THANKS BUT NO THANKS

Nicki Minaj Blocks Release of Kanye Collaboration

“Chile, that train has left the station,” Minaj said last night after Ye asked for her permission to release “New Body.”

Nicki Minaj recently released Pink Friday 2, the highly anticipated sequel to her groundbreaking 2010 album, and found quickly that dipping her toe back into the mainstream comes with its challenges—namely, catching the attention of her formerly close rap comrade Kanye West.

On Thursday evening, West, who now goes by Ye, tweeted a screenshot of a text he supposedly sent to Minaj, which read, “Hi it’s ye. May I call you about clearing new body on the new album.”

West is referring to “New Body,” an unreleased collaboration between Ye and Minaj that’s accumulated a great deal of lore between both their fan bases over the years; a demo of the song leaked back in 2019. Ye was apparently planning to include it on Vultures, his collaborative album with Ty Dolla $ign that was set to drop at midnight last night (but which, as of Friday morning, has still not materialized).

Whether the delay of Vultures has anything to do with “New Body” is not clear, but Minaj has made it known that she’s not backing down. Not long after Ye’s tweet, she took to Instagram Live to shoot down his suggestion.

“Now regarding Kanye… chile, that train has left the station. OK?” Minaj said. “No disrespect in any way. I just put out a brand new album. Why would I put out a song that has been out for three years? Come on, guys.”

While Minaj didn’t state it explicitly, Ye has also become a decidedly less desirable collaborator of late, after spewing antisemitic diatribes last year and subsequently being dropped by all his major fashion collaborators. Ye has kept up the antics since then—earlier this week, while previewing Vultures at a listening party in Miami, he sported what appeared to be a KKK-inspired hood while performing alongside his daughter, North West.

Besides, Minaj apparently has enough to deal with in regards to her own album. She wrapped up her Thursday evening with a rant on X aimed at the Billboard charts. In since-deleted tweets, she claimed that Billboard plans to disqualify 100,000 sales of Pink Friday 2 because the rapper launched a contest requiring her fans to buy four copies of the album apiece.

“I’m being punished for: Not signing a 360. Making great music. Having great fans,” Minaj wrote in one of her posts. “And for not leaving the game so that their new Nicki’s (who signed 360 deals) can be propped up to look as tho they are a lot more successful than they rlly are. Having too much power.”

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Helen HolmesCulture Reporter

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