Nicki opens up ... to YRB magazine

I was so afraid to put out an album for fear of failure,” she later admits, stretched across a dressing room couch in a yellow Harajuku Lovers tee and flowing sweatpants. “I wanted to put my album out on Valentine’s Day of 2011. And my label was like, are you fucking crazy?”


With a fan base that’s expanded from hip-hop to mainstream pop (even Regis Philbin branded her “the next Lady Gaga” following a performance on his show), Nicki isn’t ditching her aggressive hood past. Pink Friday carefully straddles the line between boisterous hip-hop and glistening pop, boasting an eclectic roster of guests including Rihanna, will.i.am, Drake, Kanye West and Natasha Bedingfield.


“I’ve always been a fan,” says Nicki of Bedingfield, who appears on “Last Chance.” “I remember I had a job right here in Manhattan as an office manager and she had a song called ‘These Words.’ I played that song, I’m not kidding, about 50 times back to back, and this guy – it was such a small office – he couldn’t take it anymore. He was like, ‘How many times are you going to play that fucking song?’”

Pop has a heavy hand in Pink Friday, but Nicki panders to the hip-hop sect with harsh “Roman’s Revenge.” The track, which sports a wobbly electronic beat and saucy lyrics, pairs her gay alter ego Roman Zolanski with Eminem, who also used the beginning stage of his career to rap from the perspective of a character.


“We both have our own world, and we’re just colliding. I feel like we’re on a freaking collision course or something. But it’s very equal,” she explains. “I want a piece of that Slim Shady world because I feel like it may have subconsciously influenced me.”


Fans who have been lured into the Minaj matrix by her mystique will also see a more introspective side of the Harajuku Barbie on the album. Typically on wax, Nicki can flip from pointy and aggressive to British and ditzy over a span of two bars, leaving listeners in the dark about the girl behind the mic. One minute, she’s a squeaky British valley girl like on Mariah Carey’s “Up Out My Face (Remix),” and the next, she’s back to being Roman on Trey Songz’s “Bottoms Up.”

But where she used the bulk of her 2010 recordings to take listeners to metaphor heaven, she strips away the gloss and allows herself to become vulnerable for the first time since her stark 2008 track “Autobiography.” On “Dear Old Nicki,” for example, she addresses why she changed from the feisty around the way rap chick to female emcees’ saving grace.

Read more: Nicki Minaj Interview with YRB magazine