It’s OFFICIAL: The Roots Sign with Def Jam
Friday - September 23, 2005
A-Plus
One of hip-hop’s hardest working rap groups, The Roots found a new recording home in the Jay Z run Def Jam Records, drummer ?uest Love announced Wednesday.
The signing fulfilled a long running dream of ?uest and front man Black Thought.
"You know, back in high school in Philadelphia, when the Roots first started, me and Black Thought just used sit in lunch making our album covers, what they would look like,” ?uest said while rehearsing for the VH1 Hip Hop Honors awards show. “We would put the Def Jam logo on the bottom. That was pipe dream. Now, some 12, 13 years later, nine albums later, we're putting out an album and there is gonna be a Def Jam logo imprint on the bottom of it.”
While the name behind the music is changing, ?uest wants the fans to rest assured that the band will continue to put out music of good quality.
"Of course, for the Roots, the most important thing for us is providing grade-quality, hip-hop connoisseur music.”
Game Theory, the group’s freshmen effort with Def Jam will hit store shelves during the first quarter of next year. Look for guest appearances from Black Star (Mos Def and Talib Kweli) and Saigon.
”[Game Theory is] gonna be our darkest, craziest record since [2002's] Phrenology, [1996's] Illadelph Halflife. This is a dirty, dirty record — a raw-sounding record.”
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Thoughts, Comments?
Thats wassup. I hope they keep making that hotness and don't loose anything. I'm a huge ROOTS fan and i really hope as they evolve they still maintain that essence that they began with and defines them as a group.
I have every single album of theirs outside of organix and have seen them live 5 times. I can't wait to see what they are bringing to the table next.
Yeah I've only had the pleasure of seeing them once but it was a great. You haven't really heard the Roots till you've seen them live, they put on a show. I'll be sure to catch them next time though, they always come through D.C.
