LL COOL J Announces Upcoming Arrival Of First Album In 11 Years

LL COOL J is making a comeback to Hip Hop and gearing up to drop what will be his first studio album in over a decade.

Taking to Instagram on Friday (June 7), the legendary rapper-turned-actor confirmed that a single named “Saturday Night Special” will be released on June 14. It will serve as the lead-in to the project, which he also confirmed will drop later this year.

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“Album’s coming in the fall. It’s the real deal, baby. It’s go time. I’ll let you know about the features in a couple of days. Tracklisting for the album is coming.”

LL’s last album was 2013’s Authentic, which was his thirteenth studio effort and his first after leaving Def Jam. It debuted at No. 23 on the Billboard 200 with 14,000 units in its first week.

Earlier this month, LL COOL J reflected on his decorated career while visiting LeBron James’ The Shop, admitting he made some “bad albums” and can relate to André 3000‘s pivot to playing the flute.

“I make bad albums, but I also have some smack, some crazy shit too,” he acknowledged. “But I made bad shit, or shit that people didn’t respond to because that was where I was at.”

Lena Waithe, who was also a guest, then interjected and said: “But at the time you thought it was good!”

LL bluntly replied: “Not always. I’m a little bit of a weirdo, B. Sometimes I make records in a vacuum just because it’s for me and then sometimes I make albums for the culture. I’m very different in that regard, so you can’t really gauge my albums like that ’cause I don’t make all my records for the culture.”

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It’s this revelation that the “Mama Said Knock You Out” rapper allows him to relate to 3 Stacks, whose long-awaited debut solo album New Blue Sun was an entirely instrumental affair that partly showcased his woodwind skills.

“Maybe that’s what André was doing with the flute thing,” he theorized. “I can understand it from that point of view. He just expressed it differently.”