Musical style

When I started rapping, people were trying to make me like the typical New York rapper, but I'm not that.

No disrespect to New York rappers, but I don't want people to hear me and know exactly where I'm from.

Minaj on her rapping technique in a Billboard interview[14]

Minaj is known for her animated rapping style, her flow particular. She often combines

metaphors, punch lines and word play into her work, which has been compared to her mentor

Lil Wayne. The New York Times called Minaj "a sparkling rapper with a gift for comic

accents and unexpected turns of phrase. She's a walking exaggeration, outsize in sound,

personality and look. And she's a rapid evolver, discarding old modes as easily as adopting

new ones."[137]

Although many critics describe her technique as bubblegum rap, Minaj said:

"What people don't know is that before I was doing that craziness I was doing me, I was just

doing regular sounding rap that anyone could hear and identify with. But once I started doing

all that weird shitI'm not mad at it because it got everyone's attention."[138] Noted as a rap artist, she lends herself to electronic music genres

[139] (especially electropop). Pink Friday

marked her exploration of the genres, spawning electro hits including "Super Bass".[140]

Also

combining rap with synthesizer music, Minaj's second album had a number of electropop

songs: "HOV Lane", "Whip It", "Automatic", "Come On A Cone", "Young Forever", and

"Fire Burns",[141]

and the Billboard hits "Roman Holiday"[142]

and "Beez in the Trap".[143]

She

collaborated with other artists, producing more electronic hits: "The Boys" with "Me & U"

singer Cassie and "Beauty and a Beat" with Justin Bieber.[144]

Her verse in Kanye West's "Monster" was appreciated by critics, who said she had the best

verse in the song.[145]

Her alter egos are incorporated with her lyrics in British accents

(Roman Zolanski) or soft-spokenness (Harajuku Barbie). Ice-T said about Minaj's rapping

style, "[Minaj] does her thing. She has her own way of doing it. She has an ill [sic] vocal

delivery. She kind of reminds me of a female Busta Rhymes, like how she throws her voice

in different directions."[146]