J. Cole’s sophomore album Born Sinner, which is due out on June 25, has yet to be released and already the North Carolina emcee has high hopes for the project. Among Cole’s goals for Born Sinner is the opportunity to be nominated for “Album of the Year” at the Grammy’s.
The rapper also addressed the fact that on top of “Rap Album of the Year” not being televised during the Grammy Awards, it’s been quite some time since a rap album has clenched the title of “Album of the Year” at the annual award show.
“Drake won rap album of the year and they didn’t even televise it,” said Cole. “Rappers never win ‘Album of the Year.’ Even Kanye West, if any rapper deserved it in the past 10 years it was Kanye West for Graduation.”
“I’m going for ‘Album of the Year;’ I’m trying to compete with the white people, man,” the rapper added.
Cole also addressed his newly-released “Power Trip” music video and wanting to sing the chorus to the song before R&B crooner Miguel was suggested.
“I kinda like how I sound doing it,” Cole revealed, according to Radio.com. “My fans and people have never heard me like that. I played it for Jay-Z and the first thing he said–even before he said it was crazy– was ‘You gotta get Miguel on that.’”
Audio from Cole’s interview with Hartford’s Hot 93.7 can be found below.
RELATED: J. Cole – Truly Yours [Mixtape Review]
j cole puts people to sleep
You are so right! In the words of Trife da God, “putting all you dawgs to sleep like veterinarians”…Coz he’s killing the rap game. Cole is better than average. Stupid troll.
1. Born Sinner (Intro) (Produced by J. Cole)
2. Forgiveness feat. John Legend (Produced Cool & Dre)
3. I Try (Produced by Bink!)
4. Jesus for a Day feat. Kendrick Lamar (Produced by J. Cole)
5. Lose Myself (Produced by Boi-1da, co. Matthew Burnett)
6. Power Trip feat. Miguel (Produced by J. Cole)
7. A Long Walk feat. Jazmine Sullivan (Produced by Salaam Remi, co. J. Cole)
8. Miss America Reprise (Produced by J. Cole)
9. Conscience Catches You (Produced by Mark Ronson)
10. How It Make You Feel feat. Melanie Fiona (Produced by No I.D.)
11. The Letter (Produced by J. Cole)
12. Shame feat. Nas (Produced by Salaam Remi, co. J. Cole)
13. Family Reunion (Produced Just Blaze)
14. Runnin’ feat. Common & D’Angelo (Produced by J. Cole)
15. Welcome to Sinville feat. B.J. the Chicago Kid (Produced by J. Cole)
That’s way too many guests for a J Cole album…
People switch for different projects.
J. Cole
The Come Up (2 features)
The Warm Up (3 features)
Friday Night Lights (7 features)
Cole World: The Sideline Story (4 features)
then… Born Sinner (9 features) could be right
look at Jay-Z
Reasonable Doubt (8 features)
In My Lifetime, Vol. 1 (8 features)
Vol. 2… Hard Knock Life (16 features)
Vol. 3… Life and Times of S. Carter (10 features)
The Dynasty: Roc La Familia (22 features)
The Blueprint (1 feature)
But this is a good ass track list if it really was this and only 3 rap features that’s not bad
Lauryn Hill & Outkast won “Album of the year” before. But I definitely feel what he’s sayin. Kanye should have won, but all the tantrums he throws hurt him. Won’t nobody vote for that bullshit behavior. And in my opinion, Nas “Life Is Good” should have won over Drake.
I agree with nas over drizzy. Drizzy album was nice tho..just not better life is good
J thinks he’s a lot better then he actually is. The internet has him gassed…I haven’t heard one J Cole song that was award material.
Born Sinner will win the Insomnia Association seal of approval for cures.
Nah. Take Care takes that prize.
Jay-Z fans will cling on to ANYTHING that he co-signs. That’s why they try to make Cole out to be a big star despite him being the equivilent of Joe Budden.
Even an indsutry modul and complete legend like my boss, Birdman, couldn’t help Cole with his boring style.
We all know that Cole is going to try to copy Kendrick Lamar and dedicate the album to some girl. The girl will be Vanessa Simmons.
How? Kendrick never dedicated an album to a girl?
the @J.Cole-Born Sinner that a dope ass track list would be crazy if it’s real
As far as him saying he’s trying to compete with white people — I don’t necessarily think it’s a race thing. Whitney Houston, Michael Jackson, and even Lauryn Hill won grammys. I just think a lot of people still don’t quite understand hip hop. Outsiders judge the whole culture by the wack ass rappers in the mainstream. Hip hop albums are going to have to be spectacular on all scales of music, not just by hip hop standards, to win album of the year. Like Outkast did..
I dont get it why do rappers stress Grammy’s so much? it is decided by a bunch of old white guys who arnt even hip to whats really popular in the streets, and this modern culture we have. A herd of fake hollywood people? Question. do yall actually care what artist won a grammy in 1996? Do you think in 2021 your gonna care who won a grammy this year? Grammy’s aint shit the only thing that matters is the quality of the music and if its timeless or not. The only way to become a legend is to make timeless music, PERIOD. bruhh should be more concerned with making an classic album then an award from an institution that doesn’t even understand urban culture like that and has continuously disrespected hip-hop through the ages. just sayin…
coFuckingSign, Grammy’s been disrespectful too hiphop for a while now not even airing when an rapper receives an award, yet rappers continue to crawl too the Grammy Awards feet and kiss hoping to get one.
Good to be confident, but J. Cole isn’t winning shit. He’s a poor man’s Nas and not even Esco could win it (losing to a bitch ass Canadian)
Please don’t compare this lame nigga to nas…More like a poor mans joe buddens…The lowest of the low.
Is there a music equivalent of the razzie awards?
I thought the Grammys WERE the equivalent of the Razzies haha
Wrong attitude by Cole here. If he’s serious about winning a Grammy he’ll have to compromise a lot of his music. Drake won and that album is practically an R & B album. Just focus on making good music for your fans. Fuck the Grammy’s and the people that run that shit. These artists today are too sensitive and care too much about what them clowns think.
Unfortunately, winning a Grammy is a sure fire way of getting international recognition (and dolla dolla bills). Keeping it strictly for the heads doesn’t pay the bills. It sucks though
Remember the Grammy winner ODB upstaged after WuTang lost a Grammy to Puff?……exactly.
As much as I like Cole, an AOTY nomination isn’t gonna happen. Maybe Best Rap Album, but not AOTY.
HE AIN’T GONNA WIN SHIT, NOT EVEN RAP ALBUM… J.COLE NEEDS TO REALIZE HE AIN’T SHIT…BUT I’M SURE JAY WILL HELP HIM REALIZE THAT AFTER THIS ALBUM FLOPS.
Damn people can’t we at least appreciate the ambition! Sure there is no way he will win album of the year but lets not just all kick him to the curb at once, he’s better than most so let’s just hope he’s right and his album is amazing
The chances of Cole getting nominated for Album of the Year is low. I do believe that Kendrick will get a lot of nominations. He’ll definitely win Best Rap Album if Eminem or Kanye doesn’t drop an album before September 30th. He has the critical acclaim and the commercial success.
Eminem is way past prime. He’ll put out 4-5 really good tracks on his new album. The rest will be corny pop rap songs or tracks where he is yelling too much.
Cole and Kendrick = the new era. It’ll be a toss up for Rap Album of the Year at the Grammys between those two.
@ Jason Bateman
Drake won rap album of the year, not because he had the best album, but because he’s a commercial high hitter. Eminem and Kanye both are commercial high-hitters too, while K.Dot is less commercial than both of them. Cole, Kendrick, Badass or whoever you might name as new dudes can be making classics as much as they want but they won’t win best rap album, let alone Album of the year.
Whatever you think about Eminem wasn’t really necessary because he’ll still put out an album that will get a grammy nomination.
“He’ll put out 4-5 really good tracks on his new album. The rest will be corny pop rap songs or tracks where he is yelling too much.”
You described Recovery and that won a grammy.
maybe Em will put out 8-10 good tracks
compete with the white people, j cole is a white ass rapper aka soft rapper
his mother is white so him saying that does sound kinda stupid.
Hmmm, yeah maybe if he was more of a black tough guy like Rick Ross, Gudda Gudda, 40 Glocc, Tony Yayo, Birdman, Gunplay, Jae Millz, Chris Brown, Ace Hood etc. etc. we would want to listen him!!!
This is like every team saying they want to win a championship. To a lot of artists and people the Grammys are like the Super Bowl for the music industry. Nothing wrong with having goals.
Cole is going back to his mixtape days on the album…he had complete freedom and some of ya’ll are underestimating him….his first album was underwhelming because he was forced to put on commercial tracks on his album (In The Morning, Mr. Nice Watch, Cole World, Work Out) Replace those tracks with 2Face, See World, Before I’m Gone, Higher, and It Won’t Be Long and he has an album better than Kendricks GKMC album…yeah I SAID IT.
BORN SINNER!
I agree with some of your statement.
true
You said it… doesn’t make it true.
i dont understand why people would click on this article just to chat shit and hate.. why the fuck would you click on this?!??? no one forced you idiots to come here!
My brother Jo Jo will get nominated before you do. Born Sinner. Please!!! I was born rich. Now what?
Dear Trolls, move out of your momma’s house and do something with your life instead of being the exact type of people that bring their country down. And if you’re not a troll and you’ve came to trash talk J. Cole that’s lamer because you think what you’re saying matters, fuck off find a post of your actual favourite artists and talk them up, do yourself a favour. I will never understand the mentality of clicking on an artists news post of one I don’t like and talking shit about them, it just don’t make a lot of sense. Think about when you’re older and are thinking what did I do with my time you don’t want to think “oh I went on internet to piss people off to make me feel better about my shitty existence” before you swallow a load of pills to kill yourself, it don’t have to come to that, go out, connect with something that’s not a keyboard…
Amen, brotha.
BORN SINNER!!!!!!!
Uh….Outkast won album of the year if I’m not mistaken…so the “rappers never win album of the year Grammys” statement can get thrown out of the window. Here’s a tip, make quality music everyone can relate to, instead of just hardcore rap fans. Thats the difference between a rapper and an artist. He’s almost there, he just needs a song that will carry him over to gaining new fans instead of impressing the old ones
Yeah but that was a double album and Andre’s disc was mostly singing. Plus it wasn’t even OutKast’s best album.
There has never been a true “rap” album that was won the AOTY award. And there probably never will be. The Grammys don’t truly reflect what is quality work and are too worried about making the “politically incorrect” move. MBDTF was the best album of 2010, went platinum, and earned a 94% rating. Yet the Grammys still didn’t nominate it. The Grammys are biased against rap music.
same shit he said last year
Ja Rule is going to be nominated in the following categories this year:
Gangsta Of The Year
Mack Of The Millenium
Urban Role Model Of The Past Decade
Most Inspirational Prisoner At Rikers
The Most Poetic Freestylist
The Brains Behind Google
Thats some funny shit. well played.
…MONICAAAAAA!!!!!!
I HEARD JAY Z AND KAYNE WEST KISSED EACH IN THE MOUTHS AND HAVING ANAL SEX!!
You need a new hobby because trolling ain’t doing it for you.
IM STUDYING TO BE AN ACCOUNTANT!!! AND WHAT IM DOINGS NOT TROLLING!! ITS STATING FACTS!!
Nice try. Stop stealing dentaldamboy’s fantasy life. Nothing you say is fact, just retarded trolling.
Got your unemployed butt to respond.
The Grammy’s are too commercial man. Nas should’ve honestly won album of the year but they gave that shit to Drake. Dnt compromise ur music for Grammy awards man unless ur ready to be heavily criticized. Keep mixtape Cole goin for as long as u can
sounds mad cocky
Graduation was Kanye’s worst early career record. The fuck is Cole taking about?
its called an opinion
This dude must have forgotten that Outkast won Album of the year.
So is he going to sample and sing a Paula Abdul song again on this album? If so, he will win 10 Grammys.
Im old school like quarter waters and eating in silence
You new school like faggot rappers competing for prizes
vinnie paz
Im going for Album of the Year; Im trying to compete with the white people, man, the rapper added.
What type of bullshit racist shit is that???
graduation was cool. j.cole is awesome. So far Miss AMerica & Power trip have been great songs so im really lookin forward to born sinner
Make music for your soul and your fans souls, just do it Cole, and you will make the best album in the game