{"id":969435,"date":"2026-07-30T16:59:17","date_gmt":"2026-07-30T16:59:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/969435\/"},"modified":"2026-07-30T16:59:17","modified_gmt":"2026-07-30T16:59:17","slug":"too-hort-has-no-plans-to-stop-his-rap-voyage-with-new-album","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/969435\/","title":{"rendered":"Too $hort has no plans to stop his rap voyage with new album"},"content":{"rendered":"

LOS ANGELES (AP) \u2014 At 60, Too $hort<\/a> is helping usher hip-hop into what he calls its senior citizen era. Just don\u2019t expect him to rap like one.<\/p>\n

The Oakland hip-hop pioneer<\/a> is still recording, touring and talking slick more than four decades after he began selling homemade tapes on the streets of the Bay Area. While the genre has long treated aging like an unwritten career-ending offense, Too $hort is breaking the rule and challenging the culture\u2019s elder statesmen to keep going with him.<\/p>\n

His latest proof is \u201cSir Too $hort Vol. 2: Drink & Smoke,\u201d his 23rd studio album, produced entirely by longtime collaborator Lil Jon.<\/a> It arrives Friday, exactly 20 years after the release of his enduring hit \u201cBlow the Whistle.\u201d <\/a><\/p>\n

Too $hort, whose catalog also includes classics like \u201cThe Ghetto\u201d and \u201cShake That Monkey,\u201d says he isn\u2019t interested in slowing down anytime soon. That was certainly evident when he and E-40 performed at the NFL Honors<\/a> in February. <\/p>\n

In an interview with The Associated Press this week, Too $hort reflected on turning 60, challenging hip-hop\u2019s age limits, preserving the legacy of Lil Jon\u2019s late son, DJ Young Slade, the staying power of \u201cBlow the Whistle\u201d and why he has no plans to stop until \u201cthe wheels fall off.\u201d<\/p>\n

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.<\/p>\n

AP: You recently turned 60, but you\u2019re still releasing albums, touring and influencing the culture. When you first started selling homemade tapes on the streets of Oakland, did you ever imagine you\u2019d still be doing this more than four decades later?<\/p>\n

TOO $HORT: At the age of 14 or 15, my mentality was, \u201cLet people hear this music. We\u2019re going to rock some house parties and high school dances and sell some tapes to fans in the streets.\u201d When I got my foot in the door, I knew this was going to be my job. It was always \u201ctill the wheels fall off.\u201d It was never, \u201cLet\u2019s do this for 30 or 40 years.\u201d<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve always said the day hip-hop is no longer my job is probably the day I\u2019ll stop. But the love I have for hip-hop won\u2019t allow me to stop recording. I\u2019ve never taken a long break. I\u2019ve continuously been in the studio, continuously doing shows. I just keep it going because it\u2019s my job.<\/p>\n

AP: Why do you think you\u2019ve remained relevant when so many careers have come and gone?<\/p>\n

TOO $HORT: I truly love making music. It\u2019s never felt like work. I could have stopped after \u201cBlow the Whistle\u201d and been like, \u201cStory told.\u201d But somebody\u2019s got to go out into these uncharted waters and blaze the trail. Look at E-40,<\/a>Snoop Dogg,<\/a>Fat Joe<\/a> and the other guys who kept going after the kids were grown and the grandkids were on the way.<\/p>\n

Who laid the rule down that in hip-hop you gotta stop at 40? Every milestone they said was old. First it was 30, then it was 40, then it was 50. Now we got senior citizen rappers, and this … is real. Hip-hop is entering the place where jazz, blues and R&B have older artists who are still performing and recording. We should too.<\/p>\n

AP: Twenty years after its release, \u201cBlow the Whistle\u201d is still played everywhere from NBA arenas to the Olympics. Why do you think that record has endured?<\/p>\n

TOO $HORT: I don\u2019t know if you could give me the ingredients and tell me how to do it again; I don\u2019t think I could. It had to happen organically. I give Lil Jon a lot of credit because he\u2019s made a lot of songs we\u2019ve loved since the day they came out. We make good music together, and that\u2019s why I\u2019m excited for people to hear what we\u2019re still doing 30 years after we first worked together.<\/p>\n

AP: This album reunites you with Lil Jon, but it also features work from his late son, Slade, who died in February.<\/a> What did that collaboration mean to you?<\/p>\n

TOO $HORT: His son passed away after we finished recording. We had actually done about twice as many songs as ended up on this project. I saw how it affected Jon, and I had recently lost my brother, so I knew that feeling of loss. The whole time, Slade was producing or co-producing a lot of the tracks I was working on. The first thing that came to me was that I\u2019d be more than proud to be part of his son\u2019s legacy and give something to the world that would help him live forever. Jon keeps saying, \u201cSlade\u2019s legacy,\u201d and I\u2019m just trying to be a part of that and show the world we lost another good, talented person.<\/p>\n

AP: You and E-40 celebrated Bay Area hip-hop together during your 2020 Verzuz appearance. Fans still love seeing you two together. Would you ever team up again, whether for another Verzuz, a tour or something else?<\/p>\n

TOO $HORT: We did one in 2020, but it wasn\u2019t a battle. We had a good time. We did a lot of laughing, a lot of togetherness. I didn\u2019t want to battle 40 then, and I don\u2019t want to battle him now. That\u2019s my best friend in hip-hop. I\u2019d sign up for me and 40 against anybody. That\u2019d be fun. They haven\u2019t had two groups. \u2026 I put that out there: Who wants to battle Too $hort and E-40 in Verzuz?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"LOS ANGELES (AP) \u2014 At 60, Too $hort is helping usher hip-hop into what he calls its senior…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":969436,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[33],"tags":[276,185,171,57,109674,975,24197,389254,61,67,132,68],"class_list":["post-969435","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-celebrities","tag-california","tag-celebrities","tag-entertainment","tag-general-news","tag-lil-jon","tag-music","tag-oakland","tag-todd-shaw","tag-u-s-news","tag-united-states","tag-unitedstates","tag-us"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/117009997288136420","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/969435","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=969435"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/969435\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/969436"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=969435"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=969435"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=969435"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}