With nearly 40 years in the rap game, Too $hort has no plans on calling it quits. While chopping it up with Shannon Sharpe on the “Club Shay Shay” podcast, the Bay Area emcee said that he will never retire from rap and proceeded to provide the reason for his decision.

According to $hort, he was close to retiring after the release of his project Gettin’ It (Album Number 10). With help from radio stations and print magazines, he announced his decision to the public and was later deterred following a conversation with DJ Red Alert.

“I do it because, once upon a time, I announced that I was retiring,” said the “Blow the Whistle” emcee. “I was 30 years old, and it was a big promotional push behind, ‘Too $hort retiring’ – I was on my 10th album at the time and I remember DJ Red Alert said to me, ‘You don’t ever see jazz musicians retiring or blues? Diana Ross and Smokey (Robinson) – they’re still on the stage. Why does a rapper have to stop?’

“So when he said that, I never ever considered retirement ever again,” he continued. “And I think that, the more I get older and wiser, I’m thinking somebody’s got to keep doing this.”

The platinum-selling Gettin’ It dropped back in May 1996. The West Coast rapper has since released 11 more full-length albums. In a 2010 interview, Too $hort claimed one of his goals is to be the oldest active rapper in the music industry.

“I think I just kind of set a goal for myself to play it as long as it can go,” he previously told West Coast website DubCNN. “I just wanna do it longer than anybody else say they did it. I wanna make more songs than anybody, I wanna be the oldest rapper who is active.”

“I didn’t set out to do this, but now that I’m doing it, I might as well do it to the fullest, like Brett Favre? he concluded, citing the NFL star who retired after 20 years in the professional football league.