Tariq Trotter aka Black Thought Speaks at RU Newark Commencement!

About Tariq Trotter aka Black Thought 

As Co-Founder of The Roots, a critically acclaimed solo artist, actor, New York Times’  Best Selling author, activist, producer, and creator, Tariq Trotter—aka Black Thought—has quietly affirmed himself as one of the most prolific, prescient, and powerful voices in hip-hop. Lyrically dexterous, politically provocative, and consciously incisive, Trotter continually encourages the game to move forward with him again and again.

Over the course of his career, he has won three GRAMMY® Awards and three NAACP Image Awards. Not only did he deliver eleven applauded albums with The Roots, but the group also joined The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon as the house band and beloved mainstay of late-night television for over a decade.

Black Thought’s solo music career has accelerated at full speed with his Streams of Thought series. Pairing him with a legendary producer for each release, the Streams of Thought  series has generated millions of streams as Pitchfork proclaimed Trotter “is somehow still improving decades after his peers’ primes, which in hip-hop sounds almost as crazy as a professional athlete doing the same.”  The Guardian awarded the series “4-out-of-5 stars,” and meanwhile, HYPEBEAST crowned him “one of the best lyricists in hip-hop history.” In 2022, Black Thought teamed up with Danger Mouse for their acclaimed collaborative album, Cheat Codes. The acclaimed release topped many year end “best of” lists in 2022. His 2023 BET single and music video “Love Letter” earned the emcee his eleventh GRAMMY® nomination and first as a solo artist in the “Best Rap Performance” category.

Maintaining this momentum, he continued his creative renaissance as the main composer and lyricist of the 2022 Off-Broadway production Black No More. In addition, he also made his Off-Broadway debut starring in the production, stretching the boundaries of his creativity once more. Black No More earned a nomination for “Best Musical” at the 2022 Lucile Lortell Awards. His presence has also seamlessly translated into roles in film and television such as HBO’s The Deuce amongst other productions. He most recently appeared in Lin-Manuel Miranda’s feature directorial debut, Tick, Tick… Boom!.

Beyond collaborations with everyone from Eminem, John Legend, J Dilla, and Big Pun to Linkin Park, Logic, and Fall Out Boy, Trotter co-produced the multiplatinum GRAMMY® Award-winning Original Broadway Cast Recording of Hamilton.

Alongside fellow The Roots co-founder Questlove, he launched the production company Two One Five Entertainment, executive producing the AMC documentary series, Hip-Hop: The Songs That Shook America. Together, in 2020, the pair announced a first-look deal with Universal Television to develop scripted and non-scripted programming. Questlove and Black Thought, under Two One Five, executive produced “Rise Up, Sing Out,” a collection of animated musical shorts for Disney Junior, which earned a nomination for  “Outstanding Short Form Series” for the 2023 NAACP Image Awards. Most recently, the company executive produced Descendant, a feature documentary on the historic discovery of The Clotilda—the last known slave ship to arrive in America illegally transporting enslaved Africans. The documentary, which made its world premiere at Sundance in 2022, was acquired by Netflix and Higher Ground—President Barack Obama and Michelle Obama’s production company. The film earned an impressive three nominations for “Best Documentary Feature,” “Best Director” and “Best Historical Documentary” and took home the award for “Best Historical Documentary” at the 2022 Critics Choice Documentary Awards. Descendant received a nomination for “Outstanding Documentary” for the 2023 NAACP Image Awards and was also named one of the “Top 5 Documentaries” of 2022 by the National Board of Review. Moveover, it received positive reviews from the New York Times, the LA Times, The Guardian, Variety and more. In 2023,  Two One Five Entertainment executive produced Sam Pollard’s The League, a documentary centered on the tumultuous journey of Negro league baseball. Once again in 2024, TOF was nominated for a NAACP Image Award for 'Outstanding Variety Show' for their production of 'A GRAMMY Salute to 50 Years of Hip Hop,' a two-hour tribute special and once-in-a-lifetime live concert celebrating the 50th anniversary of hip-hop. This year, the company is releasing an A&E series on James Brown (alongside Mick Jagger) and will executive produce a documentary on the legendary musician and producer Sly Stone which Onyx/Disney will distribute.

In 2023, Tariq Trotter debuted The Upcycled Self: A Memoir on the Art of Becoming Who We Are. The memoir, chronicling the emcee’s journey of creativity, discovery, and inspiration, immediately landed on the New York Times’ best seller list. In addition to commercial success, the book received praise from The New Yorker, NPR, The Washington Post, CBS Mornings, and more.