It’s been 7 years since Cardi B released her debut album, Invasion of Privacy. Since then, she has continued to grow her image and brand, even without putting out another project. From hopping on hits like WAP (with Megan Thee Stallion), Tomorrow 2 (with GloRilla) and Please Me (with Bruno Mars), Cardi B has slowly but steadily proven herself to not only be more than a “one hit wonder” but that her talent is legit and consistent throughout the years. Nearly a decade later, she re-enters the rap game with her sophomore album, “Am I The Drama?”. The 23-song record, released on September 19th 2025, lasts over an hour with 10 features including Janet Jackson, Selena Gomez and Megan Thee Stallion. However, the album stands strong without them. This album came out strong and has stayed so for the past month. This album proves Cardi B to be a prominent and promising artist not only in the rap industry, but overall as a dominating musician. I know, my opinion about her artistry is typically unpopular, but I genuinely love her as an artist and love this album. I believe it was released at the perfect time and did what it was set out to do: cause drama. With that, here are my favorite songs from the record, what they mean to me and what they have done since its release.
Hello: This song to me does not seem to convey a larger message other than: she’s back. She’s back and she was never gone. Although she has not released much over the past 7 years, her impact, her presence and her chokehold she has had on other musicians and the music industry is stronger than ever. Not only does she just claim it is, but she continues to prove so throughout the entire album, as the album has caused a lot of conversation and commotion. It’s the perfect song to add to the start of the album to set the tone.
Magnet: A perfect song to follow “Hello”, it’s a straight shot and diss towards City Girls rapper, JT. For context, the relationship between the two rappers started out fine. In 2019, Cardi B featured on the then City Girls song “Twerk”, where although JT was in jail at the time, brought the rap duo a lot of publicity, popularity and streams. Years later, fans called out JT promoting GloRilla’s hit “FNF” for reaching charts, but noticeably ignoring the bigger hit of hers “Tomorrow 2” that featured Cardi B. From this, the two went back and forth on Twitter, then took the conversation privately. Then last year, JT released her hit single “OKAY”, which noticeably threw shots at Cardi B in one of the verses, and continued to diss the artist throughout her album “City Cinderella”. This led to Cardi B to take her time but clap back, which is exactly what she did in this track. She cleared JT, and although JT has tried making her clapbacks, it is apparently clear that Cardi B not only embarrassed JT to the floor but won this beef and that power she showed in just one song is what makes it so great and notable.
Outside: Talk about reclaiming your worth. Cardi B once was in a very famous and notable relationship with Migos member, Offset. However, despite the (somewhat) long marriage and relationship, they have faced multiple issues in the spotlight including consistent issues with infidelity, moreso coming from Offset. So in this track, she really emphasizes the shame and ridicule she has felt and heard from her ex-husband about her exploring her options and finding other partners after giving up on the marriage, by reversing the roles and calling out his hypocrisy. How can he shame her for getting with other guys after him when all he did was sleep around during their marriage, even when they had kids together?
Other than those few tracks, notable songs that I adored were “Bodega Baddie”, “Trophies”, “Pretty & Petty”, “ErrTime”, and “Check Please”. Overall, I think this album has little to no skips, delivered every message she was intending to and doing so well, and proved that while other artists need to consistently put out projects to stay relevant, she doesn’t. I truly feel like Cardi B proved her worth, power and musicality in this album and that’s why it’s been on repeat all month long.