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The Roots have collaborated with a lot of great artists over the years. John Legend, Mos Def, Erykah Badu and Eve, and even Elvis Costello.

It certainly can’t be said that they’re not open to working with others, but, having said that, there is one rapper who feels like they let him down. Redman was once blanked by the group, and, naturally enough, it hurt.

This was revealed on Rolling Stone magazine’s Musicians on Musicians series, which, in a recent edition, featured a conversation between Red and The Roots’ emcee Black Thought. Among plenty of other topics, the pair reflected on the time that Red had sent the group a verse that he’d recorded. He’d been eager to work with them, but, despite his enthusiasm for the project, he never actually heard back from them. That left him feeling pretty bad about things. Sitting opposite Black Thought for their filmed conversation, Red told him, “I was like, damn, I did a verse for The Roots, and I never heard back from you guys.”

On reflection, Red later came to think of a potential reason for his rejection. “I said damn, you know what, I was cursing a little bit too much. I might have said ‘bitch’ or something derogatory that they probably didn’t like, and yo, I was actually hurt from that, bro.”

Black Thought, for his part, tried to assuage Red’s hurt feelings, pointing out that the decision not to take Red’s verse hadn’t even been in their hands. The band’s long-term manager, Rich Nichols, who died in 2014, had been the one to make such decisions. “You know what happened,” Black Thought said, “Rich, rest in peace, who was very much the brains of The Roots operation, he ran such a tight ship. It was hard for me to place verses on The Roots’ albums. He would shoot down every submission, and there was something about that verse, something that Rich didn’t like about it. I can’t remember what it was.”

Even though Nichols clearly had an issue with what Redman had put together, Black Thought was, apparently, a fan of Red’s verse. “I was over the moon. I loved that shit,” he claimed.

In any case, while Red had initially been hurt by not hearing back from The Roots, there are no hard feelings now. The two spoke about the subject in good spirits, and, after that, Black Thought mentioned some as-yet unreleased material that, hopefully, will see the light of day soon—and which features Redman.

Black Thought explained that, because there are a lot of samples featured on the new work, it has proven difficult to clear all the rights, but, once that’s done, hopefully we’ll hear him and Red rapping together on a track. That initial verse Redman sent The Roots will likely never get a public release, but this new one hopefully will.