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Should you need confirmation that Cardi B’s second album is considered a very big deal, you might consider the response of fellow rapper Young Thug to the announcement of its release, seven years on from her debut, Invasion of Privacy. An artist with 30 gold or platinum singles to his name, he nevertheless quickly shifted the release date of a new album he has been promoting for six months, when it became apparent that it would clash with the arrival of Am I the Drama?
It was a gesture that seems somehow antithetical to the very nature of hip-hop – a genre that’s had gloves-off rivalry in its DNA ever since the night, getting on for 50 years ago, when Busy Bee made the fatal mistake of challenging Kool Moe Dee to an onstage battle and inadvertently ushered in a new rap era in the process. But equally, you can understand Young Thug’s logic. Dressed up as let-me-hold-the-door-for-you chivalry – “It’s a ladies day,” he tweeted – it smacks a little of fear. Perhaps he remembers 50 Cent loudly announcing he would retire if his 2007 album Curtis didn’t outsell Kanye West’s Graduation, then dramatically changing his tune when it signally failed to do so. Why take the risk of being bested?
And it seems a little ironic when you actually hear Am I the Drama? From the first moments of opener Dead, the listener is made abundantly aware that Cardi B is not a rapper who needs her memory jogged about the gloves-of frivalry inherent in hip-hop’s DNA. “Never smart to beef with me – what can I say? / These hoes be dumb, bitches die young,” she offers within seconds of arriving on the mic. Seconds later, she is letting longstanding rival Nicki Minaj have it in no uncertain terms. It possibly takes a degree of magical thinking to depict Minaj’s 2024 tour as a failure, given that it grossed $108.8m – and involves invoking a hotly denied 2022 rumour that Minaj owed $173m to the taxman – but such is the hugely entertaining ferocity of Cardi B’s flow that she gets away with it.
Indeed, such is the ferocity of Cardi B’s flow when dispatching perceived slights and minor nuisances on Dead – to the critics who felt her 2019 best rap album Grammy should have gone to Meek Mill, online commenters she accuses of sticking their nose in “my coochie and my business” – that you find yourself wondering if she’ll run out of bile before she even gets to her ex-husband, Migos rapper Offset, from whom she filed for divorce in 2024 amid allegations of infidelity. But no: pausing en route to variously tear strips off Ice Spice (“snow-faced bitch”), former City Girls rapper JT (“tail-wagging bottom-feeder-ass bitch”) former City Girls rapper JT’s boyfriend Lil’ Uzi Vert (bald accusation of sexual peccadillo that modesty forbids relating), BIA (“if I did your numbers I would hop out a plane”), and indeed to have another pop at Minaj, she arrives at Man of Your Word, addressing her estranged husband in a manner that might pass for equivocal were it not so fabulously passive-aggressive: fault on both sides, but considerably more on yours than mine.
This merely proves an amuse-bouche before What’s Goin’ On. It involves Lizzo singing the hook of the old 4 Non Blondes hit What’s Up? – which turns out to be substantially less irritating when allied to a series of bitter allegations about Cardi B’s marriage, from underwhelming anniversary presents to unsatisfactory oral sex, than to the non-specific grunge-lite angst of the original. Throughout it all, Cardi B offers sharp, impressively witty lyrics delivered with brutal vigour: she never sounds like someone going through the motions, or doing what’s expected of her.
Something roughly similar is true of the music on Am I the Drama? An artist who spends six years making an album runs the risk of seeming like an artist mired in uncertainty about what direction to take, but the eclecticism here feels purposeful rather than confused. There’s a lot of distance between the bright pop of What’s Going On and the Selena Gomez feature Pick It Up; or between Bodega Baddie’s astonishing warp-speed salsa and the unsettling piano-led minimalism of Check Please.
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A lot of hip-hop albums in 2025 prize brevity, but at 70 minutes, Am I the Drama? cleaves to an era when rappers felt impelled to pack CDs to the limit of their capacity. It’s a questionable choice, particularly given a couple of duds. The Janet Jackson feature Principle feels like it’s there largely so Cardi B can brag she’s got Janet Jackson on her album – her actual contribution is understated and nothing special – while even the rapper herself sounds like she’s flagging a bit on Nice Guy, a slow jam about her current partner, NFL player Stefon Diggs: she’s more entertaining in battle than bedroom mode. She has staunchly defended the presence of two old singles, 2020’s WAP (with Megan Thee Stallion) and 2021’s Up, and in purely qualitative terms, she’s right – but there’s no getting around the fact they feel tacked on as an overly familiar afterthought and streaming grab.
Still, at least streaming means you can fillet out the bits you don’t like or don’t need to hear again. You’ll still be left with an album’s worth of imperiously raw and powerful material. One suspects on hearing Am I the Drama?, Young Thug will heave a sigh of relief at his decision: it’s not an album that a rival would want to go up against. And besides, it serves ample notice that getting on the wrong side of Cardi B is a course of action best avoided.
