-LL Cool J!
Oh, my gosh.
-What up? -I miss you, man.
Always good to see your face. -Good to see you, too.
-I should start this off by saying props and hello
for my wife, Nancy,
who worked with you on "Charlie's Angels"
with Drew Barrymore.
-Wow, that's crazy.
-That's my wife, Nancy Juvonen.
-I didn't know that.
-Yeah, so, she loves you, and Drew loves you.
They said they had the best time with you doing that.
-Yeah, yeah. Tell them I said --
Tell Nancy I said hello. Tell Drew I said what up.
That was a -- You know, that was a real big deal for me,
you know, just doing that role at that time
'cause it was a time when I was kind of trying to
really explore things outside of my music
and really get into acting a little bit more.
And I was -- kind of got my feet wet
in a larger-production film.
So I actually learned a lot on that film.
So definitely give them my love. You know what I'm saying?
-I know you're managing to stay very busy.
The "NCIS: L.A." season finale
is this Sunday at 9:00 P.M. on CBS.
That's going on 11 seasons. Am I right?
Something like that? -Yeah, this is the 11th season,
you know -- -That's awesome.
-It's amazing, man. And last week,
we were like the number-one streaming show in America,
like, you know, and it's, like, funny,
because you hear all this news about things streaming
and what's cool and what --
But the "NCIS: L.A." fans, they're just amazing.
They're unbelievable, and they just keep, you know,
keep supporting us. -Don't slow down.
-So, it's been great. It's been really cool.
-Don't slow down. Don't slow down, man.
Absolutely.
I listen to your channel on Sirius XM,
"Rock the Bells." I want to say it's channel 43.
-Yep.
-And I listen to it because I know --
Because, you know, I'm a big LL fan.
I've researched this.
You actually have a part
into selecting what songs are in there and the style and the --
-Well, it's beyond selecting.
I actually program this station.
-You do? -Like, I literally --
Like, yeah, it's one of my jobs.
You know what's interesting? Right now, it's free, too.
People could go on there and check it out.
-On April 27th, you're doing a cool thing with the Beasties.
You're -- It's a virtual town hall.
-Yeah. -The Beastie Boys.
-Yeah, yeah, and I -- You know, I saw your interview
with them, too. It was a lot of fun.
-Dude, you go way back with the Beasties, and Ad-Rock,
I want to say - - -Well, yeah Ad-Rock --
Yeah, Ad-Rock, he --
Ad-Rock actually is the person who gave me demo to Rick Rubin,
and that's how I got my break.
So Ad-Rock of the Beastie Boys,
you know, he helped me get my break.
He got -- You know, he really got me my break.
He -- 'Cause he used to hang out with Rick
in his dorm room every day. I sent the tape there.
Rick would just throw them in a corner
in a box with a bunch of other tapes.
Ad would go through the boxes when he had nothing to do.
He was playing hooky from school.
He listened to my tape. He's like, "Oh, LL Cool J."
He played it, and he liked it, and he told Rick to listen to it
and blah, blah, blah. And then he --
Rick ended up, you know, calling me down,
and we made a record. And on top of that,
Ad-Rock, you know, actually made the beat
on my first song, "I Need a Beat."
You know what I'm saying? -Did he really?
-Yeah. He programmed the drum machine.
Rick produced it, but Ad-Rock, you know, programmed the drums
and everything on that. Yeah.
-What was your beat on "I Need a Beat" before Ad-Rock did it?
-It was something I had done on a Korg drum machine,
a demo on a Korg drum machine.
Yeah. It was similar, but it definitely wasn't the same.
It was -- You know, what Adam did
was way -- was definitely better.
But it was perfect.
-He did like an 808 thing,
but then you end up, like, hanging with the Beasties
for like -- That was -- What was that, '84, '85?
-That was '84. Yeah, that was '84. 1984.
-And you -- I've seen videos of you guys on tour
in like London, maybe. -London and --
London, yeah. All over the world, yeah.
-And what was it like? What was New York City like?
-Man, you know it's crazy, because I had spent time uptown
because of my man Silver Fox.
Silver Fox was the guy who was like --
He was like my rap mentor.
He taught me a lot about hip-hop and emceeing specifically.
So I spent a lot of time uptown early on.
But I had never spent a lot of time downtown.
So, you know, I would be going downtown.
And we'd be going to, like, you know, I'd go to like CBGB's.
It wasn't always with Adam and them,
but I'd be, like, at CBGB's
listening to -- on the punk scene, and like --
You know what I'm saying? Listening to, like, this punk
and this rock -- -Were you into punk?
Were you into punk?
-Huh? -Were you into punk?
-No, I wasn't, but I would hear Rick talk about it.
I would hear Russell talk about it.
It was just part of the world of New York at that time.
So I would go just down there and check it out
just to see what was going on.
I was just very curious. You know what I'm saying?
I've always been very curious.
So, I would go down to CBG's and -- CBGB's.
That where I saw the guys, like, rocking extra hard.
You know? And that did inspire me in a lot of ways.
You know what I'm saying? Like, seeing those guys on-stage,
different groups that I couldn't even name on-stage.
But they used to be, like, killing it.
It was loud, aggressive. It was crazy.
So I think that kind of stuck with me,
you know, as I moved forward and started recording.
You know what I'm saying? Just being around that scene.
-You're also doing a thing I thought was really cool
on Instagram called "The Cool Down."
-Yeah. It's me connecting with real people.
I felt like, you know what?
Sometimes, you know, people, you know, can be celebrities,
and they can obtain a certain amount of success,
and they can be living a certain type of life
and get disconnected from real people, man.
So it's like, why not reach out to people,
see how they're doing, send them some words of encouragement,
share some love, communicate with them.
It may not be the same as me performing,
which can happen at some point, too.
But it allows me to really understand where people are at,
connect with people, and send them words of encouragement.
And for me, that's really important.
And this is not about --
You know, for me, it's not about politics.
It's not about like, you know, you -- Vote for who you want.
Do what you want, but I think humanity --
You know what I'm saying? Like, on a human level,
we just need to care about each other.
You know what I'm saying?
-We're asking everyone who comes on our show --
and first of all, thank you again for coming on,
'cause we love you. But all your fans love you.
And so this has helped a lot of people --
what charities are they spotlighting or highlighting
that they would like to talk about,
and yours is COVID-19 Solidarity Response Fund
for World Health Organization.
This is my -- My daughter wrote this out,
so it's hard for you to read it. -[ Laughs ]
-Is that helping anyone? -I love it. I love it.
Look, anybody, go there. You know, donate. Give.
And, look, all I can encourage everybody to do
is just, you know, be as supportive as you can
in this moment, because there's a lot of people that are hurting
and a lot of people that are going through it, man.
So, you know, do the right thing
and, you know, do what's right in your heart.
You know what I'm saying?