''Todd Smith'' is the eleventh

studio album An album is a collection of audio recordings issued on compact disc (CD), Phonograph record, vinyl, audio tape, or another medium such as Digital distribution#Music, digital distribution. Albums of recorded sound were developed in the early ...

American American(s) may refer to: * American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America" ** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America ** American ancestry, pe ...

rapper

LL Cool J James Todd Smith (born January 14, 1968), known professionally as LL Cool J (short for Ladies Love Cool James), is an American rapper, songwriter, record producer, and actor. He is one of the earliest rappers to achieve commercial success, along ...

, released on April 11, 2006 by his label Def Jam Recordings. It includes collaborations with

Jennifer Lopez Jennifer Lynn Affleck (' Lopez; born July 24, 1969), also known as J.Lo, is an American singer, actress and dancer. In 1991, she began appearing as a Fly Girl dancer on the sketch comedy television series ''In Living Color'', where she rema ...

, Pharrell, Juelz Santana, Teairra Mari, Jamie Foxx, Ginuwine,

Mary J. Blige Mary Jane Blige ( ; born January 11, 1971) is an American singer, songwriter, and actress. Often referred to as the " Queen of Hip-Hop Soul" and " Queen of R&B", Blige has won nine Grammy Awards, a Primetime Emmy Award, four American Music Award ...

112 112 may refer to: *112 (number), the natural number following 111 and preceding 113 *112 (band), an American R&B quartet from Atlanta, Georgia **112 (album), ''112'' (album), album from the band of the same name *112 (emergency telephone number), t ...

Mary Mary Mary Mary is a female American urban contemporary gospel duo composed of sisters Erica Atkins-Campbell (born April 29, 1972) and Trecina Atkins-Campbell (born May 1, 1974). Formed in 1998, Mary Mary was launched into mainstream recognition fo ...

Ryan Toby City High was an American R&B/ hip hop trio consisting of rappers/singers Ryan Toby, Robbie Pardlo, and Claudette Ortiz. City High is best known for their song " What Would You Do?", which earned a Grammy nomination. Career In 2001, City High ...

(from

City High City High was an American R&B/ hip hop trio consisting of rappers/singers Ryan Toby, Robbie Pardlo, and Claudette Ortiz. City High is best known for their song " What Would You Do?", which earned a Grammy nomination. Career In 2001, City High ...

) and

Freeway A controlled-access highway is a type of highway that has been designed for high-speed vehicular traffic, with all traffic flow—ingress and egress—regulated. Common English terms are freeway, motorway and expressway. Other similar terms ...

Background

The first single is the high-intensity, Jermaine Dupri produced dance track " Control Myself", another song with singer

after their collaboration on " All I Have" on Lopez's 2002 album '' This Is Me... Then''. LL Cool J and Jennifer Lopez shot the video for " Control Myself" on January 2, 2006 at Sony Studios, New York. The video was shot by

Hype Williams Harold Williams (born August 1, 1970) is an American music video director, film director, film producer, and screenwriter. Early life Williams was born in Queens, New York. He is of mixed African-American and Honduran descent. He attended Adel ...

. Originally the song was to feature Fergie (from

The Black Eyed Peas Black Eyed Peas (also known as The Black Eyed Peas) is an American musical group consisting of rappers will.i.am, apl.de.ap, Taboo. The group's line-up during the height of their popularity in the 2000s featured Fergie, who replaced Kim Hil ...

), however difference in terms of payment resulted in her being replaced by Jennifer Lopez. ''Todd Smith'' scored mixed reviews, although most critics enjoyed tracks "Preserve The Sexy" and "Freeze". Freeze was the album's second single and it features Lyfe Jennings. The album shipped 500,000 copies but sold just 367,000 copies. Despite the fact the album debuted at number-six, it quickly fell off in 6 weeks. LL Cool J said he will be doing his last album on Def Jam which is a sequel to ''Todd Smith''. The original title for the album was called "My Favorite Flavors" and this is the 4th album of LL's where he has appeared either shirtless, or has used a bare/exposed part of his body as the cover of the album. Producers on the project include Pharrell,

Scott Storch Scott Spencer Storch (born December 16, 1973) is an American record producer and songwriter. He started off as a keyboardist for the group the Roots. Early life Storch was born on Long Island, New York. He was raised in South Florida and Phila ...

, Bink!, Shea Taylor,

Keezo Kane Keezo Kane (born Keith Moore, 7 June 1979) is an American hip-hop producer. In 2004, he signed to Kanye West's G.O.O.D. Music label. Production credits *'' Right About Now'' (Talib Kweli album, 2005) : "The Beast" (featuring Papoose) *'' Firew ...

and Trackmasters. The album premiered on the Billboard charts at #6, selling 116,000 units and premiered at #79 on the UK albums chart and #40 in Canada. The album has been certified Gold by the RIAA.

Music and lyrics

''Todd Smith'' is composed of radio-friendly hip hop, with LL Cool J foregoing street material in favor of straightforward, commercial pop-rap. Much of the album is built on minimalist, distilled synthesized rap, featuring thick drum swirls and bright record production. The lyrics demonstrate LL Cool J comfortably rapping slow songs exclusively aimed at the opposite sex.

Critical reception

''Todd Smith'' was met with "mixed or average" reviews from critics. At

Metacritic Metacritic is a website that review aggregator, aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted arithmetic mean, weighted average). M ...

, which assigns a weighted average rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream publications, this release received an

average In ordinary language, an average is a single number taken as representative of a list of numbers, usually the sum of the numbers divided by how many numbers are in the list (the arithmetic mean). For example, the average of the numbers 2, 3, 4, 7, ...

score of 51 based on 17 reviews.

Track listing

Charts

Weekly charts

Year-end charts

Certifications

References

External links

MTV Interview regarding the album
{{Authority control 2006 albums LL Cool J albums Def Jam Recordings albums Albums produced by Bink (record producer) Albums produced by Scott Storch Albums produced by the Neptunes Albums produced by Trackmasters Albums produced by Jermaine Dupri Albums produced by LL Cool J