How drug lords have shaped Nicki Minaj’s QueenThe rapper speaks like a kingpin on songs like “Hard White” and “Majesty”Nicki Minaj’s fourth album Queen seems to be filled with a story painting the self-proclaimed “bad guy” as a successful drug lord. The album title might be a nod to the rapper’s female authority in the rap game, but the tracklist tells a different story surrounding the career of a successful mob boss.

While fiery tracks like “Barbie Dreams” feature Nicki roasting prominent male artists, the fifth track “Hard White” is centered around “moving weight” and reaping profits from her musical career like a drug dealer. Nicki even compares her work to the one of large-scale Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar:Be in the bando or would you rather move weight, Don Pablo?Nicki further compares herself to Escobar and details her separation from the “bando,” or the small street-level drug business, on the Swae Lee-assisted track “Chun Swae:”I'm not in the bando, I'm Pablo SandalsQueen wasn’t the first time where Nicki compared herself to the drug lord. In March 2017, during the height of her beef with Remy Ma, Nicki poked fun at Remy on “No Frauds” for Remy’s own liking of being a kingpin while at the same time being an unsuccessful artist:You can’t be Pablo if your work ain’t sellin'
What the fuck is this bitch inhalin'?On “Coco Chanel,” Nicki raps in Spanish and details her importance to the rap game similar to how a mob boss would claim dominance over the cocaine (coco) industry:Yo, llevame a la coco, yeah a la a coco
Ellos quieren coco, y yo tampoco
Never trust a broke hoe, don't fuck with po-po
Numero uno, me llama Yoko
Pull up in them thing things and let them things fling
N***as know my name ring, and it go "ding-ding"Eleven months after releasing *Queen,* Nicki dropped “Suge (Remix)” which includes further references to drug profits and drug lords, however, this time it’s surrounding the “Godmother of Cocaine” Griselda Blanco:Drug lord, Griselda, I used to move weight through Delta
So stay in your place 'cause I don't wanna put you in a shelter
I'm cookin' up in the kitchen, you could be my little helperAlthough Nicki includes many references to the drug industry, she publically has spoken against drug-abuse which affected her father during her childhood and was the topic of Nicki’s May 2014 song “Pills N Potions.”

In December 2019, after the drug-related death of collaborator Juice WRLD, Nicki spoke about how drugs have shaped the opinion of the Hip-hop community at the Billboard Women in Music ceremony:“I felt like he was a kindred spirit, and looking back now, I wish I did something differently or said something to help. [...] Drugs isn’t the problem, it’s the way we fix our problem. It’s so important that we don’t pass judgment so that people don’t feel ashamed to speak up and ask for help. It’s so important that we talk about mental health, because people are dying.”With a lot of kingpin references already under her belt, and a comment about the rise in cocaine prices on “Yikes,” it seems like Nicki might be pushing out more as she approaches the release of album number five.