LL Cool J Explains How Grandfather Helped Launch His Career & Grandma’s Warning Against Pierced Nipples

LL Cool J‘s grandfather watched every dollar, but his gift of two turntables and a mixer helped change Hip-Hop history.

His grandmother made the pitch, saying the gear would keep young James Todd Smith home while giving his love for Hip-Hop room to grow.

“My grandfather being from Barbados, he didn’t have a lot of money. He did not, but what he did have, he wasn’t spending. It’s like, ‘I got, I have $19, and I’m not spending the $19.’ You know, it was that kind of a deal, right? So she convinced him to get me some equipment because it would keep me in the house. So he went, he bought me two turntables and a mixer, and I was able to lean more into Hip-Hop ’cause he knew I loved it already. He was a very open-minded person. He would encourage it.”

Those decks became his lab, where LL practiced, built his voice and learned how to take control of a record. His jazz-playing grandfather also took him into the basement and recorded his voice on reel-to-reel tapes.

His grandfather died before LL turned pro, yet the older man seemed sure that fame was coming. During his final years in a VA hospital, he would hear the radio and insist, “That’s Todd on the radio.”

LL believed him and later named his 1985 debut Radio for the man who had heard his future first.

The album followed “I Need a Beat,” the 1984 single LL released at 16 that helped put Def Jam in business. Produced by Rick Rubin, Radio became Def Jam’s first full album and delivered “Rock the Bells” and “I Can’t Live Without My Radio.”

The family story then took a sharp turn when the grandmother who secured his gear drew a hard line over school. She told LL to choose school or leave her house, then added one last rule about keeping his nipples unpierced.

“The only time I didn’t listen is when my mother, my grandmother, ’cause I had made my first song, my grandmother said, ‘You either go to school or you got to go.’ Grandma definitely wanted me to put my shirt on. And whatever you do, don’t pierce your nipples [laughter]. That was the only moment, you know, that was the only moment when I was like, ‘I got to do this,’ and I went after my dream. But other than that, I always listened. I always tell people that, in order to really be successful, especially in especially in the arts, you have to have rhino skin and a baby’s heart.”

That was tough love with a punch line, and Trevor Noah laughed right along with him. Grandma could live with the rap career, but nipple jewelry was one step too far.

The kid who chose music built a catalog that moved from hard battle records to the vulnerable “I Need Love.” His grandmother later inspired “Mama Said Knock You Out” by urging him to fight the critics who thought his run was done.

LL won a Grammy for that record in 1992 and another for “Hey Lover” in 1997 before entering the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2021. He returned with The FORCE in 2024, showing that the music career born in his grandparents’ home was still alive.

He also became a lasting screen star through Krush Groove, In the House, Any Given Sunday, Last Holiday and S.W.A.T. His biggest television role came as Sam Hanna, the agent he played for 14 seasons on NCIS: Los Angeles.

Now LL is bringing Sam home in NCIS: New York, a new CBS spinoff pairing him with Scott Caan’s Nick Schaeffer.

CBS will premiere NCIS: New York on October 6 at 9 p.m. ET/PT, with LL also serving as an executive producer.