LL Cool J Once Explained Why He Still Makes Music Decades Into His Career: 'I Didn’t Get Into Hip-Hop for Money'

LL Cool J Once Explained Why He Still Makes Music Decades Into His Career: 'I Didn’t Get Into Hip-Hop for Money'

Hip-hop is a beautiful genre and culture with so much rich expression. However, sometimes, it feels like artists can exploit it for their gain. There’s a distance in the music they create that makes it seem like all they want is to recoup some money. The bigger that hip-hop became, the easier it became for people who didn’t care about the culture to take from it. But this isn’t the case for LL Cool J, who started rapping demos when he was a teen…

‘14 Shots To The Dome’: LL Cool J’s Transitional Fifth LP

I was 14 years old when LL Cool J’s fifth LP 14 Shots To The Dome dropped. It was March 30th, 1993 – the spring of my freshman year at White Plains High School – and I was infatuated with hip-hop music and culture. Though I was still expanding my knowledge base of the genre, LL Cool J was already a household name. I grew up watching his videos on MTV and hearing his songs on the radio, and though I wouldn’t say I was a die-hard LL fan, I got ope…