LL Cool J tells CLASSIC Def Jam & Rick Rubin stories + talks coining “G.O.A.T.,” ‘NCIS: New York’ & “I Need Love”

Joe and Jada

Fat Joe and Jadakiss sit down with hip-hop pioneer LL Cool J to discuss his decades-long career, creative philosophy, and recent acting ventures. The conversation traces LL's

Key takeaways

• LL Cool J officially coined 'G.O.A.T.' by combining 'greatest of all times' with street basketball's 'man of goat' nickname before naming his 1996 album after it.
• Rick Rubin's production genius lies in reduction and simplification, famously crediting LL's debut as 'reduced by Rick Rubin' rather than produced.

Main topics

• LL Cool J's career longevity and creative evolution
• Coining the term 'G.O.A.T.'

Notable quotes

"The genius of Rick is that he helps you facilitate whatever it is you want to create. And also, he knows what to take away."

Conclusion

The episode offers veteran artists and listeners alike a masterclass in

Transcript preview

Speaker 1 (0:00) Didn't catch the latest Roland Martin unfiltered podcast? Here's Speaker 6 (0:03) what you missed. There should not be a single law enforcement agency that does not have body cameras. It's real. Black farmers have been under attack. This is just the latest example of them just slapping DEI on anything. It's raw. And I'm sitting here going, they are playing y'all for fools. Catch Roland Martin's daily commentary on the Black Information Network. Speaker 1 (0:23) And download Roland Martin unfiltered on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Thanks for watching. Speaker 4 (0:30) Someone can teach you about not having limits, but where you go with that idea can be completely different, right? Speaker 5 (0:38) I Speaker 4 (0:39) can teach you how to work without limitation, Speaker 5 (0:41) but Speaker 4 (0:42) you may make a decision that requires you to not be limited in a way I don't agree with, right? I took the principle of no limitations all the way. That's why I do what I want to do. That's why people want to pigeonhole it to make it about... LL does love songs, but those who really know my catalog know that's not really all I do. That's just what the Speaker 5 (1:05) commercial Speaker 4 (1:05) world tries to force feed people into, you know? Speaker 3 (1:22) Biggest in the game, Joe Crack the Dawn. You know who it is, your boy Jada. You know what it is, Joe and Jada show. Every show legendary. Every show iconic. And today is those, we always say those is understated. for today's guest. He's probably the epitome of both of those words. We'll get into that shortly. Thank you. When you think of today's guest, you think of somebody who really made the word legend make sense. Speaker 3 (1:59) Before the playlist. before social media, before everybody had a brain. He was creating moments that moved the culture. From Queens to the world. Hollis to be exact. From the battles to the blockbusters. From I Need Love to Mama Said Knock You Out. Farmer's Boulevard. From the stage to becoming Special Agent Sam Hanna on television for more than 300 episodes. This brother has shown you what longevity looks like when talent, discipline, and heart are all real. He's an artist. He's an actor. He's a businessman. Speaker 3 (2:54) A family man. One of the original examples of how to evolve without ever losing who you are. Ladies and gentlemen. The one and only LL Cool J in the building. Speaker 2 (3:10) Thank you. Speaker 4 (3:15) Did they coin the phrase goat after you? Well, the way it came up was Earl, the man of goat, you know what I'm saying, the street ball player, and Muhammad Ali saying he's the greatest of all times. Speaker 5 (3:27) And Speaker 4 (3:28) when you put those two together, you got goat. Because greatest of all times was just greatest of all times. And Earl, they used to call the man of goat the goat. So I just kind of put it together. and name my album. So Speaker 5 (3:38) you Speaker 4 (3:38) put that together? Yeah, I put it together for my album. So you invented the term goat? Oh, without a doubt. Without a doubt. Speaker 5 (3:45) Yeah. Yeah. That's Speaker 4 (3:46) dope. Yeah. And it's, you know, it's stuck. It's stuck. So, you know. It's the goat of everything out there right now. I mean, yeah. At the end of the day, you made a contribution to the world. I'm glad people are running with it. I'm glad that people feel like. I'm glad I was able to create something that people are utilizing to personify what greatness is. You know? Speaker 5 (4:12) We all get, you know, we trip Speaker 4 (4:15) over one or two here and there. It happens. You know what I mean? I tripped over one and I caught that one. I Speaker 5 (4:21) always felt like if I A &R'd an LL Cool J album, it would be the greatest album in the world. I always felt that way about me A &R'ing. Nobody knows you more than Fat Joe. No, I Speaker 4 (4:33) appreciate it. Listen, I love making music. It's two sides to it because. Speaker 4 (4:40) I'm an artist first. Speaker 4 (4:43) So I don't necessarily always make them. Speaker 4 (4:47) music necessarily to appeal to people. I just like to come up with crazy ideas and see how it works. You know, so sometimes it works, sometimes it don't. It's kind of like how I approach, create, but that's very different because everybody's not like that. So I'm not conservative. Some people are a little more conservative. This is my lane. I'm staying in my lane. This is what I do. And they kind of, I don't really do that. So I have some records that'll be your favorite and then some records that people will hate and I'm comfortable with both. You know what I'm saying? The last album you had, the African... Oh, yeah. Black Hole Suite with Sona Jo Betta. That was crazy. Yeah. The album is actually a very good, fun album. It's like one of the pieces of work that I'm really pleased with. You know what I'm saying? Me and Q-Tip, the Force album is good. I like the joint I did with them. I like that one a lot. Speaker 5 (5:39) Well, you ain't like the one you did with Fat Joe and Rick Ross. No, I do. I do. Nigga, that shit rang off. I do. You gotta stop. We was on fire for a minute. You crazy? It actually, it did well. You Speaker 4 (5:50) know, you Speaker 5 (5:50) get people's attention for one day, two days. That's what this shit is now. It's like, it ain't back in the days where people lived with albums forever. It's like, you cast their attention for two days and it's Speaker 4 (6:03) just, it's moving on. To be real with you, Joe, I think that you just got to do what you love in life. I think, you know, ultimately, you can't live your life based on someone else's opinion or based on a response to what it is that you're doing. You got to do what you love. Period. And now, the double blessing is to be able to make a living doing what you love. Right? You want to be able to do that. But you can't, you know, as an entertainer, you can't really concern yourself with... constantly thinking about charts and responses. You can't get caught up in that. You know what I Speaker 5 (6:42) told Busta? Because I dropped the album last week. Busta dropped the album. I see your bust. Look. I said, at this point, let's try not to think that we're competing with the 18-year-old guy who got I Need Love right now. We just not. Hip-hop's a young Speaker 4 (7:02) game. Right? Well, hold on. Hold on. You got to understand. See, guys, people get a little confused. It's not that it's a young game. It's that your fans grew up with you. Yes. Hello. And guess what? And guess what? Your fans love you, but he got to work in the morning. So he's not up all night listening to your album and worshiping the ground that you work on. No, Speaker 5 (7:26) no, I Speaker 4 (7:26) agree. No, I'm just saying. No, Speaker 5 (7:27) no, no, no. I'm totally in agreeance. What I am saying is... It's all about you. At this point, I told Buss, let's see your Buss, man. You ever watch the Game of Thrones? He was like, yeah, I watch the Game... Do you watch the Game of Thrones? I've watched it before. So, you know, they sentence guys that are too smart. They sentence them to like a library with like a billion books. And their life is to read all these fucking books. And these guys come up with the cure for cancer. So I'm saying, yo, Buss, you dropped the new joint, Classic, with J Dilla. I dropped the joint. LL dropped some shit with the Africans there, the M to this. So in the library of hip-hop, I feel like we just dropped a new album in that whole library of hip-hop. And we put something that's needed there. It's something that's needed there for people to go back and search and be like, yo. These guys were still doing it. No matter what age they was, they still was putting quality work. They was doing what they wanted. Speaker 4 (8:31) I understand what you're saying. Let me tell you something, girl. Let me tell you something. When I go press play on a Miles Davis album, I don't think about how old he was when he created it. Talk Speaker 3 (8:42) slow. Speaker 4 (8:43) You know what I'm saying? I think the thing that's not being said that we got to be honest about is when you put a body of work out, if it's not recognized at a certain level, it's painful for some artists. It can be painful for artists to not be recognized at a certain level. You kind of got to get over that. Speaker 4 (9:00) You Speaker 5 (9:01) got Speaker 4 (9:01) to get over it. No, no. The world, the things have changed. The way things, it's not just the tension span. It's also the fans that you have have grown up and they engage with the music differently. They don't love you less. Speaker 5 (9:17) They Speaker 4 (9:17) love you just as much. Right? But the point I'm getting at Speaker 5 (9:21) is that for the last couple of years, I've seen some legends that could put out some legendary albums that are afraid to put out albums because they're afraid of sales or not being as big as they used to be. And we're losing. I'm just telling you the truth. We're losing. Speaker 5 (9:45) great talent and people who could bring more to the game. But we like, yo, what's up? What you just Speaker 4 (9:50) described, fear is always going to be a problem. Speaker 5 (9:53) Yeah. Speaker 4 (9:54) You know, you have people that are afraid to succeed. You have people that are afraid to fail. Fear is always a problem. When you hear people talk about two paths, fear and love, that's a true thing. So fear is, that's an issue of fear. You know, when you live your life based on, when you allow the public to define who you are to you and to assign your value, you get yourself in trouble. And you get in a position where you're afraid to put records out because your value is assigned. You're looking for outside validation for something that has to come from within you. When you look in the mirror, you know whose eyes, you know what you see in the mirror. You know what you see in the mirror if you want to be honest. Yeah. Okay? So you know when you're on your A game. You know when you're on your B game, and it has nothing to do with anybody's opinion. Speaker 4 (10:48) You know when you followed your diet or when you didn't. You know when you went to the gym or you didn't. You know when you made the song or you didn't. You know when you wrote more than you needed to. You know. So I would just encourage guys to not be fearful. I would encourage everybody to not be fearful and to understand that part of life is growing and part of life is maturing. And you're not going to be able to be 19 forever, but that doesn't mean that there's something wrong with being 50 or 40. You know what I mean? It's like... it comes with the territory. Speak on it, God. You over here. I'm on this. I'm on this. Speaker 3 (11:21) Nigga, what you got me Speaker 4 (11:22) saying? Speaker 3 (11:22) You probably really only feel like that because you just dropped out. Speaker 5 (11:26) I Speaker 3 (11:26) don't feel like shit. What are you talking about? I'm not talking about me. I dropped out. Speaker 5 (11:31) What are you talking about? I'm not scared of shit. Speaker 3 (11:33) There's no... Brother. Speaker 5 (11:35) Hip-hop's too young to be a young man's Speaker 3 (11:37) game. Speaker 5 (11:37) Brother, I'm not scared of shit. I'm just going off what you're saying. No, what I'm saying is I'm talking about... In general, we can't and we won't, but I can mention you, 10, 20 artists that should have dropped in the last 10 years that are fucking incredible, that keeps throwing out mixtapes. They don't want to throw out an album because they don't want the shit to not chart the way it is. And that's the fear of criticism. It's the normal Speaker 4 (12:04) thing. It's the fear of criticism and the fear of people. It's the feelings of inadequacy that they got to get over. You know what I mean? It's the same thing Busta said to me. Why you don't drop out? Speaker 3 (12:17) I don't want to drop out. Do I think I'll fucking samurai 90 % of the game? Akuma Lata, nigga. You want Akuma Lata shit. Speaker 5 (12:27) Yeah. Speaker 3 (12:27) That's right. What did