Nicki Minaj: "Feeling Myself" [ft. Beyoncé]

Nicki Minaj and Beyoncé‘s second collaboration—the highly-anticipated followup to the “Flawless” remix—is an opus in four acts. Like a great opera or short play, “Feeling Myself” has a beginning, a middle, and an end. First, there’s tough Nicki, who delivers masturbation puns and a virtuosic indictment of competitors who aren’t even in her tax bracket, all in the same sentence. And then there’s sassy Nicki, who boasts about sexual prowess while still flexing on her rivals: “Bitches ain’t got punchlines or flow/ I have both, and an empire, also.”

Beyoncé becomes a mediator between Nicki’s personality shifts, cooing out a sultry hook that keeps the vibe soft in view of Minaj’s hard lyricism. She plays the Pippen to Nicki’s Jordan, riding out one of Hit-Boy’s most hypnotic beats. Every aspect of the production is seductive, smooth, sharp: James Brown grunts, drums bounce, and spacey keys wind their way into the hook. Bey’s breathiness builds alluringly until the moment Nicki finally references her own verse on Kanye West’s “Monster” (a reminder that, in one song, she’s already boasted four different flows). If you remember nothing else from The Pinkprint, remember this: Nicki Minaj is the only woman who can get Beyoncé to do her bidding. When a woman capable of “stopping the world” tells you to “carry on”, there’s no choice but to bring it.

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