Three Is a Trend: Rapping About Anna Wintour
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Kanye West and Anna Wintour at the Givenchy Fall 2009 fashion show (left); Nicki Minaj and Anna Wintour at the Carolina Herrera Spring 2012 fashion show (right).
Is Anna Wintour a hip-hop fan?
We'll probably never know, but if the Vogue editrix-in-chief ever tuned the Town Car radio to Hot 97, she wouldn't have to wait long to hear her name get dropped. Jay-Z famously referenced her in "Empire State of Mind," rhyming, "Anna the Wintour gets cold in Vogue with your skin out." (He also references InStyle a line earlier, but sadly Ariel Foxman didn't get a shoutout.)
This week brings more news of Wintour as rap muse. Nicki Minaj's new single "Come on a Cone" reflects her new fashion icon status, referencing her performance at Versace for H&M. And when it comes to Wintour, Minaj doesn't even have to drop her surname: "When I'm sitting with Anna, I'm really sitting with Anna/Ain't a metaphor punchline, I'm really sitting with Anna/Front row in Oscar de la Renta posture." Fashion followers will know that Minaj is referencing her seatmate at Carolina Herrera's Spring 2012 show. Though she looked plenty confident, Minaj later confessed to Paper magazine: "I was screaming out loud inside my head...Me sitting next to the Queen of Vogue! It was such a strange experience. I felt like I was dreaming. And I thought she would be snobby or something. But she was so incredibly sweet to me."
Whatever pre-show chatter the two shared must have gone well, because Minaj later bagged a Smurf-y spread in the magazine's March issue. Sweet indeed.
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But Kanye West may have outdone them last night, when he released the single "Theraflu," in which he tackles topics like PETA, designing $6,000 shoes, and over-the-counter influenza medication. Another notable line? "Dinner with Anna Wintour, racing with Anja Rubik." Kanye and Anna's love affair is clearly mutual: after all, she did attend his fall 2012 show, not to mention include him in a spread with Riccardo Tisci and Florence Welch.
Of course, mainstream rappers aren't the only ones enamored of the bobbed editor. Fans of Childish Gambino, AKA Donald Glover, will know that he has also referenced La Wintour in song. "Two of your chains equals one of my shirts, sir/You got Jacob's Jeweler, I got Anna Wintour." Surely Glover, who's endlessly referenced his love of Band of Outsiders and Comme des Garçons, merits his own feature? Have they closed the May issue yet?