LL Cool J: "I Didn't Want To Be 51 Cent

Preparing for his final album release, Exit 13, legendary rapper LL Cool J sat down with SOHH to talk about fellow Queens, NY superstar 50 Cent’s impact on the project, difficulty in deciding which records to use and admitting he “didn’t want to be 51 Cent.”

LL cleared up initial rumors about his last Def Jam release being exclusively produced by the G-Unit leader but did admit they recorded an entire album’s worth of music.

“50 is not executive producing the whole album be we did a whole album together and I used like four or five songs,” he told SOHH. “I didn’t want to be ‘51 Cent.’ I want to make sure that I was giving them L. God knows that last thing I needed to do is wait ‘til my 13th album and play son-son and all that.”

Promising the decision to trim his selection down to single digits from the multi-platinum selling rapper was based on artistic purposes; the G.O.A.T. confessed his selections were carefully chosen.

“I love my man, he’s extremely talented and the music that we worked on together was hot,” he explained. “It’s just I made sure that I selected records that I felt had my voice and spoke from my heart.”

Continuing to give 50 props for his dedication to the project, LL detailed the coaching he received from him.

“I’m in there with 50 and I’m watching him and he’s writing choruses and giving me ideas for songs and telling me I should rap like this,” he added. “We sitting in there and I’m writing and he’s telling me, ‘Yo you should say it like this’.” LL went on to say that the process “was a lot of fun” and concluded by confessing 50 “got me amped up and you know once I get a battery in my back I go crazy.”

Exit 13 is currently scheduled to hit stores September 9th on Def Jam Records.