Posted by Akademiks recently chopped it up with Van Lathan and Rachel Lindsay for their Higher Learning podcast in which he discussed women who rap. Despite it being Women’s History Month and being reminded to “uplift Black women” during the interview, he doubled down on his previous criticism of Megan Thee Stallion.
Lindsay brought up the former Everyday Struggle co-host’s previous comments about her being “overrated” and he stood by them, explaining she can’t hold a candle to Nicki Minaj.
“I don’t remember all the quotes,” he said. “No, that sounds good. One hundred percent, I stand by that,” said Akademiks. “I think Meg Thee Stallion is really overrated as actually an artist. I’ve always thought that. I do think the level that she is discussed on when we’re comparing and talking about only rap, is a byproduct of a lot of industry ties that she has that has kind of lifted her up to be a super-celebrity, which is cool in that realm, but when we just talk about music, it’s not there.”
“Again, I’m not saying things without merit. We can’t really talk about no Meg Thee Stallion project that could come close to [Nicki’s album] Pink Friday. We can’t even talk about any top any Meg Thee Stallion verses that would come close to the Top 10 Nicki verses. So, again, when I see how, in the last year, she has elevated — and keep in mind in 2019, or maybe actually early 2020, I could be wrong on both dates so don’t kill me, she sold like, 27,000. This is the time when they were saying like, ‘Listen.’ It was Hot Girls versus City Girls, they were saying she’s such a huge star and whatever.”
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Megan presumably isn’t worried about what Akademiks thinks. The Hot Girl rapper recently landed in a Calvin Klein ad campaign and is prepping for the March 14 Grammy Awards where she’s nominated in the Best Rap Performance, Best Rap Song, Best New Artist and Record of the Year categories. She also just collaborated with one of the biggest pop groups in the world, Maroon 5, for the new single “Beautiful Mistake.”
Megan Thee Stallion’s ‘Good News’ Album Makes Billboard 200 Debut
But Akademiks, who only wanted to talk “facts,” has remained steadfast on his opinion about Megan. In his original remarks, he claimed she just had “one flow” and sounded “lazy” when she rapped. He also said she had just “1/100th” of the talent Nicki has and insinuated the sole reason she was finding success was appearance-based.
Megan released her debut album Good News in November 2020, which debuted at No. 2 on the Billboard 200 with over 105,000 total album-equivalent units sold in its first week. The album was the most streamed project of the week with 115.85 million on-demand streams.