Latto: 5 Things To Know About The Rapper Feuding With Nicki Minaj

• Latto (b. Alyssa Michelle Stephens) is an American rapper.
• She is champion known for her opus “Big Energy,” which won Song Of The Year astatine the 2022 BET Hip Hop Awards.
• Latto and Nicki Minaj got into it aft a study claimed “Super Freaky Girl” wasn’t hip-hop capable for the Grammys.

A bitter back-and-forth beef broke retired betwixt Nicki Minaj and Latto on Oct. 13, pursuing The Hollywood Reporter claiming that The Recording Academy, the enactment down the Grammys, won’t see Nicki’s “Super Freak Girl” opus for the rap categories, and volition alternatively see it a popular song. “I person nary prob being moved retired the RAP class arsenic agelong arsenic we r ALL being treated FAIRLY,” Nicki, 39, tweeted successful effect to the report. “If [‘Super Freaky Girl’] has 2B moved retired RAP past truthful does [Latto’s Song] ‘Big Energy!’ ANY1 who says diff is simply a Nicki hater oregon a troll.”

Damn I can’t triumph for losing… each these awards/noms I can’t adjacent celebrate

— BIG LATTO 🎰 (@Latto) October 14, 2022

Latto, 23, seemingly responded to Nicki dragging her into this speech by tweeting, “Damn I can’t triumph for losing… each these awards/noms I can’t adjacent celebrate.” (Earlier successful the day, Latto scored multiple nominations for the 2022 American Music Awards.) Apparently, the 2 attempted to sermon things privately, but the combat went public. Nicki called Latto a “Karen” successful a now-deleted tweet, Latto said Nicki was “literally older than my ma [and] tryna beryllium a bully.” The nationalist combat continued to get messy, with the Barbz getting progressive and DMs being shared. Ultimately, Nicki deleted astir of her comments.

So, who is the rapper that is the caller Public Enemy No. 1 for Barbz everywhere? Here’s what you request to cognize astir Latto.

(Gregory Pace/Shutterstock)

Latto Is A Rapper

Latto was calved connected Dec. 22, 1998, successful Columbus, Ohio, and raised successful Atlanta, Georgia. She started rapping astatine property ten, according to All Music. She released a fistful of mixtapes successful the second fractional of the 2010s, earlier releasing her debut workplace album, Queen of da Souf, successful 2020. In March 2022, she released 777, her 2nd workplace album.

“I wanted to solidify myself and wherever I acceptable successful the industry,” Latto told Complex astir 777. “This is conscionable the archetypal introduction. ‘Big Energy’ is the popular dependable from this project. I got an R&B sound. I got the rap trap sound. I got immoderate rhythmic worldly that I did with Pharrell, conscionable antithetic swaggy stuff.”

She Won The Rap Game

At property 16, she joined the Queen Latifah/Jermaine Dupri-produced Lifetime reality-television show, The Rap Game. The footwear camp-style amusement pitted rappers against each different and Latto, nether her “Miss Mulatto” name, won the competition. Jermaine Dupri offered her a signaling declaration connected his So So Def Records label, but she turned it down, saying it wasn’t capable wealth (h/t Vlad TV).

She Identifies As Biracial

When Latto archetypal began rapping, she went nether the sanction “Miss Mulatto,” transforming the disfigured racist word into a root of pridefulness (journalist Nadra Kareem Nittle wrote astir the disfigured roots of the word in an nonfiction for Thought Co.)

“I’m passionate astir my race,” a past 15-year-old Latto said, per Hip Hop DX. “I’m Miss Mulatto. The word mulatto technically is simply a racist slur. It means idiosyncratic that’s fractional achromatic and fractional white. So it’s, like, controversial. I took that negativity from the connection mulatto, and now…everybody calls maine Miss Mulatto. Why bash I person to take 1 oregon the other? I’m both. That’s what I privation to spell by.”

(Brandon Nagy/Shutterstock)

“My ma was large with maine erstwhile she was 15 years old. She went to a bulk achromatic school, truthful of course, her being 15 years old, large by a Black man, that was conscionable excessively overmuch for them to handle,” the teenage Latto added. “So galore radical uncertainty you … oh, she’s not going to beryllium capable to bash this, she’s a mutt, oh, she can’t bash this. I person to amusement this is what I’ve been moving for. I’m acceptable for this. Let’s go.”

She Adopted The Latto Name In 2021

She yet changed her signifier sanction to Latto successful 2021. “You cognize you mightiness cognize your intentions, but these are strangers who don’t cognize you, ne'er adjacent met you successful person,” she said successful a  Hot Freestyle interview (h/t Billboard). “So you gotta perceive each different out, and if you cognize those aren’t your intentions, and that’s however it’s being perceived, it’s like, wherefore not marque a alteration oregon change it? For me, it was the name. So present I’m like, ‘OK, my intentions was to ne'er glorify being mulatto.’ So if that’s however it’s being perceived and radical deliberation I’m saying, ‘Oh, I’m amended due to the fact that I’m mulatto’ oregon ‘My property trait is mulatto’ … past I request to alteration the substance astatine hand.”

Latto Has Spoken Out About How ‘Female Rappers Have It Harder’

In March 2022, Latto spoke astir immoderate of the struggles she had to look successful her career. “I’m clearing my medium close now, and it’s been, like, hard to woody with these men, you cognize what I’m saying? They don’t cognize however to support it business,” she said successful a sit-down interrogation with Big Boy TV, per Complex. “I’m conscionable keeping 100. It’s a diagnostic connected my medium that it was hard to clear, and they similar trying to driblet their nuts connected maine due to the fact that I won’t respond to a DM.”

( John Nacion/NurPhoto/Shutterstock)

“My intentions was not to, like, marque this a full thing,” she aboriginal told The Breakfast Club about the comments. “I conscionable was looking astatine it as, like, I’m a caller pistillate rapper successful the game. I privation idiosyncratic could person gave maine immoderate penetration astir however this worldly truly goes. You hear, like, ‘Oh, pistillate rappers person it harder.’ But I wanted to springiness a small penetration into what specifically makes it harder for a pistillate rapper. I didn’t privation it to distract from the euphony oregon thing truthful I benignant of wish, successful a way, I didn’t accidental that.”

“A batch of times we’re bullied down closed doors by these corporations oregon antheral artists oregon antheral producers oregon billion-dollar businesses and labels going against you,” she aboriginal explained successful a Complex interview. “They tin telephone the shots connected your creativity, which I deliberation is precise lame and unfair. But I deliberation my small dependable tin marque an interaction and possibly promote different radical to talk connected what they spell through, too, due to the fact that I’m not the lone pistillate that experiences these things, but we’re told to soundlessness it.”