34th & Now

Last night my friend and fellow blogger Jeremy (@Jefe327) and I had the opportunity to go to the Rolling Stone holiday party at New York’s Highline Ballroom for what was essentially an invite-only concert by John Legend and The Roots. To put it mildly we were psyched when we found out we were on the list to get in—did I mention it was John Legend, The Roots, and Rolling Stone?

The night opened with a pre-concert DJ set by The Roots’ very own Questlove who spun a solid mix of music while people milled about enjoying the open bar (courtesy of Absolut and Heineken.) Once the crowd was warmed up, Questlove made his way backstage only to re-emerge minutes later with John Legend and the rest of The Roots to raucous applause. Taking his place behind the keys, Legend said hello to the crowd before they launched into“Hard Times”—originally by Baby Huey and the Babysitters—the first of many songs off the new John Legend/The Roots soul cover album, Wake Up!.

What was cool about the set—aside from everything—was the fact that both Legend and The Roots front-man Black Thought made sure to point out that many of the songs they were performing were covers, and how great the original soul artists like Donny Hathaway and Marvin Gaye were.

After the concert, Questlove made his way out from behind the drum-kit and hopped back behind the turn tables for another two hour long DJ set. Jeremy and I made our way up to the stage where we managed to not only score two band copies of the set-list but run into Black Thought himself as he hovered in a dark corner watching the DJ set. After a quick conversation—and getting pictures and signatures—we wound up chatting with some Rolling Stone executives about the power of music and Rolling Stone’s place in the music world and their thoughts on music blogging before finding ourselves face to face with Kamal Gray and “Captain” Kirk Douglas, the keyboardist and lead guitarist for The Roots. Both guys were real cool and nice enough to sign some stuff for us—Douglas and I even had a solid five minute conversation about his ridiculous guitar solo, his vintage 1969 Gibson SG, and guitar tone in general.

Finally, around midnight the venue started to clear out but Jeremy and I were determined to add Questlove to our rapidly filling page of signatures. As the crew began bringing out equipment and the bouncers tried to shuffle us out the door, I made a last ditch effort by saying I had left my coat at coat-check (which was located next to the stage,) so the bouncers let me walk back in. From there I spotted Questlove, already in his coat and heading out, and quickly ran over to talk to him.

Me: Questlove! You guys killed it tonight. Seriously, it was amazing.

Questlove: Thanks, man. Always good to hear.

Me: Where do you get the energy to do an hour DJ set, play for an hour and a half, and then do two more hours?

Questlove: I always felt like…I wanted a job where you could go to bed at 3:59am and wake up at 4:00am and do it all over again, you know? I just love it.

Me: Okay one more question I gotta ask…two words to describe Jimmy Fallon?

Questlove: Hahaha. Wow. Um. Well I’d have to say ‘nicest ever.’ We see him and he’s just James Fallon. At first I thought it was gonna be all this wild nervous energy you see on TV, but really he’s a great guy. He cares.

After that he signed stuff for both of us and I met up with Jeremy who was waiting downstairs with the bouncers. As we were leaving talking about how great the night was, we ran into Questlove’s hype-man party facilitator on the street who tossed us each one last signature. 

Be sure to check out Jeremy’s blog over at Bigger Than Hip Hop in the next day or so as he will be putting up some HD video captures from the concert. Also stay tuned for pictures from the evening once I find my camera’s USB wire.