Cardi B and Nicki Minaj have a very complicated history, but it would appear the former is actually still willing to give props to the latter.
In a new Apple Music interview, the rapper spoke with Nadeska Alexis (who also co-hosts Complex's Everyday Struggle) about her new single with Megan Thee Stallion, "WAP," as well as the legacy of women rappers. Cardi remarked that when she was younger, there were considerably more popular women rappers, which prompted her to suggest one particular woman is "still dominating" the industry.
"When I was six, seven, eight, there was a lot different female rappers," she explained. "And then there was a time that there was no female rappers at all. I have to keep replaying songs from the early 2000s. I have to keep replaying it, replaying it, replaying it because for a while there wasn't no female rapper. And then there was one female rapper that dominated for a very long time. You know what I'm saying? And she did pretty good. She's been still dominating."
While Cardi didn't explicitly name Nicki—who she rapped alongside on Migos' "Motorsport," and who co-headlined Megan's "Hot Girl Summer" last year—the implication was pretty strong. "I don't know what happened in that, in a time period," Cardi continued. "But there was none at all for a hot minute. So you just never know the prediction. Maybe there will be a lot. Maybe there's going to be a time that people just get tired of it. And then there might be another rapper that just come and just take it over. You just never know, you know what I'm saying? We never know."
While there has been considerable tension between the rappers, it's been a while since either alluded to one another. Their rocky relationship reached a tipping point in 2018 when a video appeared to show the two get into a brawl at New York Fashion Week. Over the past year or so, they've seemingly put their differences aside and generally left each other alone.
During her chat on Apple Music, Cardi spoke about the false narrative that women in music aren't allowed to support each other, which is often credited as one of the reasons for her almost-feud with Nicki.
"I feel like people be wanting to put female artists against each other," Cardi said. "Every single time I feel like there's a female artist that's coming up, coming up, coming up and it's getting they mainstream moment, I always see like little slick comments like, 'Oh, they taking over your spot. They taking over this. They taking over that.' And it just makes me feel like, damn, why it had to be like that? Because I actually like shorty music a lot. Why does it even have to be like that?"
Watch a clip from the interview above.
