Written by @karabrazey20 on X formerlyTwitter
What the industry thinks is the Nicki Minaj “formula” is actually dedication and persistence with her craft, resulting in an unwavering level of resilience within her. There is no special sauce that makes a music listener like a song or album. There is no book of charm or wit that makes a person a superstar or draws the people to you. It is in you. Nicki Minaj put in the work and took all the failures and “no’s” to get to the success and accolades.
— Nicki Minaj (@NICKIMINAJ) August 25, 2024
Being successful means nothing if the foundation you are standing on can’t support the weight of your victories and losses. This is where Nicki Minaj differs from other rappers. Her foundation was built on the principle of rap and rap culture not the glitz and glamour. She understood that once stripped, music is art in its purest unadulterated form. Artistically expressing herself through words as a means to feed the creative streak that sparked in her.
I can’t put into words what Nicki Minaj means to not only female rap but the culture as a whole. A black Trinidadian immigrant grew up to become the “Pink Print” for an entire culture and inspired women of all races and ethnicities to dream big. Nicki Minaj brought pop culture to the hip hop landscape in a way we have never seen. From fashion, musical versatility and how she marketed herself, Nicki shaped the future of female rappers.
Looking at the female rap landscape now, I have to ask, where is the foundation? Where is the musicality? Labels encouraging their female rap acts to go “pop” to compensate for the over saturation in the sub genre. Completely void of the intricacies of harmonies and instruments but emboldened with elevated ego’s from “likes” and engagements on social media. Encompassed in the stench of entitlement as they considered themselves on Nicki’s level. But when “Pink Friday 2” shattered records and released its reign, it was silence.
Without urban media, most of these female rappers would be at the back of the pack. The ones being touted as the hottest out and “next up”, have or had massive media campaigns behind them. Their biggest hits exist because of algorithm manipulation and fraud industry practices. Certain mainstream urban platformsare paid to influence our opinion on music by lowering the standard so the mediocre can have success. But as we are witnessing now, once those campaigns are defunded-the propped up artist falls to the back. Manufactured hype will never be sustainable no matter how much labels use “slight of hand” to push female rappers.
When a song resonates with the majority of the public on a massive scale, it becomes a staple unless the artist falls from grace. “Electric Slide”-staple. “Candy” by Cameo-staple. “Lollipop”-staple. “In Da Club”-staple. “Super Bass”-staple. All these songs resonated with the public without a campaign telling you to like the song. Decades later, the respective artist are able to tour off those songs. Staples. Hits. Bonafide. Organic.
This is what makes Nicki Minaj such an asset to not only hip-hop but pop culture. She is multifaceted, authentic, versatile and heranimated persona always made her a standout.
Nicki understands the art and technique of rap and employs wit, entendres (double and triple), wordplay and storytelling. Nicki has perfected what few of the current female rappers have; diction, flow, cadence and tone. She started from the bottom with just a dream and a pen to write her raps. As she was grinding on the come up, Nicki knew, succeed or fail-you can’t skip the process.