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- Latto (b. Alyssa Michelle Stephens) is an American rapper.
- She is greatest recognized for her tune “Big Energy,” which received Song Of The Year on the 2022 BET Awards.
- Latto and Nicki Minaj acquired into it after a report claimed “Super Freaky Girl” wasn’t hip-hop sufficient for the Grammys.
A bitter back-and-forth beef broke out between Nicki Minaj and Latto on Oct. 13, following The Hollywood Reporter claiming that The Recording Academy, the group behind the Grammys, received’t take into account Nicki’s “Super Freak Girl” tune for the rap classes, and can as a substitute take into account it a pop tune. “I have no prob being moved out the RAP category as long as we r ALL being treated FAIRLY,” Nicki, 39, tweeted in response to the report. “If [‘Super Freaky Girl’] has 2B moved out RAP then so does [Latto’s Song] ‘Big Energy!’ ANY1 who says diff is simply a Nicki hater or a troll.”
Damn I can’t win for dropping… all these awards/noms I can’t even have fun
— BIG LATTO 🎰 (@Latto) October 14, 2022
Latto, 23, seemingly responded to Nicki dragging her into this dialog by tweeting, “Damn I can’t win for losing… all these awards/noms I can’t even celebrate.” (Earlier within the day, Latto scored a number of nominations for the 2022 American Music Awards.) Apparently, the 2 tried to debate issues privately, however the battle went public. Nicki referred to as Latto a “Karen” in a now-deleted tweet, Latto mentioned Nicki was “literally older than my mom [and] tryna be a bully.” The public battle continued to get messy, with the Barbz getting concerned and DMs being shared. Ultimately, Nicki deleted most of her feedback.
So, who’s the rapper that’s the new Public Enemy No. 1 for Barbz all over the place? Here’s what it is advisable to find out about Latto.
Latto Is A Rapper
Latto was born on Dec. 22, 1998, in Columbus, Ohio, and raised in Atlanta, Georgia. She began rapping at age ten, in response to All Music. She launched a handful of mixtapes within the latter half of the 2010s, earlier than releasing her debut studio album, Queen of da Souf, in 2020. In March 2022, she launched 777, her second studio album.
“I wanted to solidify myself and where I fit in the industry,” Latto informed Complex about 777. “This is just the first introduction. ‘Big Energy’ is the pop sound from this project. I got an R&B sound. I got the rap trap sound. I got some rhythmic stuff that I did with Pharrell, just different swaggy stuff.”
She Won The Rap Game
At age 16, she joined the Queen Latifah/Jermaine Dupri-produced Lifetime reality-television present, The Rap Game. The boot camp-style present pitted rappers towards one another and Latto, underneath her “Miss Mulatto” identify, received the competitors. Jermaine Dupri provided her a recording contract on his So So Def Records label, however she turned it down, saying it wasn’t sufficient cash (h/t Vlad TV).
She Identifies As Biracial
When Latto first started rapping, she went underneath the identify “Miss Mulatto,” remodeling the ugly racist time period right into a supply of delight (journalist Nadra Kareem Nittle wrote in regards to the ugly roots of the time period in an article for Thought Co.)
“I’m passionate about my race,” a then 15-year-old Latto mentioned, per Hip Hop DX. “I’m Miss Mulatto. The term mulatto technically is a racist slur. It means someone that’s half black and half white. So it’s, like, controversial. I took that negativity from the word mulatto, and now…everybody calls me Miss Mulatto. Why do I have to choose one or the other? I’m both. That’s what I want to go by.”
“My mom was pregnant with me when she was 15 years old. She went to a majority white school, so of course, her being 15 years old, pregnant by a Black man, that was just too much for them to handle,” the teenage Latto added. “So many people doubt you … oh, she’s not going to be able to do this, she’s a mutt, oh, she can’t do this. I have to show this is what I’ve been working for. I’m ready for this. Let’s go.”
She Adopted The Latto Name In 2021
She in the end modified her stage identify to Latto in 2021. “You know you might know your intentions, but these are strangers who don’t know you, never even met you in person,” she mentioned in a Hot Freestyle interview (h/t Billboard). “So you gotta hear each other out, and if you know those aren’t your intentions, and that’s how it’s being perceived, it’s like, why not make a change or alter it? For me, it was the name. So now I’m like, ‘OK, my intentions was to never glorify being mulatto.’ So if that’s how it’s being perceived and people think I’m saying, ‘Oh, I’m better because I’m mulatto’ or ‘My personality trait is mulatto’ … then I need to change the matter at hand.”
Latto Has Spoken Out About How ‘Female Rappers Have It Harder’
In March 2022, Latto spoke about among the struggles she needed to face in her profession. “I’m clearing my album right now, and it’s been, like, difficult to deal with these men, you know what I’m saying? They don’t know how to keep it business,” she mentioned in a sit-down interview with Big Boy TV, per Complex. “I’m just keeping 100. It’s a feature on my album that it was difficult to clear, and they like trying to drop their nuts on me because I won’t respond to a DM.”
“My intentions was not to, like, make this a whole thing,” she later informed The Breakfast Club in regards to the feedback. “I just was looking at it as, like, I’m a new female rapper in the game. I wish somebody could have gave me some insight about how this stuff really goes. You hear, like, ‘Oh, female rappers have it harder.’ But I wanted to give a little insight into what specifically makes it harder for a female rapper. I didn’t want it to distract from the music or anything so I kind of wish, in a way, I didn’t say that.”
“A lot of times we’re bullied behind closed doors by these corporations or male artists or male producers or billion-dollar businesses and labels going against you,” she later defined in a Complex interview. “They can call the shots on your creativity, which I think is very lame and unfair. But I think my little voice can make an impact and maybe encourage other people to speak on what they go through, too, because I’m not the only female that experiences these things, but we’re told to silence it.”
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