J. Cole has pivoted out of his plans for an early retirement.
The two-time Grammy winner was previously believed to be ending his music run with his seventh studio album, The Fall-Off, which was released in Feb. 2026. After hinting at the possibility of leaving rap on songs like “False Prophets” and chronicling his road to The Fall-Off in a vlog series earlier this year, the North Carolina native shared his change of heart in a new GQ interview.
When GQ culture editor Frazier Tharpe questioned if the Dreamville Records co-founder was still “throwing the concept of retirement around,” Cole shared his changed mindset around the 57-minute mark of the video below.
“No, I'm not using that word at all,” Cole said. “I was saying that I made The Fall-Off with intentions that it’s going to be my last shit. Luckily, by the time I got to actually finishing the album, because of the circumstances, it's like, ‘Oh, nah, I'll never say I'm going to retire.’”
He continued, “I don't know whenever the next thing is going to happen, but I'm definitely not going to say no.”
Upon the release of The Fall-Off, Complex analyzed whether the LP’s would be Cole’s final project here and reached the consensus that the rapper still has more to say. The album debuted atop the Billboard 200 in February, and Cole is currently on the European leg of The Fall-Off World Tour, which concludes Dec. 12.
