PASADENA, California — Nick Cannon has been called the next Will Smith, but he's not letting that comparison confine him.

"I'm doing stand-up this summer, going out on [a comedy] tour and shooting a DVD," the rapper/actor said backstage at Saturday's Wango Tango On-Air festival (see "William Hung Overshadows Backstreet Reunion, All-Star Lineup At Wango Tango"). "I gotta let everybody know I got jokes."

I Got Jokes is in fact the name of the tour, which will be finalized in the coming weeks.

"I be talkin' 'bout my mama, I be talkin' 'bout all that [family] stuff," said Cannon, who launched his career doing sketch comedy on Nickelodeon's "All That."

When asked to give a sneak peek of his routine, it was unclear whether he resisted or did just that.

"They always put stand-up comics on the spot," Cannon said. "I don't know why they do that. That's the only occupation where they put people on the spot. You tell somebody that you a stripper, they don't be like, 'Take your clothes off.' "

Speaking of shedding clothes, Cannon was proud to show more skin than any other performer at Wango Tango. "You ain't even have to hear the song, it was just one layer after another layer, and the girls were screaming," he said after his show, his biggest ever. "I ain't really think about [being nervous] till I got out there, and by then it was too late," he added.

Cannon performed favorites from his self-titled debut album at the Rose Bowl, but offstage, he's moved on to his next project, the soundtrack to "The Underclassman," a comedy he starred in and produced, due in early 2005 (see "Nick Cannon Gets Crunk, Tackles New Movie Roles").

"BT, who did ['The Fast and the Furious'], did all the scoring," said Cannon, who is executive producing the album. "The movie has that tone of a little bit of rock culture, a little bit of hip-hop culture mixed together, 'cause I'm like a hip-hop cop going to like a suburban school, so we is going to mix as much of that as we possibly can."

The hitmaker behind 'NSYNC's "Pop," BT is also producing the soundtrack's first single, a hip-hop track in the works with Cannon as the centerpiece.

"Will Smith made the perfect pattern," Cannon said. "You come with a hit movie and a hit song, that's how you get 'em. So I'm looking for my hit song for that soundtrack right now."

In the meantime, Cannon's keeping his rap skills fresh by appearing on mixtapes from the likes of DJ Whoo Kid and DJ Vlad.

"It's true to the hip-hop form, so I'm freestylin' on a lotta cat's mixtapes," Cannon said. "To all those haters out there, you don't want it! Give me 16 [bars] and I'll spit mine from the dome."

Wait, Nick Cannon has haters?

"They're pretend, imaginary haters," he admitted. "You know hip-hop, you gotta act like there's some kinda beef out there."