Over the last week, Nicki Minaj has become entangled in one of the most talked about beefs in some time. Following the release of Remy Ma's "ShETHER," an unapologetically personal 7-minute tirade, fans have been excited to hear what Nicki will come back with.
As we wait for a response, we'll take a look back at some of Nicki's more memorable feuds with other artists, all of them with very different dynamics. One thing's for sure, Nicki has generally been smart and efficient in how she's handled her issues with other artists.
Photo Credit: Kevin Winter/MTV1415/Getty Images For MTV
Lil Kim
Nicki Minaj's beef with Lil Kim is one of her most publicized, but it's origins are a little less clear. In a 2009 interview with Necole Bitchie, Minaj acknowledges that she's earned comparisons to Kim primarily for a photo shoot in which she created one of the rapper's iconic poses. "That picture played a huge role. I do say my little freaky shit in raps but everyone does. Every dude I listen to reference sex somewhere in their raps," she said, before expressing she has nothing but love for Kim. According to Kim's interview on the Breakfast Club, she feels Nicki began to act "obnoxious" towards her and diss her on record after a collaboration they did was cut from Birdman's album.
Minaj has dissed Kim on record a number of times, most notably on "Tragedy," "Roman's Revenge," and "Stupid Hoe," on which she raps, "Stupid hoes is my enemy, stupid hoes is so wack / Stupid hoe shoulda befriended me then she coulda prolly came back."
While Nicki has generally kept her remarks subliminal, Kim's responses have always been a little more straightforward, releasing a mixtape called Black Friday in 2011 that found her taking shots at Minaj. Aight you Lil’ Kim clone clown / All this buffoonery shit stops now," she raps on the title track. "This hood shit, you and Drake ain't built for / This the shit the other bitch almost got killed for."
Kim also took issue with Nicki's claim that she's the "Queen of Rap" on Beyonce's "Flawless" remix. The two have never resolved their differences, but for the time being, things have cooled down.
Mariah Carey and Nicki Minaj's issues came to a head through their hosting gig on American Idol. The two had prviously worked together on Mariah's single, "Up Out My Face," but things became complicated between the two divas when tension arose on the set of the show. Before the season had even aired, there were reports of beef between Nicki Minaj and Mariah
Only two weeks into filming (after they had already shut down early reports of tension), footage showed Minaj heatedly complaining about Mariah. "I told them I’m not fuckin’ putting up with her fucking highness over there,” she says. “I’m not gonna sit here every f**king minute to have you come down and harass me every minute everyday.”
According to a later interview with Minaj, Mariah did not want another woman as a judge. While she didn't believe teh rumors at first, eventually it became more clear, as she told Ellen, "I went there and I started to feel a bit of the shade. And I just kind of overcompensated by being crazier."
Miley Cyrus
Taylor Swift & Miley Cyrus
After Nicki Minaj criticized the VMAs for celebrating "women with very slim bodies" in the Video Of The Year category, while snubbing her "Anaconda" video, Taylor Swift decided to take the argument personally.
@NICKIMINAJ I've done nothing but love & support you. It's unlike you to pit women against each other. Maybe one of the men took your slot..
After the confusing reply, Minaj made it clear that this was not about Taylor but of larger issues of equality in the industry.
Huh? U must not be reading my tweets. Didn't say a word about u. I love u just as much. But u should speak on this. @taylorswift13
@taylorswift13 I'm still confused as to why u just tweeted me when I made it abundantly clear... pic.twitter.com/A5kJyi6fQC
Taylor Swift later apologized for misunderstanding the situation, and the two performed at the VMAs together to officially squash any inklings of beef. However, Minaj's comments had inspired criticism from Miley Cyrus is the time since Nicki and Taylor made up.
"If you want to make it about race, there’s a way you could do that," she said of Minaj's VMA critique to the New York Times. "But don’t make it just about yourself. Say: “This is the reason why I think it’s important to be nominated. There’s girls everywhere with this body type.... What I read sounded very Nicki Minaj, which, if you know Nicki Minaj is not too kind. It’s not very polite. I think there’s a way you speak to people with openness and love. You don’t have to start this pop star against pop star war. It became Nicki Minaj and Taylor in a fight, so now the story isn’t even on what you wanted it to be about. Now you’ve just given E! News “Catfight! Taylor and Nicki Go at It.”
Miley happened to be the host of the very VMAs Nicki was talking about. Following her acceptance speech for Best Hip-Hop Video, Minaj called Miley out for the comments.
"Now back to this bitch that had a lot to say about me the other day in the press - Miley, what's good?" said Nicki, to which Miley replied with the suggestion that her words were spun by the paper. "We all do interviews, and we all know how they can be manipulated, Congratu-fucking-lations, Nicki."
Things were never officially squashed between the two, and Nicki went on to rap "Miley what's good?' on her "Down In The DM" remix, as well as clarifying why Cyrus' comments were problematic in her own NYT interview.
"The fact that you feel upset about me speaking on something that affects black women makes me feel like you have some big balls. You’re in videos with black men, and you’re bringing out black women on your stages, but you don’t want to know how black women feel about something that’s so important? Come on, you can’t want the good without the bad. If you want to enjoy our culture and our lifestyle, bond with us, dance with us, have fun with us, twerk with us, rap with us, then you should also want to know what affects us, what is bothering us, what we feel is unfair to us. You shouldn’t not want to know that.’"
Tyga
"Yeah, I'm tryna' go independent. I don't really get along with Drake. I don't really get along with Nicki Minaj," Tyga told Vibe in a 2015 interview. The quote most prominently earned a response from Drake on "6PM In New York," but it's also been speculated that Nicki found her own way to throw shade at her former Young Money labelmate.
In the video for "Feelin Myself," Nicki dons a jersey that says "PERVERT," as well as featuring the number 17. The message was decoded by fans as a reference to Kylie Jenner's age. Kylie was 17 at the time, while Tyga was 25.
The two had previously had a disagreement over "Truffle Butter," an early version of which Tyga released before it was marketed as an official single for Minaj, without Tyga.
"The song was on my album, and *we don't know how* but it magically ended up in Tyga's hands, and I told him 'that's my song'," she told BBC 1 Radio. "I told him me and Drake were going to be on it, and low and behold, it leaked with him on it after I told him not to put it out. I thought that was a little bit disrespectful because I had always shown him love."
She explained that Tyga had apologized about the way the song was released, but it seems possible this dispute could have affected their later issues.
As of now, things don't seem too hostile between Nicki and Tyga, but they haven't collaborated on music in some time.
Azealia Banks
As most "beefs" with Azealia Banks tend to go, Nicki's is fairly one-sided. While Azealia has had countless negative things to say about Minaj (as well as quite a few positive ones), it seems to have all begun when Azealia claimed to turn down a spot on Nicki's tour to work on her album. After Banks went public with the news, Nicki tweeted, "#ManTheseBitchesDelirious," a quote from her track "Come On A Cone." Banks took it as a shot at her, and responded in a since-deleted tweet. "I could be really unprofessional and post emails between ur manager and my booking agent but I won't," she wrote.
From there, things have been mostly quiet from Nicki's side, but Azealia has weighed in on Minaj time and time again, including some commentary on her VMAs argument with Taylro Swift and Miley Cyrus.
It's so funny to wake up and see nicki and Miley or nicki and taylor fighting when you ALL make basic ass music. it's a ki !!!
Most recently, Banks went at Nicki for claiming to be the "queen of rap," as well as insulting her fashion choices and her weight in December 2016.
AZEALIA BANKS JUST SNATCHED THE FUCK OUT OF NICKI MINAJ BITCHHHH pic.twitter.com/WGyk7rNysd
Interestingly enough, some fans think Minaj was actually responding to Azealia's diss rather than Remy's on "Make Love."
Nicki verse was about azealia. Remy should've called nicki since they was "so cool" instead of dropping a diss she been had cooked up pic.twitter.com/JDqiK0Es7h
Remy Ma
Nicki's most recent beef, which as of this posting is still in progress, is with Remy Ma. We recently did a deep dive into this one, which can technically be traced all the way back to a 2007 freestyle from Nicki Minaj on her The Come Up DVD series. However, the real beef didn't take off until last year, when Remy seemed to be firing subliminals at Minaj, from her BET Hip Hop Awards cypher verse.
In December 2016, Remy's "Wait A Minute" verse was one of her more clear-cut shots at Minaj: "Get rid of those fake breasts and put a vest on this bitch chest / It's lunch time, she food, I'm Troy Ave with that tool," she rapped. "That ghostwriter bout to call her / That lifeline getting shorter."
In February 2017, Nicki came with two new verses that seemed to take aim at Remy, rapping "I gave these bitches two years, now your time's up / Bless her heart, she throwing shots but every line sucks," on Jason Derulo's "Swalla" and "Oh you the qu-e-e-the queen of this here? / One platinum plaque, album flopped, bitch, where?" on Gucci Mane's "Fake Love."
Of course, the defining moment of this feud (so far) is Remy's retaliation to these two verses, which came in the form of a 7-minute freestyle over Nas' iconic Jay Z diss "Ether."
"ShETHER" was a ruthlessly personal attack that criticized Nicki's body, her brother's pedophilia accusations, cheating rumors, and ghostwriting allegations. As far as diss tracks go, it's particularly disrespectful, as just about any line from the song will tell you.
"Mentionin' guns, you Pussy Galore, James Bond
Only time you touch a trigga is when you fucked Trey Songz
Coke head, you cheated on your man with Ebro
I might leak the footage of you sniffin' them ski slopes"
So far, Nicki's only direct response came in two Instagram posts where she pointed out Remy's low sales figures and pointed to a video of Beyonce calling her the queen of rap. Fans on either side are hoping that she retaliates with a diss track of her own.