In June, she responded to a mildly critical tweet from a fan and freelance music writer named Wanna Thompson with a series of vitriolic DMs, which when publicized triggered a further avalanche of abuse from the Barbz, Minaj’s fearsome army of online superfans.
To be clear, some of Minaj’s gravest recent errors have been unforced. But they’ve also put her in a hell of a bind, and Queen itself is likely too dense and exhausting to break her out of it. Minaj’s struggles in 2018 put her in excellent company.
I’d hate to tell you who it reminds me of. That capitalized “AMERICA!” really hurts. I love my fans for the #1 album in AMERICA! I’ll explain on #QueenRadio 4 albums in, #1 in 86 countries ♥️ /CiYEuczgm3- QUEEN August 19, 2018 He knows he doesn’t have the #1 album this week. With no requirement of redeeming the album! With no dates for a tour, etc. On the other hand, you can only spin even Travis agrees that I’m the REAL no. The new system sucks, even if it is “accurate.” But this dark new streaming era of complex album-equivalent formulas has left us taking Billboard’s word at taking the algorithm’s word at taking Spotify’s word for it, and the all-Drake-everywhere fiasco was indeed a chilling look at our dystopian present. Given the music industry’s general scuzziness, there are no pure and unassailable Good Old Days when it comes to chart tabulation. The ticket-bundling ploy is an irritating Billboard lifehack lately abused by everyone from Bon Jovi to Kenny Chesney, Taylor Swift to Metallica. Minaj has a point - several points, in fact. Who’s coming to the secret show? When people call me & hear me crackin up laughing they seem so puzzled. People are calling me thinking I’m huffing & puffing. (In a statement given to Variety, Spotify denied Minaj’s allegations, adding, “The company continues to be big fans of Nicki.”) It was quite the tweetstorm, down to the dramatic this-isn’t-a-tweetstorm conclusion. Minaj also called out Spotify for threatening to “punish” her as retaliation for debuting Queen too early on her new Beats 1 radio show over at Apple Music, and alleged that her label, Republic Records, backed down from that fight out of fear that fellow Republic artist Ariana Grande’s numbers might be sabotaged, too. Specifically, she objected to Scott bundling Astroworld with tickets to his upcoming tour, then getting his girlfriend, Kylie Jenner, to advertise that bundle on Instagram while conspicuously name-dropping the couple’s 6-month-old daughter, Stormi. Thank Jesus & thank you to my fans.- QUEEN August 19, 2018 #Queen broke the record of being number 1 in 86 countries.
I put my blood sweat & tears in writing a dope album only for Travis Scott to have Kylie Jenner post a tour pass telling ppl to come see her & Stormi. 2 behind Travis Scott’s narcotized mini-monolith Astroworld, already in its second week. It’s Minaj’s turn to be so mad that she’s actually laughing, which in her case involves her actually saying, “I’m actually laughing.” Over the weekend, it emerged that Queen, her fourth studio album, would also fail to top the Billboard 200, debuting at no. 1 spot on Billboard’s album chart to an Australian boy band.
Even Jay-Z and Beyoncé, who invaded the Louvre and surprise-dropped Everything Is Love on Tidal with their usual NDA-driven tactical precision, blinked in the face of modern music-biz reality, put the record on Spotify and Apple Music 48 hours later, and still lost the no. The interminable run-up to Drake’s Scorpion devolved into the worst belated birth announcement of all time. Kanye West tried to kill summer 2018 before it even began and settled for holding the entire month of June at gunpoint. It was inevitable, here deep in the Year of the Cursed Album Rollout, that the unveiling of Nicki Minaj’s Queen would be calamitous.