Nicki Minaj is the new face of Roberto Cavalli. These are her first ads for the Italian fashion house. Cavalli says he chose Nicki because she’s “a sensual woman who is aware of her body.” I guess Roberto likes the way Nicki moves her anaconda. These ads are okay. Nothing special, but Nicki’s famous enough to spread some brand awareness.
Nicki is everywhere right now to promote The Pinkprint. I’m a not-so-closet rap fan, but I haven’t listened to this album yet. Rolling Stone calls it a “busting-out-all-over magnum opus.” The general consensus is that it’s a pop-rap hybrid that fluctuates between raunchy shock tactics and serious introspection. Nicki’s pushed her album on The Ellen Show, where she spoke about wathing “a cute little fat baby.” She visited Andy Cohen and had a predictable wardrobe malfuntion. She also told Andy that she hasn’t slept with anyone in the industry.
Nicki has a new interview with AllHipHop, and she’s not exactly humble. But we knew that already:
She thinks she’ll be a good mother: “I think about all the female icons that we cherished and loved, and they never had children. Like Janet. I personally love what Beyonce has been able to do. I want to focus on the child.”
Her role in the rap community: “I am the greatest female rapper, and it’s humbling because the people make you that. I wanna let the Hip Hop culture know I take this serious. I know now they will never be able to dispute my skill.”
She still self-doubts at times: “There’s a real thin line between genius and crazy. Sometimes I’ll ask people, ‘What’s wrong with me?'”
[From AllHipHop]
Is Nicki really the greatest female rapper in the world? I don’t think she’s all that, and if she was that awesome, she wouldn’t have to rely on stuntqueening and constant wardrobe malfunctions for attention. Nicki also tosses so much shade that she seems petty. Then again, male rappers tear each other apart too. Eminem and Snoop Dogg will never get along, and that’s only one example. The world pays more attention to catfights.
Photos courtey of Fame/Flynet & Roberto Cavalli
I’m giving the same look Nicki is giving on the last picture to this.
“Best female rapper” is a subjective title, but there’s no doubt that Nicki is a better businesswoman and marketer than Lil’ Kim is. The endorsements, the clothes, the music features, etc. I’m not trying to take away from Nicki’s talent. Nicki’s a beast. I think The Pinkprint is a new rap classic. Lil’ Kim had a really crazy flow back in the day. Since Nicki blew up, people forget that – including Nicki.
She is a beast! Her stunt queening has distracted a lot of people from her raw talent, but you can’t deny that she has upped the female rap game, the world hasn’t seen such talent since Kim. I have nothing but respect for her, I just got her album and so far am loving it.
She is far from that title. She is pure ego and nothing else.Like many
young artists, trying to clame unreachable titles.
I read about/watched azealiA banks last night for the first time, not a bad interview:
http://jezebel.com/azealia-banks-explains-her-iggy-beef-in-this-sad-fascin-1672876094
She is not much of a Nicki fan.
I’m excited to watch this when I get out of work.
Banks always gives good interview.
I watched Both Azealia’s and Nicki’s Interview on Angie Martinez ( they both got VERY emotional and cried Different reasons) Liked them BOTH so so Much after that SO Good and both came across better than they both usually do, so Passionate!
QQ, your hair on your pic! Wow, it looks amazing!!
I like the ads! She looks perfect
Photoshop does that.
Yeah she’s ‘Shopped to death.
She’s still gorgeous in real life, love her or hate her.
I can’t hate. That zebra dress is modeled perfectly.
+1
I think she’s gorgeous (fake parts and all). Her music is also fun and she’s a pretty good rapper. Not the greatest but I think you have to psych yourself and others out a bit to have the chutzpah to rap…and someone’s got to think she’s the greatest! I don’t mind the statement at all.
I’ll see myself out.
Right, until the created by corporate committee ‘next greatest female rapper of all time’ is released next year.
There’s talent there too, though. Although I don’t doubt that YM has some input they can’t manufacture talent. She writes her own rhymes.
Yes, ‘Stupid Ho’ is pure lyrical genius. Dylan and Springsteen and Eminem bow to her greater talent. LOL
Nicki IS a great rapper; she reminds me of Lil Wayne with her plays on words and use of puns and she writes her own rhymes. She doesn’t rely on a man in the rap game to carry her, she holds her own alongside the CM rappers. Her flow is killer and her verses are funny and then on this album she got more personal which was cool.
I’m a fan but she comes across as arrogant. I think that’s just her insecurities. She puffs out her chest with bravado like so many rappers; it all stems from lack of true confidence so I try to give her the benefit of the doubt. I imagine she feels a ton of pressure to maintain her body and fit the image, stay on top of her game, ignore her haters, etc. And now, it sounds like she’s eager to start a family but just broke up with her longterm boyfriend of 12 years.
“She puffs out her chest with bravado like so many rappers;”
Oh absolutely. That braggadocio is such a huge part of hip hop, but the difference is that dudes never get called out for it.
Agreed. She’s a fantastic rapper and one of the best around right now, full stop. I don’t really think she’s saying she’s better than Missy or whatever here – her main point is that her skills are much greater than Iggy’s, which is absolutely true.
Maybe she broke up with the boyfriend because he wouldn’t start a family or commit?
I think the bragging is definitely a cover for insecurity, and she sort of unintentionally admits as such in the answer to the question afterwards. I remember an interview she did right before going on stage at the VMAs awhile back where she was talking about being afraid to go on stage because she knew she was going to get hate from some people. It was somewhat endearing the sense that she was willing to own up to that insecurity in the first place.
Nicki is a good rapper but the “best female rapper”? Missy Elliott, always.
Thank you. Take a seat, Minaj. Now.
Sorry but that title will always go to Lauren Hill…crazy or not
Exactly!
Love me some Missy but sorry, the title goes to MC Lyte always and forever.
I agree with that one ,but Queen Latifah should get a little love too.
Yep. MC Lyte is my #1, especially when she was out during a time when a female had to be able to authentically spit fire, and didn’t have to/couldn’t resort to using sex or self objectification in order to compete with the fellas.The bar back then was set much much higher than now Lyte can actually tell a story from beginning to end, coherently, concisely and intelligently, and without the gimmicks
Lauryn Hill, Eve Foxxy, Queen Latifa and Kim all get my votes before Nicki does.
I am a child of the 90’s and Missy and Lauryn Hill are my favorite female rappers. The music was actual music and had a kind of groove to it that was invigorating and relaxing all at the same time. I want another Missy Elliot album before I die.
I’m a huge fan of Lauryn Hill myself. I know every word of Miseducation. I wish she’d come back with a vengeance and show this talented (yes) little stunt queen (yes) a thing or two about being real.
@OGTessa, it’s coming!
I agree. I think there are a lot of other women who do a better job.
I’m the greatest everything in the world, and she’s right, it’s humbling.
Lol GoOdNames, I hear you can throw a mean tantrum. 😉
Naturally, miMif, I’m great at that, too.
Well, it’s important to be aware of one’s strengths, after all …
LOL!
I laughed at that comment too! It takes a lot of ego to make a statement like that and follow it up by claiming to be humble.
Ehhh. All rappers boast about being the best. It’s a part of the game. I don’t see anyone dissing Jay Z, Drake, Biggie Smalls, Ja Rule, Kendrick, Eminem, 50 Cent and the countless male rappers who’ve claimed to be the best at various times. The only one who gets flack, maybe, maybe, is Kanye.
The boastfulness of rappers is cringeworthy.
Yes, that’s why I, and many others, still prefer the classic rock gods; bands like zeppelin and queen played live for 3 plus hours before 50 to 80,000 fans with few or no gimmicks – something rappers can’t do, and they are still listened to, played, admired, and articles in guitar world, RS etc. examine their careers and music; they were too classy to talk like juveniles – their talent (far above rappers) and live shows were all that was needed.
I’m sorry, I don’t understand all this “rap game” talk; why not just make good music that can stand on its own?
Could all this boastfulness be just to disguise the fact that rapping isn’t that difficult. Ask any guitarist how hard it is to write and then play live all the various guitar parts from Stairway To Heaven, for example. It’s not for amateurs, and you can’t use backing tracks and lip synch.
@theoneandonly you must be fun at parties.
theoneandonly: Indeed!
Yeah I posted the same above, Farah.
I don’t know if it’s cringeworthy- it’s just part of the hip-hop culture, and it makes sense in terms of mic battles that you’d be out there trying to prove you’re better than the guy you’re going up against.
Exactly. It’s an inherently competitive genre. Rivalries, hubris, and insults are three of the major underpinnings of the art form.
Rappers and professional wrestlers seem to have a lot in common.
I suspect some of that comes from the background from which a lot of rappers came. The African American community suffers from an extensive amount of poverty and disenfrachisement in the United States, and the hip hop genre provided a path for upwards social mobility. So some of that bragging is probably the “new money” mindset, but some of it is also an unapologetic flaunting of their economic power. It’s a way of saying, “I beat the system.”
I think we’re also talking about a big difference between artists who skew pop and those who stay pure rap/hip hop as well. Because there’s a lot of criticism when someone declares themselves “the best” when there’s the appearance that they’re selling out. Great example from your list: Ja Rule. By the time he went to prison no one took him seriously. But then again, artists that don’t skew pop also don’t make mainstream news and their interviews and feuds simply aren’t big stories.
If you’re the best at something, you shouldn’t have to tell people, they will decide that for themselves.
Male rappers say the same yet there are no headlines. God forbid a female saying the same thing w/o it becoming a news story. Her being rude and arrogant isn’t new. IIRC, she got fired from around a dozen jobs in years past for her behaviour.
I like the ads! About what she said.. well, right now I think the most known rap-women are Nicki and Iggy. And well, since I really don’t like Iggy, I guess Nicki does it for me. I love when she raps in her song, she’s damn good. Surely not the best, but she’s good, as far as I know.
She’s the top selling female rap artist of all time (if I’m remembering correctly), so she’s not being too, too arrogant with that statement. And she does acknowledge her fans got her there. Men don’t play down their accomplishments, so why should a woman? I don’t always like her work, but she’s done a surprisingly good job of breaking into a male dominated industry and maintaining the drive.
Pinkprint sounded pretty good when I glanced through it on iTunes. It has a stronger hip hop/R&B vibe than her last one. I’m not a huge rap fan, but I could see myself downloading a few singles.
More records sold than Missy Elliot or Lauryn Hill? Really? Wow, I had no idea.
I know Nicki Minaj holds some records for female rappers.
Lauryn Hill only had one successful solo album. Her sales and hits with the Fugees wouldn’t count towards that statistic. While Miseducation *could* be the top selling female rap album of all time, just because it’s a classic and people keep buying it over time, I feel like she was more of a critical darling than a full-on pop star with pop star sales. (And I say that as someone who adores that album, I’m a 90s kid and it blew my mind. Every single song on there hit me in a different, meaningful way.)
Missy is the bee’s knees. She might hold one of the album records as her early 2000s albums were monster hits. She’s a great talent as a rapper; I love her energy. I don’t know if she can perform anymore because of her lupus (or some other autoimmune disease) but I would love to see her on TV somehow, like on a singing show or maybe her own talk show?
Actually Missy has a protégé called Sharaya J. She is pretty good. Her rapping is on target, her dance moves are SERIOUS and I personally L-O-V-E her style; hip without being trashy.
I hope Missy promotes/produces more female rappers like this.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BoB6_z4cJZg
Actually, now that I’ve done a little more research, I was incorrect – Missy Elliot holds the all time record. (Only female rap artist to have every album go platinum, too – incredible!) Nicki’s albums are mostly platinum sellers, as well, but her biggest accomplishment is that she’s the only female artist to ever have seven hits simultaneously on the Billboard Top 100. It’ll be interesting to see how long she can maintain the drive over the next couple of years. Whole album sales are much harder to come by in the iTunes era, so I’d be impressed if she ever managed to stick around long enough to catch up.
Back in the day real hip hop was never judged on album sales, or else MC Hammer and Vanilla Ice would have been included as some of the GOATS over Rakim, BIG Pac, Nas, KRS JayZ,etc. So her selling x amounts of albums and/or how many grammy’s she’s gotten really shouldn’t count as any criteria for the GOAT.
POP acts have always outsold real hip hop anyway. Even Jay Z admitted to watering and dumbing down lyrics in order to sell more albums to the masses. But at the time he did, he was already solid and proven entertainer in his genre.
Not disagreeing that her skill level is debatable and subjective. That’s entirely personal, though I agree that independent artists are often superior to the mainstream industry. I’m not enough of a hip hop/rap expert to really say one way or another where she stands comparably to other artists in terms of liguistic talent.
I think it really depends on how you interpret her words. Based on the surrounding context, I’m wondering if she was referring to her position as the foremost female artist of the current time in terms of record sales and cultural relevance. That, I would certainly agree with, and I did notice she was careful to avoid adding “of all time” to the end of it.
Good point also there are so many marketing avenues available to today’s acts in every genre that didn’t exist even 15 years ago. This whole issue of “album” sales has to be recalculated in the social media/internet era.
It’s not petty if it’s the truth.
She is really good-one of the best around now. But for me it’s Missy for all time. P.S. Those gold heels in that first pic..ooooohhh, yessss.
Shock… In the Cavalli ads, she is somewhat normally proportioned! Whilst on awards shows she looks like a fake, fat, plastic beast writhing her implants on the floor and walking around giving “f me” looks. The way these women are so desperate for male attention is nauseating. Anyone seen the Amber Rose/ Blac Chyna video? It made my stomach turn. They look like poodles getting reading to make a steaming pile on the floor. PUKE!
Totally agree. I used to like Nikki more when she was fun (without the fake tits and ass). She has huge talent but why the need to turn to plastic surgery to look like a real doll? It´s the opposite of empowerment. I also liked Amber Rose´s look, with the shaved head and all. She´s having fun with her style and I think (?) that she is naturally curvy. Then I listened to her talking. She talks with a baby voice and all I ever see her do is twerking. I like sexy, but when it´s fake and/or accompanied with no talent it´s just embarrassing.
I think Nicki is one of the greatest female rappers but she needs to exercise a little humility.
If she does say so herself…..personally, I think she’s unattractive, and low-class. The ridiculous Rosie Perez applauded her for “embracing her sexuality”–what does that really mean and why do we care?
She dances like a trashy slut and when my husband saw her he couldn’t imagine what the appeal was.
How about some respect for yourself nikki minaj-obviously we’re not fans. And btw, what a rotten example you are to young girls.
No offence, but I don’t think Nicki would care what your husband thinks of her. Also, what’s “trashy” is labeling women as “sluts”. Slut shaming is so passé, darling.
Nicki M. is so whack. I wonder if Cavalli is aware that she has lyrics boasting about her line being sold at Hot Topic. “I’m a brand b*tch, I’m a BRAND”. Yes, you are a special brand of not hip hop & never will be.
GOAT female rapper for me will always be MC Lyte. In a time where the bar was set extremely high for female emcee’s she really held her own and was thoroughly respected by her male counterparts.
Her rhymes were smart, crafty, and cohesive. She made her songs around a subject and stuck to it, without talking about 7 different, random things at a time. She paved the way for female rappers to be taken seriously. Salt & Pepa, Queen Latifah and Monie Love were around that time too, but Lyte takes the top spot for that era.
Lauryn Hill was amazing and deserves a top spot on my list, Eve and Da Brat were awesome. Early Foxxy was a force as well and she and Kim ushered in a new era of Femme Fatale, bombshell rappers. Missy was extremely entertaining as well.
Nicki is OK. She falls in the middle to me, she’s mediocre and rumor was Wayne was ghostwriting for her for a while anyway. She broke through the scene using elements of Missy and Busta Rhyme’s flows and using Kim’s style and sex appeal. It’s all stuff I’ve seen/heard before.
Whatwhatnot: You nailed it.
Please, no. Tell me she’s not calling herself a genius. Also, could anyone bring up any good lyric of Nicki? Being well known doesn’t make you the best. People praise her because she does what male rappers do, buy they’ re awful. Rap world is lame.
I cant believe so many people have drank (drunk?) the Kool-Aid on this woman. Greatest female rapper? Geez. Must be a really low bar. Her lyrics are atrocious and there is nothing about her “skills” that is socially redeeming. I think she’s disgusting lyrically and physically. And I mean physically because of the gratuitous display of all the fakery. Yuck!
I’ve only seen whats featured of her on Tumblr, but that is enough for me to say she is petty and classless. Greatest rapper? Honey there are hundreds before and will be hundreds after you (female rappers). Foxy Brown was/is more of a rapper in the pure sense, and less of a crayon on stage. Depends on what you’re looking for. If you base it on commercial success and tailoring to the mainstream and pop genre, then she climbed her way onto that scene. But I will never think much of her for being classless and for buying into what she claims to be against— ie, she completely sells herself out physically. I dont even get that anyway to begin with– all women have breasts (generally speaking) so why the hell does it even get attention anyway.
In my book, you need talent but most of all DEPTH to get my attention and I don’t buy what she sells at all.
Edit: specifically for this post, I looked at 15 seconds of one of her music videos. And she is making bitter and abrasive faces the whole time– I cant stand her. No class. Being a strong woman is one thing, being a nasty bitter person with no respect for others, is completely something else. But, cant expect too much from a woman who seems to have so little self-respect to begin with, right?
Sell-out.
Nicki Minaj is such a weird celebrity to me. On one hand, she’s incredibly talented and really beautiful. On the other, she lets her insecurities drive her to stunt-queen and be horrifically nasty to people.
She has some great songs and some great performances. She has put out utter crap too and has some blisteringly-embarrassing performances under her belt.
I never liked her as a rapper but she is really funny in the movie The Other Woman with Cameron Diaz. Also, does clean up well in pictures. She looks classy but all is wasted when she opens her mouth.