Nicki Minaj
Onika Tanya Maraj-Petty (née Maraj; born December 8, 1982), known professionally as Nicki Minaj ( min-AHZH), is a Trinidadian-born rapper, singer, and songwriter based in the United States.
She is known for her musical versatility, animated flow in her rapping, alter egos and accents. Minaj first gained recognition after releasing three mixtapes between 2007 and 2009. Her debut album, Pink Friday (2010), topped the Billboard 200 chart. Its fifth single, "Super Bass", reached number three on the Billboard Hot 100 chart and, in 2021, was certified diamond by the RIAA.
Minaj's follow-up album, Pink Friday: Roman Reloaded (2012), explored dance-pop and her singing, reaching number one in several countries worldwide. Its lead single, "Starships", peaked inside the top five in fifteen countries. Her third album, The Pinkprint (2014) explored more personal topics and marked a return to her hip hop roots. Its second single, "Anaconda", reached number two on the Hot 100 and, in 2021, its music video became the first by a solo female rapper to reach one billion views on YouTube. She released her fourth album, Queen, in 2018 and it spawned the top-ten single “Chun-Li”. In 2019, her collaboration with Karol G, "Tusa", became the longest-running number-one single on the Argentina Hot 100 chart. In 2020, Minaj achieved her first two Hot 100 number-one singles, with her remix on Doja Cat's "Say So" and her collaboration with 6ix9ine, "Trollz". With the re-release of her 2009 mixtape Beam Me Up Scotty in 2021, she achieved the highest debut for a female rap mixtape on the Billboard 200 chart, at number two. The lead single of her forthcoming fifth studio album, "Super Freaky Girl", became the second solo song by a female rapper to debut at number one on the Hot 100.
Often cited as the "Queen of Rap" and the "Queen of Hip Hop" by several media outlets, Minaj is also one of the best-selling music artists, with more than 100 million records sold worldwide. Several media outlets have described her as one of the most influential rappers of all time, and Billboard ranked her as the top selling female rapper of the 2010s, and seventh among the top female artists of that decade. She became the first female artist to have one hundred Billboard Hot 100 entries and has twenty one top ten singles in the United States. Her various accolades include eight American Music Awards, five MTV Video Music Awards (including the 2022 Michael Jackson Video Vanguard Award), twelve BET Awards, four Billboard Music Awards, a Brit Award and three Guinness World Records. In 2016, Time included her on their annual list of the 100 most influential people in the world. Outside of music, her film career has included voice roles in the animated films Ice Age: Continental Drift (2012) and The Angry Birds Movie 2 (2019) as well as supporting roles in the films The Other Woman (2014) and Barbershop: The Next Cut (2016).
Similar Artists