Editor’s note: The following article is an op-ed, and the views expressed are the author’s own. Read more opinions on theGrio.
Very few artists in hip-hop command the attention of J. Cole. Of course, along with Cole are Kendrick Lamar and Drake, and a small smattering of others here and there whose announcements of albums and things truly move the needle, at least for a moment. There was a time when Kanye West (or Ye) would be on that list, but honestly, I’m not sure where the culture stands on Kanye at the moment; he has a new album coming out at the end of January, and nobody seems to care at all.
Back to J. Cole. Every time he drops a project, a single, or a feature, it becomes a must-see (or hear) event. He more or less (unintentionally) ignited the Kendrick Lamar and Drake beef, hopped in and then hopped out, and while he took some initial flak for that, he came out looking a bit like a sage old wise man who could see the future. He also has to be one of the few hip-hop artists who spits like a battle rapper to ever apologize publicly in a rap battle he was an active member of and manage to maintain a career afterwards.
That is largely because Cole has a legion of fans who view him as one of the Mt. Rushmore-level GOATs, but there are also TONS of people (like me) who still don’t quite understand why Cole was anointed as a Mt. Rushmore-level artist to begin with. I’ve never understood the hype. I think he’s good at rapping, and even better than most, but the GOAT-level status he’s achieved often surprises me. Unless, of course, you only count his features, in which case he might be the greatest feature artist of all time, destroying every record he’s hopped on with ease.
Most of that is neither here nor there at this point; regardless of how I may feel, J. Cole, now 40, is considered a GOAT and has cemented his place in hip-hop history. He recently announced the release of “The Fall Off,” his 7th studio album, and follow-up to 2021’s “The Off-Season.” To announce the release date of his final album (February 6, 2026), we got a set of Instagram posts from Fayetteville’s finest, one of which featured a video of Cole doing several ordinary things like washing a $200,000 car at a local car wash and eating at Waffle House.
In the video, there is a voiceover that says this, in full:
“Everything is supposed to go away eventually. You see this especially in show business with famous actors or musicians. And it’s like, ‘Oh this guy used to be famous, then he fell off. What happened?’ And they want to point to, ‘they did this and this’ and made some kind of mistake. Instead of thinking that, ‘It’s kinda crazy they got famous in the first place.’ So few people reach that level that, yes, of course, it’s not going to last forever. Somebody is going to take that spot. That’s how show business has been since forever. But no, they always want to say, ‘Oh, that guy fell off.’ They wanna look down on him, or look down at the natural cycle of rising and falling.”
Yowza.
While I’ll be like everybody else in line to pull up his album at midnight on February 6, I’ll be thinking about that statement for the rest of my life. I suppose in some capacity, I’ve been thinking about it already as I gauge my own career as a person who, at one point, was famous-in-my-lane, who isn’t quite as well known as I used to be.
It’s an interesting way to promote his album; rumors have swirled that this is his final work. Perhaps Cole wants to go out while he’s arguably still on top, kind of like Michael Jordan did in 1998 after winning his 6th NBA championship. Jordan’s last shot in Utah is emblazoned in the minds of all of us who came of age in the 90s with Jordan as our most famous figure. We also like to pretend like the whole Washington Wizards experiment never happened. Cole’s right in that most times when folks lose their foothold on the culture, we like to assume something happened, as opposed to the natural order of things. It’s impossible to be the hottest thing smoking forever. To quote the famous line from “The Dark Knight,” “You either die a hero or live long enough to see yourself become a villain.”
More aptly in fame circles, especially artistically, you either die on top or live long enough for people to dissect, analyze, and decide why nobody cares about your work anymore. I’ve been guilty of doing that. When the truth is, I wish my perspective was rooted in the most important line in that entire voiceover: ‘It’s kinda crazy they got famous in the first place.’
That’s perspective. Artists like Cole, Kendrick, Beyoncé, Taylor Swift, and any number of others who are so famous it feels unreal are truly living an alternate reality. The vast majority of us will never know that level of fame, especially not for something we’ve given the world. It really is insane that all of those people and any number of others have had such a meteoric impact, simply because of their art of their athletic abilities. We should be thankful we got to witness it for however long we did instead of tearing folks down or acknowledging that they fell off. Usually, Father Time happens to athletes and time and tastes change for artists. Artists don’t always fall off; sometimes we decide that what we loved at one point isn’t lovable any longer.
I don’t know if that’s the ultimate message Cole hopes to land with his new, and perhaps final, album. But if it is, whew chile…if he sticks the landing on it, people like me who have experienced some level of fame and eventually moved into the “after fame” point of life are in for a treat. I think about that a lot, honestly. Not just for me, but in terms of all of the artists I love, or used to love. Nothing lasts forever…the ability to make money and get love from the world, even for a short time, isn’t something anybody should take for granted, and, as fans, we should just enjoy that we got to experience things, even for a while.
J. Cole has been around in hip-hop at maximum relevance longer than most. By all accounts, he’s also an amazing human based on what I’ve seen, read, and heard from him. That he was able to live entirely off of his artistry is a godsend and one he obviously doesn’t take for granted. That he is so self-aware to realize how fleeting this life can be and acknowledge it the only way he knows how, through music, is a new stage unlocked in a journey that has been interesting to watch.
Whether “The Fall Off” is just an album or also a missive on fame and celebrity remains to be seen, but he’s already proving a perspective not often so loudly shared in hip-hop. As might be an Old African Proverb at this point, “Anybody can make a million dollars, the hard part is keeping it.”
Love yourz.
Panama Jackson is a columnist at theGrio and host of the award-winning podcast, “Dear Culture” on theGrio Black Podcast Network. He writes very Black things, drinks very brown liquors, and is pretty fly for a light guy. His biggest accomplishment to date coincides with his Blackest accomplishment to date in that he received a phone call from Oprah Winfrey after she read one of his pieces (biggest) but he didn’t answer the phone because the caller ID said “Unknown” (Blackest).
