Hear The Roots Perform "Web" Live In Philadelphia July 4th, 2014
The Roots have been on a tear lately...I mean they are always the hardest working band in music business but between backing Snoop Dogg at Roots Picnic, turning in one of their best performances of recent memory (with full backing orchestra) forDave Chappelle's Radio City Music Hall run and Essence Festival, damn. One of the highlights of their current live repertoire is "Web" from 2004's Tipping Point. Like any working band, The Roots continue to develop and find new depths in their established catalog of recorded material and the way recent Roots shows have brought "Web" back to life with augmented drum breaks (Billy Squier, anybody?) and surprise medley-style song changes mid-bar is a case in (tipping) point. They may have peaked with this energetic rendition for ALL OF AMERICA live at Wawa's Philly 4th of July jam last Friday.
Unfortunately, due to some trigger happy bleeping from the TV censors, some people got the mistaken impression that The Roots were dropping more f-bombs than fireworks for the 4th of July. In the true spirit of the day, Questlove decided to bring the issue straight to the people and let America hear the unedited audio for themselves. So we got the word to upload "Web" to Okayplayer's soundcloud and share this live track with all a' y'all. But don't listen to it as evidence, listen to it as Exhibit A in the case for why The Roots are America's band. Watch out for DJ Jazzy Jeff providing the proper raw pedigree with his cuts and the melodic breakdown at the end. As soon as Black Thought splinters the mic with his opening sentence fragment "...and it weighs a ton," you already know that right about you're rocking with the best. America, stand up. Friends, Illadelphians and countrymen: The Roots!
