Speaker 1: Let's start by saying that most of the icons featured
Speaker 1: on our podcast have multi decade careers, but this icon's
Speaker 1: recent run and simple name recognition got our attention. Ultimately,
Speaker 1: we had to include her in the lineup because in
Speaker 1: a few short years, this woman has rewritten the music
Speaker 1: industry's rule book by breaking rap records left and right
Speaker 1: and paving a career unlike anyone else's. Today we're talking
Speaker 1: all things Belgalis Marlenis al Mansar.
Speaker 2: Cardi, b in a Half.
Speaker 1: He has another talent from the Bronx who played a
Speaker 1: part in Bad Bunny's success, So it only seems fair
Speaker 1: that we give her the flowers she also deserves.
Speaker 3: Who, like Jlo, also paved her own way.
Speaker 2: The self made performer went from stripping in the club
Speaker 2: to then becoming a full blown superstar better like how.
Speaker 3: Well, Joseph.
Speaker 1: That's why we're here to help break it all down
Speaker 1: from the poll to a global stage. This is a
Speaker 1: woman who is changing the music game and igniting a
Speaker 1: conversation about feminism for a whole new generation.
Speaker 2: Uh oh, don't forget how about our feud with one
Speaker 2: of rap's biggest names.
Speaker 3: Oh trust me, we won't.
Speaker 1: This is Becoming an Icon a look at Cardi B's
Speaker 1: rise to a global stage.
Speaker 3: I'm your host Lilianavosgaz.
Speaker 2: And I'm Joseph Carrio and this is Becoming an Icon a.
Speaker 1: Weekly podcast where we give you the rundown on how
Speaker 1: today's most famous LATINX stars have shaped pop culture.
Speaker 2: And given the world some extress.
Speaker 3: Leble, sit back and get.
Speaker 2: Comfortable, because we are going in the only way we know.
Speaker 1: How with when I'll be with usunesas, some esney and
Speaker 1: a lot of opinions as we relive their greatest achievements
Speaker 1: on our journey to find out what makes them so iconic.
Speaker 3: Nineteen ninety two The Bronx.
Speaker 2: Wait what month?
Speaker 3: October?
Speaker 2: The full date?
Speaker 3: Ugh, October eleventh, nineteen ninety two.
Speaker 2: Oh h let me peepeep beep btpepep. She is a
Speaker 2: Levra's Sun, an Aries, Moon and an Aries Rising. Oh
Speaker 2: my god, this explains so much, Walter focus. Okay, right
Speaker 2: right back to the Bronx.
Speaker 1: She was raised in the Bronx. Her dad is Dominican
Speaker 1: and her mother is Trinidadian. But before we get into
Speaker 1: the episode, I want to know how much he knew
Speaker 1: about Cardi B. Before we started researching her for this episode.
Speaker 2: I knew a lot of her memes and her me music,
Speaker 2: but I didn't really know anything else before what about You.
Speaker 1: I didn't know her memes as much, and I knew
Speaker 1: a lot of her one liners, but I was actually
Speaker 1: confused that they were attributed all to one person. I was, Oh,
Speaker 1: that's a bunch of different people on from love and
Speaker 1: hip hop. I didn't realize it was one brilliant mind
Speaker 1: responsible for all of those one liners. And then obviously
Speaker 1: I knew her music, just because how do you not
Speaker 1: know her music? But I tell you this, I did
Speaker 1: not know a lot about Cardi B prior to the
Speaker 1: really big collaborations, right, so, prior to the j Balvin collaborations,
Speaker 1: prior to the Bruno Mars collaboration, Like, I did not
Speaker 1: know anything.
Speaker 3: About Cardi b mixtape era. That was all new to me.
Speaker 2: Agreed. I knew the memes, and all of a sudden
Speaker 2: she was like superstar exactly.
Speaker 1: To be honest, for a long time, I didn't even
Speaker 1: know why her stage name was Cardi B.
Speaker 2: Wait, what's her real name?
Speaker 3: Belle Galis Marlenis al Mansa. That's a mouthful.
Speaker 2: That literally sounds like a spell from Harry Potter.
Speaker 3: It does, but it can definitely be a lot to
Speaker 3: say so.
Speaker 1: Growing up, people gave her a nickname Macarty, like, you know,
Speaker 1: that's what my friends call me when I was five
Speaker 1: on the playground Tequila Tequila.
Speaker 2: Lily, but Carti Cardi b Wow, her mind was the future.
Speaker 1: I think it goes to prove that Carti has always
Speaker 1: had a really good eye and ear when it comes
Speaker 1: to branding herself. It's definitely one of the many reasons
Speaker 1: why she cemented herself as an icon.
Speaker 2: But in all fairness, it did take a while for
Speaker 2: her to get there.
Speaker 1: Growing up, she listened to artists like Missy Elliott, fifty
Speaker 1: Cent and Jah Rule, and she was obsessed with another
Speaker 1: outspoken and lovingly eccentric artist, Lady Gaga.
Speaker 2: Cardi b the Little Monster Yo. I can totally see
Speaker 2: it in the way she expresses herself now, in the
Speaker 2: way she dresses.
Speaker 1: She's even admitted to looking at god Go for fashion inspo,
Speaker 1: but she's also cited Missy Elliott and becoming an icon
Speaker 1: fashion queen Miss Jennifer Lopez I mean Affleck as additional inspo.
Speaker 2: The taste, the Taste Cardi, we.
Speaker 3: All want to know, how did we get here?
Speaker 2: Well, I'm recording at my place and I'm assuming you
Speaker 2: took a card to the Joseph.
Speaker 1: I mean in Carti's journey, how did she get from
Speaker 1: the Bronx to being called the reigning Queen of Hip
Speaker 1: Hop by publications like Billboard and Entertainment Weekly, Oh, and
Speaker 1: the Queen of Wrap by iHeartRadio, our Bosses, Love y'all
Speaker 1: and Vanity Fair. You know, there's a lot of talent
Speaker 1: out there, and people have been changing the game for
Speaker 1: a long time. So what makes Carti one of the kind?
Speaker 2: It's just like you're saying her attitude.
Speaker 1: She grew up with her sister shout out Hennessy Carlino
Speaker 1: in the Bronx, but I also spent a lot of
Speaker 1: time in Washington.
Speaker 2: Heights growing up. She was close to her Abuela, whom
Speaker 2: she credits for her accent and well done.
Speaker 1: She says she wasn't the best student and was in
Speaker 1: and out of school, but then she found a way
Speaker 1: to make money in a more, let's say, non traditional way.
Speaker 2: Oh, I don't know. The oppressed finding recompense from a
Speaker 2: culture built on a foundation of misogyny and toxic masculinity
Speaker 2: that encourages men to obfuscate when presented with opportunities to
Speaker 2: express vulnerability. In Versity creates incentives to treat women's bodies
Speaker 2: as products to be bid, bought, and sold, but most
Speaker 2: importantly controlled. Well, that seems as traditional as apple pie. Sorry,
Speaker 2: I went somewhere.
Speaker 3: Back to Cardi, Okay, well, back to the podcast.
Speaker 1: At only nineteen years old, she started her career as
Speaker 1: a stripper.
Speaker 2: Many of judges are for which, first of all, it's
Speaker 2: very techy of y'all, but to each their own listen.
Speaker 1: Carti owned it. She saw a way to make a living,
Speaker 1: and she took it.
Speaker 2: She needed that money, honey.
Speaker 1: She's gone on to call it a positive moment in
Speaker 1: her life, saying it really saved me from a lot
Speaker 1: of things. Stripping gave Carti financial freedom to escape poverty
Speaker 1: and an abusive relationship, and to put herself through school.
Speaker 2: Don't be out here judging haters. You build the life
Speaker 2: you can with the tools you have. You don't have
Speaker 2: to answer to no one but yourself.
Speaker 3: Phreach, and Carti did what she had to do.
Speaker 1: She recalls, when I first entered the strip club, I
Speaker 1: was really shy. I felt really uncomfortable. I felt very ashamed.
Speaker 1: There were times when I was crying, like, oh my gosh,
Speaker 1: if my mom or dad found out, they'd be so humiliated.
Speaker 3: But I needed the fucking money.
Speaker 2: That attitude, you know, for her, that's where she harnessed it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, she says, stripper's talk a certain way. The stripper
Speaker 1: attitude is I'm not ashamed of being a stripper because
Speaker 1: a lot of these bitches don't have shit. A lot
Speaker 1: of these bitches don't have a place to stay, don't
Speaker 1: have no car, can't afford this, can't afford that. During
Speaker 1: an interview with Cosmopolitan, she admitted that quote. She doubts
Speaker 1: the me Too movement will change much in the hip
Speaker 1: hop world, especially for women whose sexuality is at the
Speaker 1: forefront of their commercial appeal. She says, a lot of
Speaker 1: video vixens have spoke about this, and nobody gives a fuck.
Speaker 1: When I was trying to be a vixen and people
Speaker 1: were like, you want to be on the cover of
Speaker 1: this magazine, then they pull their dicks out. I bet
Speaker 1: if one of these women stands up and talks about it,
Speaker 1: people are going to say.
Speaker 3: So what, you're a hoe, It don't matter.
Speaker 2: Wait, I'm a hoe. No no you co Cardi.
Speaker 1: And just two years after she started stripping, she became
Speaker 1: a social media hit on both Instagram and Vine, rocking
Speaker 1: up thousands of views and followers.
Speaker 2: Oh my god, Vine, A wait, macop to dead Vine.
Speaker 2: I don't know her.
Speaker 1: Yes, yes, Vine might have died, but it gave her
Speaker 1: a career because people loved her vibe, her videos, and
Speaker 1: her signature Cardi Tude, so much so that she earned
Speaker 1: a spot on Love and Hip Hop New York. This
Speaker 1: regular Degula Shmegula Go from the Bronx was making waves
Speaker 1: on social media with her one million plus followers, so naturally,
Speaker 1: the execs behind the VH one show thought, let's bring
Speaker 1: some of that, but Cardi flavor over here. According to
Speaker 1: complex Is Dria Roland, VH one wanted to portray her
Speaker 1: as a silly, exotic dancer languishing in a messy situationship.
Speaker 1: This is what Cardi herself.
Speaker 3: Had to say about the experience.
Speaker 1: Yo, it's so crazy, Like the motherfuckers the producers really
Speaker 1: doubted me. It's like, why would y'all doubt me? Like
Speaker 1: I have seven hundred thousand, bajillion followers, she told The
Speaker 1: Fader in February twenty sixteen. I'm telling them, like, yo,
Speaker 1: I have a brand. I'm not even an artists and
Speaker 1: I fill out clubs three thousand whatever the crap.
Speaker 3: I filled them shits out. But they didn't care about that.
Speaker 1: They just wanted to make me look as a stripper,
Speaker 1: a struggling stripper.
Speaker 2: I could totally hear Cardi in that.
Speaker 1: I feel like I didn't do my best Cardi impression,
Speaker 1: like no I could.
Speaker 2: I could really hear her in that, though. I felt that.
Speaker 1: I could see her doing the movements because so much,
Speaker 1: so much of her delivery is like the physical delivery
Speaker 1: of what she says, so animated.
Speaker 2: So you watched the show, so I've watched Okay, wait
Speaker 2: a minute, whoa.
Speaker 3: Okay, hold on wait you are.
Speaker 2: A Love and Hip Hop season one through six?
Speaker 1: Or First of all, I will watch any reality TV.
Speaker 1: People that know me know that there is nothing too
Speaker 1: low brow for me to watch.
Speaker 2: Wow.
Speaker 3: I love television.
Speaker 1: And this is obviously before I had a baby and
Speaker 1: I had lots of hours in a day to spend
Speaker 1: watching crappy TV. But I love reality and I I
Speaker 1: love raw reality TV. I used to like the house.
Speaker 2: You were a Jerry Springer girl?
Speaker 3: Yes, Oh my.
Speaker 1: God, Yes, and I loved like Mari, like Who's the Daddy?
Speaker 1: I love all that shit, The messier the better, and
Speaker 1: so yes. Occasionally I would watch Love and Hip Hop
Speaker 1: and I had caught it early in the seasons, stopped
Speaker 1: watching it, and then I actually got sent a link
Speaker 1: to Cardi b on the show, and I was like,
Speaker 1: who is this girl? And that's when I watched it
Speaker 1: on VH one on the actual TV. But I remember
Speaker 1: watching it and thinking, I just want a whole show
Speaker 1: about her. If you watch housewives, you remember in real
Speaker 1: house Lives of New York, you would watch scenes and
Speaker 1: Bethany would be in them, and you would leave that
Speaker 1: scene and be.
Speaker 3: Like, whoa, whoa, whoa.
Speaker 1: I want a whole show just about Bethany. To me,
Speaker 1: Carti was the Bethany of Love and Hip Hop. You
Speaker 1: just wanted more. And what I was saying about Carti
Speaker 1: is the reason she popped on screen was obviously because
Speaker 1: she's just got natural commie timing, but she's also very
Speaker 1: physical in the way that she presents her thoughts and
Speaker 1: ideas and who she is. And I always thought about
Speaker 1: her and I think this is the ultimate compliment. I
Speaker 1: see a lot of Lucille Ball in Carti what.
Speaker 3: I don't know that anyone has ever made that connection
Speaker 3: or said.
Speaker 2: That in the world.
Speaker 3: Am I alone here?
Speaker 1: If you are a Lucile ball fan, which I am,
Speaker 1: there is so much physical comedy to who she is.
Speaker 1: Her face moves in a certain way, her body moves
Speaker 1: in a certain way, she waits for the laughs, and
Speaker 1: I see so much of Lucille in Carti. And I
Speaker 1: could be the only person that has ever thought this
Speaker 1: in my entire life, but that is what I thought when.
Speaker 3: I watched her on for Love and Hip Hop Call.
Speaker 2: Me Crazy, Listen, Carti is now definitely going to want
Speaker 2: to chime in on the show because this is one
Speaker 2: of the craziest things. Do you think that she could
Speaker 2: have gotten anywhere without this exposure of the show?
Speaker 1: Yes, because I think that at that point in time,
Speaker 1: she had such a huge loyal audience on Vine and
Speaker 1: she was growing her numbers on Instagram that yes, I
Speaker 1: don't think. I think it would have taken her a
Speaker 1: little bit longer. I think that VH one gave her
Speaker 1: more of an audience because people that maybe weren't on
Speaker 1: social media in the same way that her audience was
Speaker 1: might catch her on late night on VH one.
Speaker 3: So I think she multiplied her audience by being on
Speaker 3: Love and Hip Hop.
Speaker 1: And I think she got to where she got faster,
Speaker 1: but I don't think she necessarily needed it.
Speaker 2: Well, the good news is she joined Love and Hip
Speaker 2: Hop in season six and stayed for two seasons before
Speaker 2: leaving to pursue her music career.
Speaker 1: You know, most people on that show completely doubted her,
Speaker 1: even her fake DJ Mann's in the series.
Speaker 3: But guess what, CARTI didn't give a fuck.
Speaker 1: She was too busy earning the show views and imparting
Speaker 1: all of her cards wisdoms.
Speaker 3: Her lines were iconic, y'all.
Speaker 2: To this day, people always be quoting her.
Speaker 3: I be quoting her like a hoe never gets cold.
Speaker 3: I mean I can't.
Speaker 2: I actually never get cold.
Speaker 1: So I even own a sweater, Joseph, I do I
Speaker 1: have a vest.
Speaker 2: I have a vest, So.
Speaker 3: You're like a half ho because you get cold half
Speaker 3: the time.
Speaker 2: It's true.
Speaker 1: Now, if you go back and watch, there's a really
Speaker 1: great YouTube link that has her greatest hits from the show.
Speaker 3: She's pure comedy gold.
Speaker 1: It's almost as if they had hired the best comedy
Speaker 1: writers in Hollywood and the best actress to play this role.
Speaker 3: But this was just Carti being Cardi, and the one
Speaker 3: liners just flowed from.
Speaker 2: She just has that.
Speaker 1: She absolutely does, and even The New York Times has
Speaker 1: credited her popularity on the show to her ability to
Speaker 1: just rattle off these one liners.
Speaker 2: But beyond that, she had already had this dream of
Speaker 2: making it in the music business, and we see it
Speaker 2: throughout the show. Yeah.
Speaker 1: She made her music debut on a remix of a
Speaker 1: Shaggy song, Boom Boom.
Speaker 3: You remember Shaggy.
Speaker 2: I have never heard of him.
Speaker 3: I caught you listening to him the other day.
Speaker 2: It was to me.
Speaker 3: You were listening to him on the sofa. It was
Speaker 3: me and you were singing it in the shower.
Speaker 2: It wasn't me.
Speaker 3: I even have it on camera.
Speaker 2: It wasn't me.
Speaker 3: Right, listen, this song was fantastic.
Speaker 1: It mixed up reggae with dancehall and Carti's trademark vocals.
Speaker 1: A year later, she released her first official mixtape called
Speaker 1: Gangsta Bitch Music Volume One. Then then she even joined
Speaker 1: the cast of BT's Being Mary Jane as Mercedes. But well,
Speaker 1: the whole TV thing just wasn't doing it for Cardi anymore.
Speaker 1: She was one hundred percent certain she wanted to stick
Speaker 1: to music.
Speaker 2: And odd she did because she has saved my workout playlists.
Speaker 1: But to do that, she had to leave love and
Speaker 1: hip hop New York. So she did and followed her
Speaker 1: departure with Gangstavich Music Volume two, her second mixtape, and
Speaker 1: that's when things really started to shift.
Speaker 2: She was about to get that breakthrough baby.
Speaker 1: She was even getting noticed by more global mainstream brands
Speaker 1: like Matt Cosmetics.
Speaker 3: She was attending events at New York Fashion Week?
Speaker 2: Wait wait, wait, wait wait? Are we going to talk
Speaker 2: about her brawl with Nicki Minaj at New York Fashion Week?
Speaker 2: That one time that somebody I know leaked the footage?
Speaker 3: Are you kidding?
Speaker 1: That moment went a viral online and guess who captured
Speaker 1: the whole fight on their iPhone? That's me, because you
Speaker 1: know I always get the exclusive.
Speaker 2: That's one hundred my boo.
Speaker 1: In late February of twenty seventeen, Cardi B signed with
Speaker 1: her first major record label, Atlantic Records.
Speaker 2: Oo. Our girl is on her way to becoming a star.
Speaker 1: Indeed, she was Joseph thanks in part to her love
Speaker 1: for bloody shoes. Carti is the kind of performer that
Speaker 1: feeds off other people's energy.
Speaker 2: Wait, like an energy vampire.
Speaker 3: No, like a hype woman.
Speaker 2: Oh well, that's why she's a team player. She's always
Speaker 2: making collapse at chart and that's just a fact.
Speaker 1: After signing her contract with Atlantic Records, Carti started collaborating
Speaker 1: with rappers like Little Kim.
Speaker 3: And Remy Ma.
Speaker 2: Let's get a boatac yella already, Okay.
Speaker 3: I was just setting the scene.
Speaker 2: Be patient, these expansive these is red bottom zesus bloody shoes.
Speaker 3: Okay, okay, we're there, We're there.
Speaker 1: On June sixteenth, twenty seventeen, Atlantic Records released Cardi B's
Speaker 1: commercial debut single, Bodak Yellow. She performed the single on
Speaker 1: The Wendy Williams Show and Jimmy Kimmel Live. Oh God,
Speaker 1: take me back to Bodak Yello. The first time I
Speaker 1: heard that song, this is terrible, but okay. So the
Speaker 1: first time I heard it, I was like, it sounds
Speaker 1: like Niki, but that's.
Speaker 2: Not Nicki whoa.
Speaker 1: Not the voice, but the tone and the delivery. There's
Speaker 1: not that many female rappers. I can listen the monk
Speaker 1: one hand right. So you've got Remy mag, Cardi B,
Speaker 1: Lil Kim, and Nicki Minaj that are real artist when
Speaker 1: it comes to rap that can rhyme like.
Speaker 3: That, And I was like, this isn't Nikki. Who the
Speaker 3: hell is this? It was Cardi.
Speaker 2: I knew it wasn't Nicki because it just seemed a
Speaker 2: little darker. There was just something more. I don't know
Speaker 2: hardcore about the song, but it was definitely a bop.
Speaker 2: It was definitely something that I wanted to hear, but
Speaker 2: it did just feel a little heavier.
Speaker 3: I think that's why people responded to it.
Speaker 1: I think we had been served so much, for lack
Speaker 1: of a better term, bubblegum rap from share from female EMCs.
Speaker 3: And not that there's anything wrong with bubblegum rap.
Speaker 1: I bopped that too, but I think for so long
Speaker 1: our ear has listened more poppy rap from female EMCs.
Speaker 1: Right right, I missed the days of Miss c Ellie.
Speaker 1: I love that and I think to hear her, especially
Speaker 1: with her signature Cardi sound, it made everyone stop and listen,
Speaker 1: which is exactly what you want when you are a
Speaker 1: new artist. And not only did it make you stop
Speaker 1: and listen, but then she hit you with that video
Speaker 1: and then you stopped, you listened, and you watched.
Speaker 2: You stopped, listened and got lubitons.
Speaker 3: Well, if you could afford them.
Speaker 2: I know.
Speaker 1: The song generated a two hundred and seventeen percent spike
Speaker 1: in search traffic for Christian lubatant shoes and get this,
Speaker 1: four point five million dollars in media value according to
Speaker 1: Business of Fashion. So if people were questioning whether Carti
Speaker 1: could make it and whether or not Carti was going
Speaker 1: to be big, their questions stopped right here because the
Speaker 1: song climbed the charts for months on end.
Speaker 2: It even reached the number one spot on the Billboard
Speaker 2: Hot one hundred chart that year.
Speaker 3: It made Cardi b the first female rapper to do
Speaker 3: so with a single since nineteen ninety eight, when Lauren
Speaker 3: Hill's duop that thing.
Speaker 2: Wait what happened to Lauren? That album was amazing.
Speaker 1: The miseducation of Lauren Hill. That is my freshman year
Speaker 1: of college. I would do an entire podcast on that album,
Speaker 1: can we?
Speaker 2: But wait there's more. She also became the first person
Speaker 2: of Dominican descent to reach number one in her story
Speaker 2: of the Hot one hundred since it launched in nineteen
Speaker 2: fifty eight. That's insane.
Speaker 1: Yeah, she was even tying with your miss Taytay the
Speaker 1: number one spot with look what you made me?
Speaker 2: Do you leave the Reputation Era out of this?
Speaker 1: Okay, fine, I don't want to fight you or the Swifties,
Speaker 1: well unless I have Cardi on my side. But back
Speaker 1: to Carti. Soon enough, she was everywhere. I'm pretty sure
Speaker 1: everyone and their mamas and baba's were listening to Bodak Yellow.
Speaker 2: It was a rap anthem of the summer. Lubton should
Speaker 2: have been paying her for the deal. I wonder if
Speaker 2: she gets unlimited Lubtons.
Speaker 1: Well, she can buy unlimited lubatons now, so it does
Speaker 1: not matter.
Speaker 3: She doesn't even need them for free anymore.
Speaker 1: That song went on to receive nominations for Best Rap
Speaker 1: Performance and Best Rap Song at the sixtieth Grammy Awards.
Speaker 1: It also won Single of the Year at the twenty
Speaker 1: seventeen be Et Hip Hop Awards.
Speaker 2: Vindication take that Chance the.
Speaker 3: Rapper No, I love chance?
Speaker 2: Okay, so do I, but just felt good.
Speaker 1: Then she dropped Motorsport and No Limit, and soon she
Speaker 1: was the first female rapper to land her first three
Speaker 1: entries in the top ten of the Hot one hundred, also.
Speaker 2: The first female artist to achieve the same on the
Speaker 2: Hot R and B hip hop chart.
Speaker 1: She went on to headline and Power one oh five
Speaker 1: point one's annual Powerhouse music celebration, where she met Mi
Speaker 1: Gos you.
Speaker 2: Mean her baby Daddy and future heavy Offset for those
Speaker 2: wanting the tea. According to a magazine, not much as
Speaker 2: known about their first meeting.
Speaker 1: But Carti has said they first met at an industry
Speaker 1: event and Offset pursued her. He was very consistent, Cardi
Speaker 1: said in a video on our Twitter account recapping the
Speaker 1: night they met. He really wanted to talk to.
Speaker 2: Me and they're still together. My heart.
Speaker 1: Did you know that Offset and Carti actually got secretly married?
Speaker 2: Oh my god, like benefit.
Speaker 1: Yup, right before they announced her first pregnancy. But we'll
Speaker 1: get into all that very soon.
Speaker 2: Carti's for success was simple, keep up the collabs. Wait,
Speaker 2: didn't you do a song with Osuna?
Speaker 3: See she also collaborated with another Bodikua.
Speaker 2: Well half Bodikua.
Speaker 1: Okay, well my people claim him either way. I'm talking
Speaker 1: about Bruno Mars.
Speaker 2: Yes, sir, Cardi b was featured in the remix of Finesse,
Speaker 2: appearing in the music video, but also went on to
Speaker 2: release Please Meet.
Speaker 1: Later on, they were charting like crazy all of it,
Speaker 1: making Cardi B the first woman to have five top
Speaker 1: ten singles simultaneously on the Billboard Hot R and B
Speaker 1: Hip Hop Songs charts.
Speaker 2: After all of these collabs, wasn't you ready to drop
Speaker 2: her own album?
Speaker 1: She was? Invasion of Privacy was released on April sixth,
Speaker 1: twenty eighteen, to universal acclaim. Before we get into the album,
Speaker 1: as promised, we got to talk about New York Fashion Week.
Speaker 1: Oh shit, Nicki versus Carti bing bing B.
Speaker 3: Nicki versus Carti ing bing B.
Speaker 2: For those of you guys who don't know, Lilliana is
Speaker 2: fucking everywhere and she just so happened to be there
Speaker 2: at the night of this fight.
Speaker 1: Okay, So I was covering the red carpet at the
Speaker 1: Harper's Bizarre Icons event, which.
Speaker 2: Is no big deal, no big d eel.
Speaker 1: It's one of the most well attended and well respected
Speaker 1: events during New York Fashion Week.
Speaker 3: It happens every year.
Speaker 1: It features all of the icons from their Icons issue,
Speaker 1: and let's just say it's a very classy affair. This year,
Speaker 1: it happened to be at the Plaza Hotel, and somehow
Speaker 1: both Carti and Nicki weren't just invited but were within
Speaker 1: minutes of each other during arrivals. On the red carpet,
Speaker 1: I interviewed both women. I can tell you this, They
Speaker 1: were both in great spirits. Carti's interview with me was
Speaker 1: so sweet. She was raving about being a new mom.
Speaker 1: She seemed really peaceful, honestly, And what was she wearing?
Speaker 2: Like? What did she look like? Oh?
Speaker 3: God, she looked gorgeous.
Speaker 1: It was a big red carpet moment for her because
Speaker 1: she was in Dulchangabana cauture head to toe. She had
Speaker 1: on all of these beautiful jewelry pieces, the gorgeous necklace,
Speaker 1: had these big earrings, and then she had this beautiful
Speaker 1: red dress. It was almost kind of very Flamento inspired,
Speaker 1: lots of ruffles, and she looked very regal. She stepped
Speaker 1: up her fashion game for this night by Iconic. Yeah,
Speaker 1: well it's called Bizarre Icons and she was working with Dulceangabana.
Speaker 1: And listen, whatever your opinion is of Dulchangabana, point is
Speaker 1: they dressed Cardi beautifully that night. But more so than
Speaker 1: how she looked, she gave me this feeling that was
Speaker 1: just softer, And I asked her about that on the
Speaker 1: carpet I said, how has motherhood changed you?
Speaker 3: And she said so many ways.
Speaker 1: I'm just more at peace, I'm more relaxed, like I
Speaker 1: just want to be with my baby. It was a
Speaker 1: very different version of Carti than I think the public
Speaker 1: expected of her. Well fast forward minutes later, that's four
Speaker 1: minutes later, and what happens the brawl to end all brawls.
Speaker 3: Nicki and Carti had beef.
Speaker 1: We all know this, right they did, and in the beginning,
Speaker 1: and then it escalated because Nicki was being a little
Speaker 1: shady about Carti being a mom. She was liking tweets
Speaker 1: on Twitter and on Instagram, liking posts that basically said
Speaker 1: that Carti was a bad mom. And I can tell
Speaker 1: you this as a mom. Don't come for me, and
Speaker 1: don't talk shit about me as a mom, and worse,
Speaker 1: don't talk shit about my kid. And Carti had had enough,
Speaker 1: and I think when she saw Nicki in a small
Speaker 1: room close to her, she lost it.
Speaker 2: It was like the stripper locker room all over again. Bitch.
Speaker 1: All of a sudden, I think Carti was like, you've
Speaker 1: been saying all this shit about me. Now you're in
Speaker 1: a small room with me. I'm going to let you
Speaker 1: know exactly how I feel. And I think we can
Speaker 1: all agree that if there's one thing that Carti is
Speaker 1: not going to do, it is mint or hide how
Speaker 1: she feel.
Speaker 3: She is out there.
Speaker 1: So I happen to hear some commotion, so I ran
Speaker 1: from the carpet to right.
Speaker 3: Below the second floor where you could see.
Speaker 1: He called your camera man right away. Okay, first of all,
Speaker 1: held my hand. I was not wasting time with a
Speaker 1: camera crew. I was like, oh, no, something is about
Speaker 1: to go down. You just have this feeling, you have
Speaker 1: intuition as a journalist, like something is about to happen.
Speaker 1: So I whip out my iPhone, I aiming up, and
Speaker 1: Carti's ass just happens to be right on top of me,
Speaker 1: like you can exposed ass, like exposed ash.
Speaker 2: The skirt of the dress tour right.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So she was in a little bit of like
Speaker 1: a scuffle the dress tour. So she was just in
Speaker 1: her spanks underwear and Colin Carter, her stylist, is standing
Speaker 1: right next to her, grabs the dress or try and
Speaker 1: cover her back up, and then you see Cardi bend
Speaker 1: down and you're like, what is she doing? Girl was
Speaker 1: taking off her shoe to throw it at Nicky's face,
Speaker 1: threw her shoe. In the video you see her throw
Speaker 1: the shoe. And then that's not all. Cardi's no bitch.
Speaker 1: She charges at Nicki and then never gets to Nicki
Speaker 1: but runs into Nicki's security team, who bops her in
Speaker 1: the head. And then you're like, wait what And all
Speaker 1: of a sudden, people are screaming. You see Cardi's publicist screaming,
Speaker 1: and I'm like, okay, I'm going to run to the
Speaker 1: staircase because there's only one way in and one way out. Listen,
Speaker 1: I know how to get a story, man. So I
Speaker 1: run to the staircase because I'm like, there's only one
Speaker 1: way for her to leave. There's literally one exit. So
Speaker 1: I stand at the bottom of the exit, and within
Speaker 1: thirty seconds I see two security guards coming down, and
Speaker 1: then who appears but Cardi. B Right, she appears, huge
Speaker 1: bump on her head, a big giant welt, no earrings,
Speaker 1: and I say that for a reason, okay, And she's
Speaker 1: got her head held up high. She gets escorted out,
Speaker 1: and then all of the commotion, which is all about
Speaker 1: stop filming cameras down, no cameras.
Speaker 3: Do you think I listened?
Speaker 2: Obviously, not. That's how we got some major footagee.
Speaker 1: Bad Zobe got the footage. So she gets escorted out,
Speaker 1: Nicky stays at the party. I don't see Nicki leave
Speaker 1: until maybe an hour later. But it was a scuffle.
Speaker 3: I am telling you.
Speaker 1: There has never been a fight or a brawl like
Speaker 1: that at any Bizarre Icons event.
Speaker 3: It was insanity.
Speaker 2: That is amazing, and I'm just so glad that you
Speaker 2: were there and got to see it. I feel it
Speaker 2: wasn't premeditated, only because she was dressed up with those
Speaker 2: earrings and all of that.
Speaker 1: So I love that you think that some fancy ascatur
Speaker 1: is gonna stop Carti from being Carti. You clearly don't
Speaker 1: know our girl, Belle galis. If Carti had some scores
Speaker 1: to settle, she was about to get them. On Invasion
Speaker 1: of Privacy, listen, Carti is sensitive. She may seemingly let
Speaker 1: things slide, but she's admitted that a lot of what
Speaker 1: people and people online say does get to her.
Speaker 2: So when she gets on that mic, girl addresses what
Speaker 2: she's heard. You heard. This wasn't just collapse. This was
Speaker 2: Cardi b telling the world that she wasn't going anywhere.
Speaker 1: Invasion of Privacy was a hip hop record, but it
Speaker 1: also included trap, Latin drop, and R and B sounds.
Speaker 2: It featured vocals from Me Goes Chance, the rapper Kalanie Sizza,
Speaker 2: twenty one, Savage YG and J Belvin Gone Bad Bunny.
Speaker 1: It became the most on demand audio streaming week ever
Speaker 1: for an album by a female artists. It also opened
Speaker 1: the door for an unapologetic expression of culture. Carti an
Speaker 1: artists who followed her wouldn't have to water themselves down
Speaker 1: to appeal to the general market.
Speaker 2: The title itself also sent.
Speaker 1: A message, Yes, Carti has a public persona, and yeah
Speaker 1: she built her brand on social media, but it's still
Speaker 1: got to be on her terms.
Speaker 3: She chooses what or what she doesn't want to share.
Speaker 2: Girls entitled to some privacy, so get up out of
Speaker 2: her business.
Speaker 1: If you're a hot item, the tabloids know no boundaries,
Speaker 1: kind of like a Latino household d D. Let me
Speaker 1: live my life and Carti is smart and strategic. She
Speaker 1: knows how to always stay one step ahead of the press.
Speaker 1: Rmor started swirling that she was expecting her first baby
Speaker 1: with Offset. She went on SNL and put an end
Speaker 1: to the rumors by showing off her beautiful bomb right
Speaker 1: in the middle of her performance.
Speaker 2: Looking fire and very innocent and maternal.
Speaker 1: I am, I add but if you thought a baby
Speaker 1: in her belly was going to stop her conquest of
Speaker 1: the biz, think again.
Speaker 3: The fourth single off the album.
Speaker 2: I like dollars, I like diamonds, I like stunning, I
Speaker 2: like shining.
Speaker 1: I like million dollar deals. Where's my bend, bitch? I'm signing? Wait,
Speaker 1: can we sign a.
Speaker 2: Million dollar please? I heart it.
Speaker 1: I like it was about to change everything we talked about.
Speaker 3: I like it back in the Bad Bunny episodes.
Speaker 2: Episode two for those of you taking notes, and if
Speaker 2: you missed it, make sure you go back and listen.
Speaker 3: This song was everywhere.
Speaker 1: It's a legacy defining hit, and you know it is
Speaker 1: because you're probably singing it right now.
Speaker 2: I like those Balan the ones that looked like.
Speaker 3: Sucks flexing on bitches as hard as I can eat.
Speaker 3: The lamb told that bitch. I'm sorry though, about my
Speaker 3: coins like.
Speaker 1: Mario, Yeah, they call me Cardi b I run this
Speaker 1: shit like Cardio.
Speaker 2: That song is just so good.
Speaker 1: Are we gonna have to pay to use that? Because
Speaker 1: I sounded so much late?
Speaker 2: Literally, I was like, dude, is Cardi on right now?
Speaker 3: Wait, did we just invite Cardi into the studio?
Speaker 2: She's going to be here. She totally is okay. So
Speaker 2: did you like the album? Yes? Or no? God?
Speaker 1: Is that even a question? It was so good and
Speaker 1: just her lines in it. Who raps about eating fucking Hallal?
Speaker 2: Someone who lived in the Bronx bitch there.
Speaker 1: I always wondered with that line, like, did my friends
Speaker 1: in Texas listening to that go eating Hallal?
Speaker 2: Hey? Google, what's Hallal eating Halal? Driving the lamb a lamb?
Speaker 1: Because here's and you know what I love about that line.
Speaker 1: It's first of all, just poetic. But I love the
Speaker 1: mix of highbrow and lowbrow. And that is why Cardi
Speaker 1: is so authentic in everything that she does. Because she
Speaker 1: is going to roll up to the Halal guys on
Speaker 1: fifty first and sixth.
Speaker 2: Avenue in her Fendy Firs Verstachi.
Speaker 1: In her in her Versachi furs, dripping in Jacob the Jeweler,
Speaker 1: and she's going to step out and buy Halal and
Speaker 1: then eat the Halal in the neon green Lamborghini.
Speaker 3: I love her, Am I wrong? No, No, Everything about
Speaker 3: that album was just born to be.
Speaker 2: Everything every touches turns to gold.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Carti had a Midas touch, so much so that
Speaker 1: even Maroon five wanted in.
Speaker 2: Oh, I have a quote from them, Adam Levine said,
Speaker 2: and I quote, it is truly unreal how fucking hot
Speaker 2: you are. It truly blows my mind.
Speaker 3: Wait, Joseph, I don't think that was about the song
Speaker 3: they did with.
Speaker 2: Car Oh, I didn't say it.
Speaker 1: Was girls like you made it onto the Hot one
Speaker 1: hundred and the music video received more than three billion views.
Speaker 1: Then she received the most nominations at the twenty eighteen
Speaker 1: MTV Video Music Awards twelve to be exact, including Video
Speaker 1: of the Year, and she took home three awards. A
Speaker 1: few years earlier, Carti was just a woman from the
Speaker 1: Bronx waiting for a big break, trying to find a path,
Speaker 1: And now here she is dominating the VMAs.
Speaker 2: And opening doors for other badass low mama fitas out there.
Speaker 1: Cardi b has paved the way for so many of
Speaker 1: today's top female rap artists, Doja Cat Lizzo, Meganie Stallions.
Speaker 1: Speaking of Yes, Yes, we are going to be discussing
Speaker 1: the song that cemented Cardi as a musical sensation.
Speaker 2: On that wop wop woah on.
Speaker 3: The next Becoming an Icon.
Speaker 1: Becoming an Icon is presented by Sonoo and Iheart's Michael
Speaker 1: Guda podcast Network. Listen to Becoming an Icon on the
Speaker 1: iHeartRadio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you