Cardi B is back.
After days of anticipation, the Grammy-winning rapper came through with her “Like What” freestyle, a braggadocious track that marks her first official record release of 2024. Cardi began promoting the cut earlier this week on social media, where she posted the official cover art as well as a snippet.
"Like What" also arrives with a music video, above, directed by Offset.
The song, which samples Missy Elliott’s 1999 hit “She’s a Bitch,” finds Cardi redeclaring her status in the game and putting her haters on notice: “I ain’t even got dressed/Any L that I took, come after YS,” she rapped in the teaser. “Ayo, let me put some gas in this motherfuckin’ year, bitch/I ain’t really talk my shit in a minute/Like, who the fuck these bitches really think they talkin’ to?/Like, bitch, is you fuckin’ dumb?”
The freestyle arrives just weeks after Cardi’s husband teased her forthcoming music. He posted a muted Instagram Story in which he was seen inside the studio bobbing his head.
“Stop being scary and drop the album,” Offset captioned the post, which tagged Cardi. “Shit goes crazy.”
Cardi has not revealed if “Like What” is a standalone release or part of a full-length project, perhaps the long-awaited follow-up to her 2018 debut LP, Invasion of Privacy. The music video does promise at the end, "This is just the beginning. Stay tuned."
The MC spoke about her sophomore album during a September interview with Ebro Darden, saying she planned to drop the record “very soon.”
“You know what? I was indecisive but I was like, you know what? I should already start talking about the album because I’m going to be putting it out very soon,” she said. “But it’s like I have to watch it because I always feel like somebody watching me—it’s going to come out when it’s going to come out…I can say that it’s not going to come out this year. … For this album, I’m just holding it because I feel like I’m missing a couple of things. Then on top of that, everything just has to be like perfect from everything because I feel like people are expecting so much.”
Cardi is not the only artist to take inspiration from Missy Elliott's "She's A Bitch." Last year, BIA released her song “I’m That Bitch” which also sampled the same Missy Elliott song.
Elliott reflected on the impact of the song and it's music video in 2021, flexing about how she, producer Timbaland, and director Hype Williams were "decades ahead" of the game.
You can stream Cardi’s “Like What” freestyle on Apple Music, Spotify, and other major platforms.
