Throwback Thursdays: The Roots First Ever Live Show [Video]

Anyone who follows our afro’d overlord @questlove on the twitters doubtless noticed that he was buggin out yesterday over a video that surfaced online of the first ever live performance by The Roots. Ever. In the history of time. This video was uploaded in Oct. 2011 and is labeled:

Excerpts of the only known recording of the first show by the Roots featuring the original band members Black Thought and Malik B on vocals, Questlove on drums, Leonard Hubbard on bass,and Scott Storch on keyboards — this is PART I of the excerpts … filmed on location at the Painted Bride in Philadelphia sometime in 1993

The ‘excerpts from the only known copy’ part is pretty real because even Questo had never seen video of the show until yesterday (sampling some now-famous Roots vocal intros from an audio). Here’s what he said about it (via facebook):

History haahahahaha. i remember this show well. those who have Do You Want More/Things Fall Apart will recognize the “you are all about to witness….” intro (always had audio, never seen video) the mc of the show was my (not then yet) co manager Joe Young (aka AJ Shine) who at the time was philly’s Bobbito to Cosmic Kev’s Stretch Armstrong. he used some bus accident money to record our Organix album. he also introduced us to his business partner and cameraman Richard Jeremy Nichols. a man to whom i still hold high value and is my manager to this day. (Rich HATED us back then and thought we were corny but figured the smoke and mirrors of it all could manage to fool some people lol)

guest of the group and Tariq’s buddy from Millersville U Malik B brought along a pal to this show. his name was Jamaladeen Tacuma (jazz bassist and cousin to YZ) after this performance Jamal will offer us a chance to tour with him in june for one date in germany some 7 months from now (i think this is december ’92) we somehow manage to hype up that 2-show 2-encore performance into a hype machine that started a 5-label war and ended with us going to Geffen records at 1755 Broadway. its 20 years 15 albums and several members later. im proud to say i never gave up my dream. we sat in the lunchroom thinking about doing concerts and impressing girls and having “date money and a trizzy” (philly knows whats up) this was the beginning of that journey.