Actor and singer Terrence Howard with son Hunter, Friday, April 11, 2008, at Virgin Megastore in New York.
Terrence Howard,who recently held a listening party for his debut album “Terrence Howard – Me and the Band of Kings,” says that he has always wanted to be in the music industry:

At 39, Howard plans to make his musical debut this fall with a mix of soft, pop-rock tunes he wrote or co-wrote. They draw upon his musical influences such as Simon & Garfunkel, Jim Croce and the easy-listening sounds of The Carpenters.

“This has been my dream forever. I just want to go on the road with it,” says Howard, sifting through CDs during a trip to the Virgin Megastore in Times Square, a few hours before curtain time for “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof.”

“I’ll do a film every year and a half or something, but I’m not going to be distracted by the cute girl at the bar anymore,” he says. “I’m just feeling the girl that I came here to meet.”

For Howard, that “cute girl at the bar” was acting. He has evolved from character actor to matinee idol, with roles in the Oscar-winning “Crash,” his Oscar-nominated turn as a pimp-slash-rapper in “Hustle & Flow,” and memorable appearances in flicks like “The Best Man.” In “Iron Man,” he plays Rhodey, the straight-laced military man, star Tony Stark’s best bud, and surefire component of the inevitable sequels.
His big break came in 1992, playing Michael Jackson’s older brother Jackie in the TV miniseries “The Jacksons: The American Dream.” But Howard describes it as his first real mistake.

“I got sidetracked,” he recalls. “I kept thinking, I’ll get a music deal somehow, even though I couldn’t play anything at the time. I thought because I was a songwriter, because I had dreams it would work out.”

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