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Flashmag! Issue 177 October 2026
Multi-hyphenate musician Questlove has become known as the industry’ s go-to music historian. Through films like Sly Lives, Summer of Soul, and his latest on Earth, Wind & Fire, out now on HBO Max, he has created definitive accounts of some of music’ s most essential voices. Arguably, he’ s also kept music of the past alive through his work as a DJ and member of The Roots. Over its decades-long tenure, The Roots has both sampled the greats and been sampled themselves by artists like Drake, Kendrick Lamar, Wale, Logic, and more.“ Sampling works because of the idea of a community creating something together,” he explains. The practice of sampling provided the bedrock of hip-hop and dance music as the latter half of the twentieth century progressed, and like many parts of recorded music history, Questlove has studied its development carefully, cataloging the influence of icons like James Brown, Kraftwerk, A Tribe Called Quest, and Public Enemy on its evolution. The history of sampling, however, has not always been an easy one. From 1988 to 1991, Questlove says it was the Wild West for the practice.“ No one was policing us,” says Questlove of that fertile time. But that freewheeling period of sampling came to an end as copyright infringement litigation against artist Biz Markie led to new rules around it, creating both a logistical and financial barrier to its use.
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