Nicki Minaj has been pretty vocal on Twitter lately, letting all of her feelings out on the social networking site. The female rapper, who dropped an incredible new album this summer, has been pretty salty about the lack of chart spots she’s been getting.
Specifically, she’s angry that her album, Queen, didn’t make it to number one on the Billboard Top 200 chart. Minaj has a pretty solid theory as to why–and she’s not holding anything back.
Minaj is convinced that the only reason she hasn’t made it to number one is that rapper Travis Scott has been holding that seat. Queen stood at number two, while Scott’s album Astroworld secured the number one spot.
According to Billboard, Astroworld had 205,000 album units with 78,000 traditional album sales, while Queen had 185,000 album units with 78,000 traditional album sales. Minaj is now blaming Scott’s girlfriend and baby-momma, Kylie Jenner, and their daughter Stormi for screwing her out of her number one spot.
I put my blood sweat & tears in writing a dope album only for Travis Scott to have Kylie Jenner post a tour pass telling ppl to come see her & Stormi. lol. Im actually laughing. #Queen broke the record of being number 1 in 86 countries. Thank Jesus & thank you to my fans.
— Nicki Minaj (@NICKIMINAJ) August 19, 2018
The photo that Minaj is referring to, of course, is the one Kylie Jenner posted on her Instagram, captioning it: “me and storm ready for tour.”
https://www.instagram.com/p/BmjTmptgpzl/?taken-by=kyliejenner
Fans of Kylie Jenner began to grab these Astroworld Season Passes without tour dates even out. The passes get you priority venue access and future discounts–and, they’re now sold out. According to Minaj, Scott doesn’t even have tour dates or locations just yet but has somehow sold all of these (of course, with the help of his girlfriend’s fan base and the anticipation they might get a meet-and-greet).
https://twitter.com/NICKIMINAJ/status/1031278618561921025
Kylie Jenner has also been spotted all over social media wearing Astroworld merchandise, so it’s only natural that fans of Jenner will want to pick up the same shirts, hoodies, and accessories—whether they want to bump Scott or not. It’s a social media domino effect, and Minaj is on to it.
I looked at the numbers the Carters, Kanye, Nas, etc recently did. Travis sold 200K in his first week of clothes alone. I spoke to him last night & he said he’s been selling clothes b4 the music. Billboard says they’ll change the rules cuz of this, so it should be changed now!
— Nicki Minaj (@NICKIMINAJ) August 19, 2018
Essentially, Minaj is talking about the way that artists have now bundled their albums with merchandise on their websites. It’s not a new occurance–many artists will sell clothing, accessories, and merch and include the album in the sale to boost numbers. With Kylie’s help in selling more merch, Astroworld got more sales.
But, Billboard stands by the fact that Minaj also saw some high numbers due to merchandise bundling and sales on her website, as well. They said:
Queen, like Astroworld, saw its sales bolstered by an array of merchandise/album bundles sold via Minaj’s official website. Queen also benefits from sales generated by a concert ticket/album sale redemption offer with her upcoming co-headlining tour with Future.
However, Minaj was unsatisfied. She also began throwing shade at streaming service Spotify, saying that they were “punishing her” by promoting other artists more so than her. If you go onto the app when a new album drops, the artist is usually featured on multiple playlists–like Drake when Scorpion dropped, or Ariana Grande when she released Sweetener.
Spotify put drake’s face on every playlist but told me they’d have to teach me a lesson for playing my music 10 mins early on #QueenRadio. Even tho they’ve been giving away my music for free for years & I am one of the top Spotify artists of all time.
— Nicki Minaj (@NICKIMINAJ) August 19, 2018
Whatever the true reason may be, Minaj is clearly salty over her lack of top chart spots. Seeing as she had a relentless beef with Cardi B (and let’s not forget Remy Ma), Minaj felt as though she had something to prove, especially with Cardi B’s album hitting the top of every single chart during release week.
Fans, however, were not on board to support this Twitter rampage. Oftentimes, people call Minaj out for never taking accountability and always projecting her problems onto others. This time, it was no different.
https://twitter.com/Iamserenahoward/status/1031304277241802752
Nicki Minaj really believes the sole reason Travis Scott outsold her is because Kylie posted a link to his website captioned “me and Stormi ready for tour” pic.twitter.com/15kiINKqFo
— You send emojis (@kehann_) August 19, 2018
nicki really sat up all night looking for a way out of just accepting the L and said to herself “i’ma blame travis scott, kylie jenner and a whole baby” 😂😂😂
— kenny (@phillycustoms) August 19, 2018
I imagine Travis Scott picking up Nicki Minaj call and saying “You Right sis… u #1 this week… “ then hanging up and laughing his ass off with Kylie n stormi while they refresh billboard 💀
— DJ Akademiks (@Akademiks) August 19, 2018
https://twitter.com/LikhoMango7/status/1031290832001949696
https://twitter.com/Princexercize/status/1031283083021037569
Ugh please stop. You're whining about how a Kardashian's baby out here making you lose your "#1 spot". Yonce is a queen becoz her hard work, talent, respect and humility speaks volumes. Trump's a clown bcoz he tweets fake crowd numbers and cries over Obama being better than him.
— Jodie Simanu (@jodiesimanu) August 20, 2018
https://twitter.com/cutclear/status/1031286163875741696
https://twitter.com/chuuzus/status/1031281747001061377
https://twitter.com/SicilianInHeels/status/1031283124972544000
anyone: …
Nicki Minaj: this mf travis impregnated this bitch kylie jenner to get her PREGNANT and to get people buy tickets for his tour only to see that GODDAMN BABY THATS WHY MY ALBUM TANKED
— alexah (@mystrangeaddctn) August 19, 2018
Nicki Minaj is really yelling about Kylie's baby Stormi over her first week sales come on just be proud of your art https://t.co/rCt2zOnkm2
— Bobby (@BobbysByline) August 19, 2018
IMAGINE BLAMING A BABY FOR NOT GOING NUMBER 1 LOL THATS YOUR QUEEN? @KobeIsDaddyup 😂😂😂
— 𝙅𝘼𝙔 … 😈 (@VintageTmac1) August 20, 2018
https://twitter.com/marc_188/status/1031313940859351041
https://twitter.com/icylike1017/status/1031282277525999617
And someone pointed out that Nicki Minaj is going to be sitting rather close to Travis Scott and Kylie Jenner at the MTV VMA’s this week…
You telling me tomorrow night Nicki is going to sit that close to Travis & Kylie after the mess that’s happening right now.. Ariana girl run pic.twitter.com/z3E4FbAL7b
— 𝔇𝔯𝔢𝔞 (@buteracypher) August 19, 2018
https://twitter.com/tearyiana/status/1031302845092356096
Let the drama begin!