J. Cole Says He's Done Talking About Retirement, and Opens Up About Why His Kendrick Response Fell Flat

J. Cole is not retiring. The North Carolina rapper, who made his 2026 album "The Fall-Off" believing it would be his last, said in a conversation with GQ on Wednesday that he no longer plans to use the word, Billboard reported.

Cole sat down in Las Vegas on Wednesday, Oct. 28, with his longtime manager Mark Pitts and GQ's Frazier Tharpe. Asked about retirement, he waved it off. "Nah, I'm not gon' use that word. After this tour right here? Come on man, this is crazy," he said, according to Billboard. "Nah, I'm not using that word at all. I'm not using that word."

He explained the change of heart. "When I was making that album, I was making it like, 'Damn, this is going to be my last s–t,'" Cole said. "Luckily, by the time I got to actually finishing the album, because of circumstances — it's like, 'Nah, I'll never say I'm going to retire.' I don't know when the next thing is going to happen, but I'm definitely not going to say no."

"The Fall-Off" came out in February as a double-disc album and gave Cole his seventh No. 1 on the Billboard 200. The tour behind it sold out arenas, Billboard reported, and Cole credited that run for his shift.

The more revealing part of the conversation was about 2024. That spring, Kendrick Lamar dissed both Cole and Drake on Future's "Like That." Cole told GQ he was torn: he felt pressure to respond, but he also had Lamar verses on his own next album. Billboard noted that Cole has previously said there were two Lamar features on "The Fall-Off" that he ultimately scrapped because of leaks.

"I'm not giving him the real, which is like, 'N–a, f–k!' I probably told you I got this n–a on the album, which puts me in a weird position," Cole said. "I got to like respond without responding, but still try to save face. I was holding a lot. On top of that, I thought I was done with the album. I'm retired, uninspired in my mind. I probably would've did a little better getting it all off."

Cole's response was "7 Minute Drill," released in April 2024 on "Might Delete Later." Days later he apologized to Lamar, and later that month he bowed out of the feud on stage at his Dreamville Festival. The song was then removed from streaming services, Billboard reported.

At the festival, Cole said the diss "don't sit right with my spirit" and "disrupts my f—ing peace." He told the crowd that in trying "to find a little angle and downplay this n—a's f—ing catalog and his greatness," he had gone against himself, and asked, "how many people think Kendrick Lamar is one of the greatest motherf–kers to ever touch a f—ing microphone?"

Billboard noted that Cole's exit cleared the way for the Lamar-Drake clash that peaked in May 2024. Cole's GQ comments are the most detailed he has been about his own mindset at the time: that the response was constrained by a working relationship he had not made public, and by a belief that he was finished making music.

Billboard has also covered Cole addressing his apology to Lamar on a "Birthday Blizzard '26" freestyle. And in February, during the final Los Angeles stop of his Trunk Sale Tour, Cole was asked whether fans could expect him on Drake's album "Iceman" and seemed caught off guard, Billboard reported; it said it was unclear where the relationship between the two "First Person Shooter" collaborators stood. Cole and Drake topped the Billboard Hot 100 with that song in 2023 and toured together on the Big as the What? Tour in 2024.

Taken together, the GQ comments add a layer to how Cole's 2024 exit has been understood. In his telling, he was boxed in twice: by unreleased collaborations with the man he was supposed to be attacking, and by his own belief that his career was ending. "I was holding a lot," he said. He also offered something like a critique of his own diss: "I probably would've did a little better getting it all off."

For fans, the headline is simpler. The man who built a farewell into his album rollout now says he won't commit to a farewell at all. "I don't know when the next thing is going to happen," he said. Cole did not announce new music or dates.

Still unknown: when, or what, Cole releases next.