Nicki Minaj has received TIME’s prestigious 100 Most Influential People designation, and earned herself an artful TIME magazine cover in the process. Nicki Minaj’s name is placed alongside the likes of incredibly prolific, respected figures from all over the globe, such as Pope Francis, Riccardo Tisci, John Kerry and more. Along with Lil Wayne’s write-up, pieces from equally-renowned individuals such as Joe Biden, Bono, Donatella Versace and others are featured. There were a total of six people enlisted for covers, with the other five being Leonardo DiCaprio, Priscilla Chan & Mark Zuckerberg, Christine Lagarde, Priyanka Chopra and Lin-Manual Miranda. You can read Lil Wayne’s blurb on Nicki Minaj for TIME below.
You know, in New York they used to have these street DVDs. It just so happened that I appeared in one, and when I looked at the finished product, Nicki Minaj was on a part of the DVD. I was like, “Woooooow!” She was just being Nicki without the glitz and glamour. When I heard the first two and four bars, it wasn’t even about her rapping better than any female rapper. It was about, man, she’s rapping better than other rappers—period.
I always wanted more for my artists and saw Nicki’s potential from the first moment I laid eyes on her. She’s reached far beyond everything I would have imagined. Man, she’s so influential and doing all the right things. She’s an icon, a boss and a role model to all these young girls out here on how to do it the right way. Her work ethic speaks volumes and has yielded these results. The scary thing is she’s still going. Ha! Nicki Minaj will go down as one of the best to do it in the history of music.