![](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/4c85376926df65216fa683f5315018309f-blackthought-jimmy.rsquare.w330.jpg\")
<\/p>\n <\/p>\n
\n He was determined.
\n Photo-Illustration: Vulture; Photos: Gilbert Carrasquillo\/GC Images, Todd Owyoung\/NBC via Getty Images\n <\/p>\n
Unlike the mid-run switch<\/a> over at The Late Show, the Roots have loyally served as Jimmy Fallon\u2019s house band ever since he began hosting Late Night in 2009. Questlove, Black Thought, the cutie who tries to keep a straight face<\/a> while doing the thank-you-note music, and the rest of the Roots crew have remained a steadfast (and silly<\/a>) presence in Fallon\u2019s world ever since, which included a promotion to The Tonight Show in 2014. While the pairing of host and band may have initially been perceived as a strange one to viewers, Black Thought \u2014 who co-founded the group with Questlove<\/a> \u2014 told Rolling Stone in a new interview<\/a> how Fallon only had his sights set on them. \u201cMan, the way we got the gig, Jimmy was always a huge music nerd,\u201d he explained. \u201cHe\u2019s a huge, huge Beastie Boys fan. That\u2019s the first band that took the Roots on tour. We learned the ropes from them.\u201d<\/p>\n Fallon began his persistent efforts about a year prior to the show\u2019s debut, as he had been tapped by Lorne Michaels to assume the role with a long amount of lead time. \u201cJimmy came around and said, \u2018I\u2019m thinking about doing the\u00a0Late Night\u00a0show, and I need a band. Would you guys be interested in doing it?\u2019\u201d Black Thought recalled. \u201cWe thought it was bullshit until he kept coming around.\u201d Even if that meant a random tour stop, Fallon would materialize. \u201cWe would show up at a gig, and he\u2019d be in our dressing room, like, \u2018Hey, hey, what\u2019s up? I was serious about what we talked about.\u2019 He was dedicated,\u201d Black Thought added. \u201cHe showed up a bunch of times pitching it. This was around the time that we had just got done working on Dave Chappelle\u2019s show. It was so much uncertainty at that time that it sounded good to have a day job. But we didn\u2019t want it to mean the end of the Roots.\u201d Redman, who was also interviewed for the Rolling Stone feature, considered the group\u2019s hiring as both a win for hip-hop and \u201cour culture.\u201d If only they were also allowed to ask an unhinged question<\/a> at the end of every show.<\/p>\n Related<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"He was determined. Photo-Illustration: Vulture; Photos: Gilbert Carrasquillo\/GC Images, Todd Owyoung\/NBC via Getty Images Unlike the mid-run switch…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":92851,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[69333,3682,156,44039,157,111,43,139,69,69334,69335,69332,437],"class_list":{"0":"post-92850","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tv","8":"tag-black-thought","9":"tag-comedy","10":"tag-entertainment","11":"tag-jimmy-fallon","12":"tag-music","13":"tag-new-zealand","14":"tag-news","15":"tag-newzealand","16":"tag-nz","17":"tag-questlove","18":"tag-the-late-night-wars","19":"tag-the-roots","20":"tag-tv"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/92850","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=92850"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/92850\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/92851"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=92850"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=92850"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=92850"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}