In 30 years, LL Cool J has gone from swaggering New York rapper to LA crime-drama actor to five-time Grammy host—on his own terms.
This, as the old Oldsmobile commercial used to go, is not your father’s (or even your mother’s) LL Cool J. First of all, not only did he make it back to Cali, he seems content to stay there. The 48-year-old LL is a long way from his native Bay Shore, New York, calling in from the West Coast on a Wednesday afternoon. He’s on a break from filming NCIS: Los Angeles, where for seven seasons he’s portrayed special agent Sam Hanna, a former Navy SEAL and true-blue American hero. “I’m proud of that character,” he says. And LL’s planning to stay in LA for the indefinite future—in addition to his ongoing cop show duties, he’s getting ready to host his fifth consecutive Grammy Awards.
Not that long ago, LL Cool J was the baddest rapper alive. If you played a word-association game at the dawn of hip-hop and you said “rapper,” you would instantly picture the man known as Ladies Love Cool James: Kangol hat on top, Adidas sneakers on the bottom, gold ropes and a staccato baritone in the middle. He had the most energy, the most assertive moves, the most aggressive phrasing and he seemed hypercomfortable in the way he prowled and jabbed in his tracksuit.
Young LL was always comparing himself to large predators like sharks and panthers. It was all braggadocio and it was the purest, most hilarious braggadocio available: “MC’s can’t win/I make ’em rust like tin/They call me Jaws/my hat is like a shark’s fin.”
And then, unexpectedly, on the same record, Bigger and Deffer, 1987’s follow-up to his 1985 debut Radio, LL gave us a peek underneath that iconic velour cap, crooning at bedroom volume: “When I’m alone in my room sometimes I stare at the wall/And in the back of my mind I hear my conscience call/Telling me I need a girl who’s as sweet as a dove/For the first time in my life, I see I need love.”
It would have been a startling admission of vulnerability for any rapper, but it was especially effecting coming from him—and hearing it again still surprises. In fact, re-listening to those first few albums, and seeing the old videos on YouTube, you’re transported back past the Grammys and NCIS to contemplating how important LL is to rap history and thinking about how cool he really was. LL Cool J was the first modern MC, a black artist who appealed to both men and women—on the block or the cul de sac. He’s very much a template for today’s generation of introspective tough guys, whether Kendrick or Drake, Future or Fetty.
“Yeah, I know what’s going on,” LL says. “I still listen [to hip-hop] when I’m at the gym or when I’m driving.” He says he rarely listens to an entire album or lingers on any one artist. “DJs send me mixes or I’ll listen to Pit Bull Radio.” He thinks “Going Back to Cali” would’ve been a massive pop hit if it came out today, while back then, (even peaking at 31 on the Billboard charts) it was a surprise hit that came up from the underground, a shock to the music business establishment.
“We had to fight to get on the radio,” he says. He thinks yesterday’s radio gatekeepers would have no idea what to do with, say, Drake’s “Hotline Bling.” He imagines the objections: “Is it rap? Is he singing? What’s he talking about? It’s too risqué!” Things have changed. “Now ‘Doin’ It’ is like a barbecue song,” he says.
We talk about Drake. Does LL see himself as the antecedent to Drake, with his ratio of braggadocio to lothario? He acknowledges that there might be a blueprint in there somewhere, with “Doin’ It” existing alongside “Mama Said Knock You Out,” but he seems both flattered and flustered by the comparison. “Sometimes I think that people don’t remember my body of work,” he says. “I do appreciate Drake, I do. It’s something you can bump in the car, and I appreciate that women like him. But at the same time, I recorded some of the hardest songs that were ever recorded.”
The 58th Grammy Awards will be a story about another hip-hop record: Kendrick Lamar’s To Pimp a Butterfly is nominated for 11 awards, including album of the year. TPAB is a political phenomenon, with “Alright” becoming an anthem for the Black Lives Matter movement and President Obama tapping “How Much a Dollar Cost” as his personal favorite song of 2015. In 2013, LL released his own political rap song, “Accidental Racist,” a collaboration with country artist Brad Paisley. He says there are people out there who will never forgive him for lyrics like, “Now my chains are gold but I’m still misunderstood/I wasn’t there when Sherman’s March turned the South into firewood.”
“Timing is everything,” he says. “And it changes how things are received.” He says things have changed dramatically in this country in the two intervening years—with massive protests against police brutality eventually forcing a cultural re-appraisal of the Confederate flag central to LL and Paisley’s duet. LL says the intended message of “Accidental Racist” was one of empathy, but he concedes it was clumsily delivered. “I wish I could’ve articulated what I was trying to say better,” he says. “And there are times when pain just doesn’t want to hear diplomacy.” He says he doesn’t regret contributing to the track, but sees it as a failure of ambition. “A lot of the time, the value in hip-hop is responding to things that are actually happening,” he says, “while Brad and I were in pursuit of a loftier ideal. And people weren’t ready for it.”
This consideration of his legacy has LL itching to return to the studio, the place where he still may have the most control over how he will be remembered. His newest gig is the host of Spike’s Lip Sync Battle, and though he says it’s fun, he’d like to make new music, to keep contributing to a genre he helped pioneer, a genre he says is “maturing.” He hasn’t released an album since 2013’s Authentic. “Yeah, it’s time to get back in there,” he says. “Whether with Rick [Rubin] or whoever, it would be exciting.”