Nicki Minaj the phenomenon

Nicki Minaj exploded onto the scene using Lil Wayne's handbook on overexposure to position herself as the best (hyped) female emcee of the last decade. Her delivery, witticisms, gimmickry (including her supposed sexual fluidity) and image (though recycled Lil Kim circa 1996) brought her lots of attention...fast.

She catapulted from relative obscurity to mega-stardom within a matter of months by appearing on what seemed like everyone's song. If you sang "the itsy bitsy spider" she had a knockout 16 bars to take it from "blah!" to "bumboclaat!!!".

She said it herself:

"Which bitch you know made a million off a mix tape???"

"So let me get this straight, wait, I'm the rookie? When my features and my shows ten times your pay? 50k for a verse; no album out?!"

"...just killed another career, it's a mild day!"

Among a litany of other totally left of centre one-liners that make you remember her and wonder if she's of this earth. Fact is, some of the shit she spits is weirder than a muscle spasm in my right ass cheek.

She is the new black drag-queen wet-dream. Her light-hearted, tongue-in-cheek, campy, sexually-charged swagger has made seemingly every black gay man a wannabe Harajuku Barbie (damn, that's a lot of hyphens!).

She is to punkdom what Lady GaGa is to the twinks.

And for that we laud you Onika Maraj! (she's Trini btw).

Although you have recanted your previously unapologetically bisexual persona (until Cassie becomes available you say...*side eye*) you are still doing more good than bona fide rainbow club holders have been able to in the music industry. You are part of a more tolerant (some say latently homosexual) pop music culture that is largely urban (read black people) and interestingly is no more afraid to say the word gay in a positive sense than don gender ambiguous fashions that previous incarnations of black hegemonic masculinity would abhor.

The world is now a gayer place and Nicki Minaj is the Venusian Ambassador.

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