Outakes from The Roots...
continued...
TKTKTKT
Actually James Poyser been taking some accordion lessons. Usually James makes a cameo on a Roots album playing something crazy. There’s one joint where I sent for him to play the accordion. I just wish Madvillain didn’t do that accordion song first. I knew I was going to be the first cat to bust out with it. I had been dying to do that shit-the year we won our Grammy I cornered Cheryl Crow like, Yo, you play accordion, what’s up? Oh, I’m with it, that’d be hot! [in a girlie voice] Then like six years later…
KAMAL GRAY On…
The Keys of Life
When I’m on stage I used a Korg Triton and a Fender Rhodes. Not any particular one because it varies from show-to-show. Them things are so heavy. You can’t really carry them around. We’ve tried touring with them and actually sometimes when we do summer tours at the ampitheaters and things we got trucks. We’ll load up, we’ll take them out but they get fucked up all the time man. You hit one bump and and you lose a key, it’s like constantly getting them repaired. We used to travel with them jawns struggling. It got to the point where look, “I’m not carrying a keyboard”, it’s not a guitar, it’s not a cymbal case or a stick case. This is a 200-pound keyboard, maybe not that much but still it’s like carrying a person. It was just too much, we get everything backlined now.
Inspiration
“Sacrifice” is near and dear because I remember recording that being in the studio with my little daughter. She couldn’t be more than 2 or 3 and I was running the MP and she was sitting on my lap banging on my Triton just playing to the MP and I was just recording what she do. I had it on loop and she was playing something and it looped. I was like, Why does this make sense? I just started building around what she did. I put some drums on it, I started playing some stuff all over the top of what she had. What she did was miniscule but it was what sparked everything to come around it. It drove where I ended up going with the drums, That was the 2nd thing to come after what she did. She came with one note or something she was playing and I said damn that sound hot with the beat.