Questlove recently sat down with The Hollywood Reporter and shared a hilarious story about an awkward phone call from the former president of the United States, Barack Obama. The famed Roots drummer recalled Obama reaching out to him to send a congratulatory message after Questlove won the Grand Jury Prize at Sundance Film Festival. However, he didn’t receive the heads up and thought that Obama was a Postmates driver.
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“The phone rings and I’m wondering where my Postmates guy is with my food. So [the caller] is like, ‘Hello?’ And I was like, ‘Yo, come [to this] floor, I’ve been waiting for you.’ He’s like, ‘Huh? Wait.’ I said, ‘Postmates?’ ‘This is Barry. Wait, do you think I’m your Postmates?’ And I was like, ‘Huh?’ I looked on my phone and there’s all these [texts saying], ‘The president’s going to call.’ I totally missed that. I had a belly laugh.”
Questlove previously joked about the time that Obama forced him into retirement for a six-month period after spinning at a private party at the White House. He explained that he was running through the oldies until the host of the party (Obama) asked that he “pep it up.”
“[Obama’s] coming up to me like, ‘Do you have French Montana?’ And I’m like, ‘Sir! I don’t have the clean versions of that.’ He’s like, ‘We’re all adults here. Play it!’ I’m like, ‘Sir, I’m not gonna play, ‘Pop that p*ssy, b*tch, what ya twerkin’ wit’,” he told Rick Rubin in 2019.