Top Qs
Timeline
Chat
Perspective
Am I the Drama?
Upcoming second studio album by Cardi B From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Remove ads
Am I the Drama? is the upcoming second studio album by American rapper Cardi B. It is scheduled to be released on September 19, 2025, through Atlantic Records. It serves as the follow-up to her debut album, Invasion of Privacy (2018).
Remove ads
Background and development
Following the release of Invasion of Privacy in 2018, Cardi B partly took time off to focus on motherhood and ventured into other forms of entertainment, including television[1] and fashion.[2] "WAP" featuring Megan Thee Stallion was released on August 7, 2020, and was followed by "Up" on February 5, 2021. The rapper revealed that the album would shortly follow however, the project was delayed multiple times, citing perfectionism and pressure to live up to expectations.[3]
Arriving over seven years after its predecessor, the project was recorded over a six-year period[4][5] and is set to feature collaborations with artists she has worked with before as well as new collaborators.[6] After sharing a teaser related to an announcement on June 22, 2025, the rapper officially revealed the album artwork and the release date the next day via social media. Am I the Drama? is set to feature twenty-three tracks, including "WAP", "Up" and the lead single, "Outside".[7] The decision to include "WAP" and "Up" sparked some criticism, to which Cardi B responded by tweeting that "'WAP' and 'Up' are two of [her] biggest songs [...] they deserve a home."[8]
Remove ads
Release and promotion
Summarize
Perspective
Starting with "Money" six months after the release of Invasion of Privacy, the rapper released 12 more standalone singles and collaborations with her credited as a lead artist over the following seven years, including the Billboard Hot 100 number-one songs "WAP" (2020) and "Up" (2021). She returned in 2024 with "Like What (Freestyle)" and the top-ten single "Enough (Miami)", which were intended to herald a new era.[9] Shortly before the album announcement, she released the lead single "Outside" on June 20, 2025, which became a viral hit and earned her a top-ten placement on the Billboard Hot 100.[10] Apart from single releases, the rapper occasionally previewed snippets of other tracks on social media.[11][12] The album's second single "Imaginary Playerz" will be released on August 15.[13]
Cardi B was inspired to name the album Am I the Drama? after the amount of "real-life drama" she had been experiencing. She also drew inspiration from a meme in the online Drag Race community, specifically a quote from Scarlet Envy said during an episode of RuPaul's Drag Race All Stars. Following the announcement, Cardi B's representative announced that she and Scarlet Envy had plans to collaborate in the near future. On June 27, Scarlet Envy brought Cardi B onstage on the LadyLand Festival, where the latter performed "Outside".[14][15]
Remove ads
Visuals
Black birds, identified variously in the media as crows or ravens, are a major visual motif used for the album and its promotion.[16][17] The cover art depicts Cardi B in a red bodysuit with several black birds in the background. One of them is perched atop one of her shoes.[18] A CGI flock of aggressive black birds attack Cardi B, who tries to get inside a car to escape, in the album's official trailer. Jonah Krueger of Consequence and Atreyo Palit of Screen Rant wrote that the video and cover art's aesthetic were reminiscent of The Birds (1963) by Alfred Hitchcock; Krueger made an additional comparison to Home Alone 2 (1992) by Chris Columbus.[19][20] During Cardi B's appearance at the Schiaparelli fashion show in Paris in July, Cardi B brought with her a live black bird on her arm. Multiple news outlets named the bird as a raven or as a crow.[17][21] Julia Reinstein of The Cut argued that it was more likely a rook, a member of the corvid family of which ravens and crows are also a part.[22]
Track listing
Track listing adapted from Apple Music.[23]
Notes
- "Imaginary Playerz" samples "Imaginary Players" (1997), written by Shawn Carter, Daven Vanderpool, René Moore, Angela Winbush and Herman Chainey, and performed by Jay-Z.
- "WAP" contains a sample of "Whores in This House" (1993), written and performed by Frank Ski.
Remove ads
Personnel
Credits adapted from Apple Music.[23]
- Belcalis Almanzar – vocals
- Megan Pete – vocals
- Austin Owens – programming
- James Foye III – programming
- Colin Leonard – mastering engineer
- Evan LaRay Brunson[a] – recording engineer, mixing engineer
- Leslie Brathwaite – mixing engineer
- Shawn "Source" Jarrett – engineer
Notes
References
Wikiwand - on
Seamless Wikipedia browsing. On steroids.
Remove ads