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And Finally Artist News
Nicki Minaj sends SOS to Tracy Chapman via Twitter
By Chris Cooke | Published on Wednesday 1 August 2018
Presumably having seen Sky Ferreira regain control of her Soundcloud account by sending out an SOS on Instagram, Nicki Minaj is upping the stakes. She is seeing if she can employ the same technique to license a Tracy Chapman sample that appears on her new album ‘Queen’.
Using Twitter as her SOS delivery platform of choice, Minaj revealed yesterday that: “There’s a record on ‘Queen’ that features one of the greatest rappers of all time. Had no clue it sampled the legend Tracy Chapman”.
Suggesting that this last minute sample discovery – and the resulting licensing requirements – could scupper her plans to release ‘Queen’ on 10 Aug, Minaj then asked her fans in a since deleted tweet: “Do I keep my date and lose the record? [Or] do we push ‘Queen’ back one week? Ugh! I’m torn!”
Before launching a Twitter poll to decide which of those options she should go for, Minaj did test whether an option three was available. That is to say, a speedy licensing deal that would allow the full album to still be released on 10 Aug. Hence the SOS to Chapman. “Tracy Chapman, can you please hit me”, Minaj declared in tweet form.
Whether Chapman herself is in a position to help isn’t clear. Though if she is, well, I’m sure she could turn around a deal super fast. I’ll let you insert your own sign-off gag about a ‘fast car’ here. But it better be a goodun.
