Essence: Nicki Minaj Heads to E!
Monday, October 1, 2012 at 9:30AM Last week, E! announced Nicki Minaj would be starring in a number of reality specials on the cable channel. That was widely misconstrued to mean that the YMCMB rapper would be getting her own reality show. Not so. Minaj will be featured in three hour-long specials that will feature never-seen-before footage of her personal and professional life, starting in November.
Oddly enough, I’m anticipating this. I say “oddly” because I don’t consider myself a Nicki Minaj fan. I played the first album a couple of times to see what the hype was about, but other than a couple songs, I wasn’t feeling it. I heard the singles for the sophomore CD and passed. No real surprise, as at 30-plus I’m not her core demo. But even without trying to pay much attention to Nicki, it’s nearly impossible to avoid or ignore her. She’s landed a coveted slot as a host on American Idol (beside Mariah Carey, no less), scored an endorsement deal with Pepsi, was handpicked by Madonna to perform with her at the last Super Bowl, and recently debuted her own perfume, Pink Friday. That just scratches the surface.
When she speaks, or raps, it seems everyone is listening. Last month she dropped a verse on the remix to the uber-popular (and entirely misogynist) song “Bands a Make Her Dance” that included the lyric, “I’m a Republican voting for Mitt Romney.” That apparent GOP endorsement reached the ears of President Obama, who, when asked about his take on it, said, “She likes to play different characters, so I don’t know what’s going on there.” Even the POTUS is aware of the ins and outs of her Barbie-pink universe. (Nicki confirmed via Twitter that the President’s hunch was correct — she was just channeling one of her alter-egos.)
Nicki’s lyrics may not move me and others make me wonder “WTH?”, just because of all the interest Minaj has garnered — good and bad — plus the accolades she’s received in an entertainment industry she’s rapidly plowed through to get to the top, I want to know who the real Nicki is. How does a young girl with a family history so rocky — she has said her father was once a drug addict who physically abused her mother — manage to become one of the biggest stars on the planet?
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Reader Comments (1)
Just a note, the lyric about voting for Romney was on the Mercy remix.