Questlove says the Roots were first discovered playing a strip club

Their roots were in a Philly jiggle joint.

Questlove says in a new interview that his acclaimed band the Roots were first discovered at a Philadelphia strip club.

The recent Oscar-winner and drummer of “The Tonight Show” house band recalls on the newly launched podcast “Til This Day with Radio Rahim” that before the Roots’ first album debuted in the early ’90s — their routes to local success were either the “Ivy league route, playing college frat parties,” or to play “a talent night for rap groups at this strip club called the Princess Lounge at north Philly.” (Pronounced, according to Questlove, “N-O-R-F.”)

But when Questlove’s eclectic act showed up at the strip club: “We walk into the Princess Lounge and I’m hella esoteric. I’m wearing Birkenstocks,” he said on Rahim’s Luminary podcast. “And they’re just looking at us like, ‘You’re wearing Birkenstocks in north Philadelphia?’ ”

Questlove recently won an Oscar for his documentary directing debut. Getty Images

Luckily the band’s playing quickly shattered the crowd’s initial reaction to their hippie-hop look a la P.M. Dawn or Arrested Development. “We set up and we play our first song and the whole club’s like, ‘Yo,’ ” said Questlove.

They kicked off by recreating a Tribe Called Quest tune and “the novelty” of it was a knockout.

In the crowd, “one of the guys happened to be a local college radio DJ legend, named AJ Shine,” who told the band, “Yo, I want to record you all. Let’s do a 12-inch single,” Questlove says.

Ultimately, “That 12-inch single winds up being an EP, which then winds up being [a] 16-song record, which then winds up being kind of our demo. And within a year’s time we finally get a record deal.”

The band in a classier climate than their strip club talent night gig years ago. Todd Owyoung/NBC

They released their first album, “Organix,” in 1993 after first forming in the ’80s when cofounders Questlove (a .k. a Ahmir Thompson) and Tariq “Black Thought” Trotter were students at the Philadelphia High School for the Creative and Performing Arts.

The original name of the band was Square Roots. They went on to win three Grammys.

They later joined Jimmy Fallon in 2009 on his NBC “Late Night” show before moving with him to “The Tonight Show” in 2014 as the show’s band.

Guests on Rahim’s new podcast also include Jon Stewart, Rosie Perez and “SNL” comic Michael Che. Rahim is also a close pal of comedian Dave Chappelle, who has his own Luminary podcast, “The Midnight Miracle” with Black Star rappers Talib Kweli and Yasiin Bey (formerly known as Mos Def).

Questlove was on stage at the 2022 Oscars immediately after Will Smith bizarrely slapped Chris Rock at the awards. The Roots drummer’s directorial debut, “Summer of Soul (…Or, When the Revolution Could Not Be Televised),” won Best Documentary Feature.