly will invent the alphabet for which most of pop and R&B or black music will write from for, you know, the next 60 years. Like, we're still writing from his dictionary to this day. And so, okay, we have a four-minute song to make. How many micro songs can we have in this particular song? In other words, a typical Sly the Family Stone song is— has a bunch of elements that will grab everybody.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
So basically Sly makes the song Stand. And he completes the song and he has a kind of a test pressing demo made of it. And, you know, he takes this record demo to Whiskey A Go-Go in Hollywood on Sunset Boulevard, which was, you know, the nightclub of the moment. And he gives the DJ the 45 to play. And the DJ puts it on.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
You know, it's like a proto-disco in 1969 where teenagers are dancing in the club. And, you know, the teenagers are dancing and the song ends. And Sly was, like, really disappointed. He's like, man, like, that song didn't hit the way I wanted it to. And at the time, the girl that he was with was like, well, you know... you didn't put a get down part in. And he's like, well, what do you mean?
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
He's like, you got to have a part in the song that just like wakes people up and makes them want to like really get down. And he's like, oh, get down part. And so he leaves the club that night and around one in the morning, he calls the band together and says, hey, we need to add something to the song that really just wakes it up out of nowhere.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
So kind of in the last minute and 15 seconds of the song, this tension-building kind of structure of the lyrics comes to this feverish, climactic end where the song totally changes from what it was to something totally, completely different. And he creates a get-down part, what we will now know as a breakbeat.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
You know, the part of the song that sparks magic, that makes people really want to dance and get down to it. And I kind of think that was Sly's... not to the black community, you know? Because by that point, Sly was such a pop hit, but he really didn't have much numbers on the board for his black audience. Like when he first came out the box, his white audience immediately latched onto him.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
And sometimes I know with certain black artists, Even though it's unspoken, one of the burdens of black genius is sometimes like the burden of being white people's favorite black person. You know, that's often like kind of a mark of shame. Like, man, I got to get right with my people first before the rest of the world loves me.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
So I almost feel as though in a sort of code switch way, he wanted to add a part to that song that really made black people say, oh, okay. He's still down with us. You know, so he adds this really funky part at the end that really solidifies his genius.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
Like, most songs will just have one specific hook. Like, this is the chorus. This is my hook. Okay, here are my lyrics. Instead, Sly will do a four-bar part that's, like, earworm. You know, like, that'll grab you, and then he'll do another four bars that will grab someone else. So, you know, lyrically and melodic-wise, his formula is also... The world's funkiest nursery rhyme music.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
Yeah, I mean, the thing is, is that one of the burdens, especially with Black success, is that you might lose yourself. And oftentimes, look, I'll be very honest with you. Even though my experience with Summer of Soul was one of the most magical, transformative moments of my life, there were many a time where
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
Besides the Oscar, there were 40 other awards that I won also in the circuit of film festivals. By the 20th, I would tell... My manager's there. I'm like, man, can we pull out of some of these things? There's a fear of winning because if you're too successful, then you're singled out. And being singled out for positive reasons or negative reasons is such a nightmare for most black people.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
And yes, in this case... Why? Because... you're going to be separated. Like for a lot of black people, it's, you come up in the neighborhood, you, you know, your next door neighbors, you, you spend the night at your cousin's house. And then in the snap, suddenly, you know, I'm, I'm a Macaulay Calkins character staying at the four seasons hotel, like by myself in the lap of luxury.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
And, um, that's an alienating feeling because you can't take everyone with you. You can't save everyone. Um, Um, you know, I grew up in a neighborhood in which I had between the two neighbors, you know, my grandmother's house and my house, like I had 30 plus friends and now it's just four of us. Like I'm one of four who's not dead or in jail. And so there's, there's a constant, like, why me?
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
Why was I chosen? My cousin was just as smart as I was. And that person plays drums better than me. Like, they should have been in this position. Like, there's an imposter syndrome thing that happens and just a feeling of guilt that one feels.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
And, you know, the Panthers sort of approached Sly and was like, okay, well, you know, you're talking about these political subjects that we're about, so we want you to be our leader and fund our movement. And Sly fundamentally doesn't... necessarily agree like he's not that revolutionary, even though he has the ability to channel in the feeling of a revolutionary.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
So what winds up happening is for every time the pressure is on Sly to prove his blackness, the more success he gets. He just winds up, his only answer is to create blacker music. So, you know, the pressure of everyday people leads to Stan. And then the pressure of Stan leads to basically the ribbon cutting of funk. The very first funk song, which is, thank you for letting me be myself again.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
You know, it's kind of like this brilliant deflection thing. Like his version of, hey. Hey, guys, what's that over there? You know, it may turn around and then like he's gone. Instead, he'll just say, here's an even funkier song to prove that I'm super black, you know, and that's that's kind of how he gets out these situations. He he has to performatively. Yeah.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
For me, it's probably 41 of the most painful documented minutes in a creator's life. Like, this is clearly someone who is an unwilling participant. In his journey, like, I hear someone crying for help, but because the music is so awesome and so mind-blowing, you know, we wind up fetishizing his art and you don't see the pain of it. Or the fact that Black Pain is so... beautiful.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
Like the sound of Aretha Franklin's voice, like, yeah, we'll say like, it's so soulful. So, but no, that Aretha Franklin's voice is, is the sound of a woman who never had a relationship with her own mother, whose mother rejected her. And when you hear her beautiful voice, that's, that's the sound of pain.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
So somehow, you know, a lot of black music that we love, you know, the, the sound of Ray Charles's voice, the sound of Stevie Wonder's voice, the sound, what we're really getting off on is, is their pain, which I'm guilty of it, but you know, it's problematic and it's also a pleasure, you know, and I, I feel guilty that, Sometimes I get off on someone's pain.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
Look at Everyday People, his number one hit. Everyone knows Everyday People. Everyday People is basically the schoolyard version. The lyrics of that song, the melody of that song is basically schoolyard taunting. There is a black one who doesn't like the... And... his whole thing is like if it can appeal to a kid to a first grader um then melodically you have them and rhythmically um
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
We do, but see, here's the problem with that, though. One of my mentors who passed away, writer Greg Tate, he wrote a book called Everything But the Burden. And what that essentially means is that oftentimes black art, black pain is just so beautiful that oftentimes, you know, we'll take everything. We'll take the dancing. We'll take the fashion. We'll take the lingo. We'll take the singing.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
We'll take everything but the burden and the pain that it takes to – reach that level of art. For me, one of the best examples, every time I DJ, there's a song by James Brown called It's a New Day. And probably three minutes into that song, James Brown does a level of screaming that is beyond just ad-libs.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
Every time I DJ this song, it's so awesomely danceable and funky, but also so painful to hear because James Brown is a person that was an orphan that grew up in a brothel. His mother gave him away. His father gave him away. So that feeling of rejection he had all of his life, all that pain is coming out in this song. And that's kind of the thing. It's everything but the burden.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
That's kind of the empathetic way that we wanted to paint this story that, you know, because people often just say like, wow, he he had everything and he was a genius. And then he chose drugs.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
Yeah. For me, it's like what happened in his life that made him want to choose drugs? And that's the question that no one could answer. Like, especially like when I interviewed Clive Davis and Clive has a history of, you know, there's Janis Joplin, there's Whitney Houston, there's Sly Stone, there's, you know, all these artists that have sort of famously succumbed to darker demons.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
And, you know, I kind of asked him like, well, you know, I think it's more than just like, oh, he was hanging with the wrong crowd and, you know, chose cocaine instead. And, When I asked him, like, what circumstances do you think that he was going through during that period he was on your label that you might not have been aware of? And this is definitely not just a story of Sly Stone.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
This is a story of anyone I've ever worked with. This is a story of Frank Ocean or Lauryn Hill or Dave Chappelle, Kanye West. Like, anyone who's ever been mired in trouble. Anyone you ever ask, like, why are they doing this? Like... Everyone goes through this.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
His rhythm section, Greg Rico on drums and Larry Graham on bass, specifically Larry Graham's right thumb are probably the two most revolutionary aspects of Sly's music. And that's because Larry Graham is a bass player who used to play in bands without a drummer. So as a result, he would have to hit his bass in a very specific way so that you could feel the rhythm because there's no drummer there.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
One, to the pressure of writing game-changing music. Sly's the first person to use a drum machine. Sly's kind of the pioneer of the bedroom, do-it-all-yourself musician. There's the pressure of feeding the machine, of writing the hits, of keep winning. There's the idea of what... you are versus who you really are. You know, as the generations go on, like Sly was unable to do that.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
And when he drops the baton, there was someone in the wings waiting to pick that baton up. And at the time that person was 12 years old and that person's name was Michael Joseph Jackson. So Michael Jackson will wind up picking up the baton and of what should have happened to Sly.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
And then 10 years later in 1982, Michael himself will go through that same process of being the chosen one, being the God, being the unifier, being the center of attention. And then suddenly he'll just wind up on a kind of a hamster wheel of chasing perfection. And this happens to everyone. Prince, Whitney Houston.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
It's that level of pressure that one puts on themselves, you know, and there's just no space for humanity in entertainment, but especially in Black entertainment. So I feel as though now's the time to have that conversation because I feel as though, especially with Black people, we are now in a space where we are open to Things like the discussion of therapy and mental health.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
Well, yeah, this became a serious point of contention with kind of me and the Disney organization and the idea of like, well, is this the burden of genius or the burden of black genius? The difference between black genius and regular genius is that most white artists aren't Their feet aren't going to be held to the fire of, you know, remind yourself that you're Italian.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
You know, make sure you keep up your German roots.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
Yeah, exactly. When you have black success, nine times out of ten, you're going to go in the history books because it's just so pioneering. And you better make us proud and you better not mess up or embarrass us. I think right now we're just starting to have that conversation about how do we feel inside, you know, our humanity.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
So these next six projects I'm working on, this will be the common denominator. I touch on this in the Earth, Wind & Fire doc, which comes out in September. And with Sly, it's also about humanity and vulnerability, which, you know, is sometimes just way too risky to... Figure out, will you get penalized if you are oversharing too much? Because some people might not be able to handle it.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
Yeah, he's been clean for about kind of close to a decade. And that's why we called it Sly Lives. The irony of all this is that all of his disciples... Unfortunately, didn't make it, but yet Sly is still with us. And for me, my favorite part of that film is when his kids describe what his life is like now. I love the fact that Novena Caramel from KCRW in L.A. says that, you know, like...
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
And, of course, once he's in the sly system, he invents kind of a thumping, plucking thing, which I guess most of your listeners would probably be familiar with, the way that the Seinfeld theme sounds, or the way that Flea plays in the Red Hot Chili Peppers, like with his thumb. Larry Graham from Sly and the Family Stone, a.k.a. Drake's uncle. Oh, really?
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
He loves pizza with pineapples on it. He loves, you know, watching old Westerns. He loves driving new cars. The first time I saw a slide drive, he was driving a very unusual, I don't know what kind of car that was, but just the fact that he has an everyday normal existence. Like he plays with his grandkids. Like he, he's just a, the,
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
a normal guy, which to me, that speaks volumes, like to be normal, to be human, you know, not to be the scary black guy, not to be the over-sexualized person, but just a normal, relatable, everyday person. To me, that's the dream.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
Well, whenever I do a press run, this is one of my favorite highlights. And, you know, I'm so glad that for the last 20 plus years, like this has sort of been like the springboard for my projects coming out. And I thank you for receiving it.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
Yeah, Larry Graham is... Well, you know, Drake's name is Aubrey Graham. Drake's father is Larry Graham's brother. Anytime I show this movie to someone under the age of 30, they're like, wait, is that Drake's father? I'm like, no, that's his uncle. Because they look alike. But, yeah, he revolutionized a way to play bass. And so, I mean, pretty much he just invented the idea of, like, ear candy.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
Like... A whole bunch of micro ideas inside of one three-minute song. And that's the genius of Sly Stone.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
So what people don't know is that Sly basically considered dance to the music like his sellout song. Sly had released this really intelligent debut album called A Whole New Thing, which is probably my favorite album of its entire canon. But It was way too wordy, way too smart, way too nerdy, just so ahead of its time that only a certain few latched onto it.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
And the rejection of that album kind of depressed Sly and his label said, look, You know, like you're doing way too much. You know, you're doing way too much. You got to simplify it. People aren't as smart as you are. Like instead of you being the smartest guy in the room, be a relatable guy in the room. People just want to dance to the music and kind of in a very bitter, scoffy way.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
Like he's like, all right, well, people want to dance to the music. Fine. And so he did a very sarcastic thing. And so he's like, all right, well, people want to dance to the music. Fine. I'm going to make a song and I'm going to teach them how to dance to my music. And essentially dance to the music is an instructional introduction on who we are. Hey, I play the bass. Yeah. I play the drums.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
I play the keyboards. And literally, that's the song. There's no lyrics to the song. It's just a sing-along. But what Sly doesn't realize is that in his very sarcastic, bitter, middle-finger type of way,
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
he includes everybody and people grasp to it and so it dance the music is one of those accidental number one songs that he didn't intend on catching on it was more of like a just a bitter here you guys want you know regular food instead of this you know meal i cooked up for you fine take your sandwich and get out of here and people gravitated towards it so
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
Yeah. So what he includes is, you know, a very, you know, the drum beat that is played there is kind of a precursor to what we will call four on the floor. And 10 years later, four on the floor will just be, you know, whereas in the 60s, four on the floor means that the snare, the kick and the hi-hat are all doing... You know, it's teaching your body how to dance to it.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
Ten years later, they'll take the snare and the hi-hat away, and it'll just be the kick. Boom, boom, boom, boom. And that will be the disco rhythm. You know, what we call boots and cats. Boots, cats, boots, cats. Boots and cats. So Sly will basically kind of give you the prototype of what... will be the disco pulse in the late 60s.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
But, you know, he's writing the blueprint of what modern dance music will be in 10 years.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
Yes. So, again, Sly believes in micro examples. Like, you know, another artist will make one hook, one melody, one lyric, and You know, like just one thing where Sly will probably try to cram in seven ideas at the same time. Like Sly puts a lot of attention to harmony, which is a church thing. So that makes people feel comfortable like, oh, they went to church because they sing harmonious.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
But then Sly knows the importance of unison. Yeah. unison singing is where everyone sings in the same register. So think of the idea of when Billy Joel's Piano Man comes on. That's the type of song that you hear in a bar and everyone sings together as they hold their mug of beer and sing along. So that's a very inclusive type of thing.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
So when everyone's singing in the same key without harmony, it's not intimidating. The worst singer and the best singer can unify. So he knew the power of unison singing, which is included, and harmony singing, which is a spectacle and type of dance rhythms and innovative bass sounds.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
Just every new idea that was unexplored in 1967, 68, and 69, Sly was the pioneer and the first person to do those things.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
Sly's role, Vernon Reed of Living Color kind of painted that role. You know, this marks the first time that a Black singer is kind of stepping out of the roles that we were traditionally playing. You know, before Sly was like, you were strictly singing about love songs, in particular about relationships.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
You really weren't giving any commentary about everyday life or things that are relatable in the present to the artist, you know, to the audience that you're serving. It's almost like... Music before Sly was almost kind of a fantasy, if you will, like a means to escape your present situation. And Sly kind of uses his music as a means to escape. sell humanity.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
And Everyday People's a great example where he's essentially saying that, hey, like, I breathe air like you do. I bleed like you do. There's some things that we have in common. There's some things that we don't have in common, but we're all the same person. And sometimes, especially, you know, during that period, during the civil rights period, especially with that time in which
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
And Martin Luther King has died and Malcolm X has died and Mecca Evers has died and the Kennedys died and kind of the dream of the civil rights period died. That kind of messaging at the time seemed very necessary for, you know, there was questions in the air like, what do we do now? So Slyde kind of accidentally died.
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Questlove On Sly Stone & The Burden Of Black Genius
inserts himself in the leadership position, kind of in the name of just trying to find relatable content to his lyrics, because a lot of his music is very self-confessional and very relatable, kind of in a way that Dylan was also affecting music with his songs at the time. I guess Sly wound up being the unofficial spokesperson for black people.