The performance, which took place on Friday night (July 1st), was Minaj’s first in-person live performance in around three years. A portion of the set was dedicated to a medley of Minaj’s early guest verses that contributed to her success — including Young Money’s ‘Bedrock’ and Drake‘s ‘Make Me Proud’. When her verse from Kanye West’s 2010 single ‘Monster’ was queued up, however, Minaj cut it short.
“We don’t fuck with clowns,” she said following the DJ stopping the song, grinning at the audience. Minaj immediately changed subjects, saying that she wanted to “give a shout-out to New Orleans” instead of performing the song.
Consequence of Sound has speculated that Minaj could potentially have been referencing West’s appearance on Cardi B‘s new single ‘Hot Shit’, which was released the same day as Minaj’s performance.
Minaj and Cardi have a long-standing rivalry, stemming from an incident surrounding Migos‘ single ‘Motorsport’ in 2017. Back when the track was released, Minaj was unaware that Cardi B would also be making an appearance on the song. The two weren’t exactly too fond of each other at this point due to Minaj supposedly dissing Cardi’s motherly skills on ‘Barbie Tingz’.
