The year is 2010. Drake and Nicki Minaj both release their debut albums through Young Money Entertainment and Cash Money Records. The game is shifting and we don't know exactly what it's going to look like, but we know it's exciting and we have Lil Wayne to thank. In a historic move, Weezy introduced two artists to the world that went on to become household names and continuously grow bigger over the following decade. Their music crossed over into mainstream, producing countless hits and breaking countless records in the process.
Actually, you can count their hits and this quantification just resulted in another clenched title for the rappers. Nicki Minaj's new promotional single "Yikes" has just entered Billboard's Hot 100 at #23, placing her in the company of Drake and Lil Wayne as the rappers with the most charting singles in history.
Wait, there's more. Nicki was already the female artist with the most entries in Hot 100 history, her latest release boosting her entries to a total of 108. However, "Yikes" debuting at #1 on the Digital Song Sales chart makes Nicki the first female rapper to ever do so with a solo track. As the Queen herself delineated in an IG post, she accomplished this with no feature, no video, no promo, no performance, no radio, no placement on any big Spotify playlists AND she released the track three hours late. She appeared to comment again on this accolade in her IG Story, which read, "dropped my first tape in '07. 13 years later..." What a ride.