Ice Spice has given the late Pop Smoke his flowers for being a pioneer of the New York drill movement in a new interview this week.
During her conversation with DAZED, The Bronx rap star spoke briefly about Pop Smoke and his contributions to the game before his untimely passing in February 2020. According to Ice, the “Dior” rapper is one of the goats, and she was bumping his music long before she took music seriously.
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She also threw in the names of other New York drill rappers who came before her and paved the way, such as Brooklyn natives Sheff G, Sleepy Hallow and Bizzy Banks.
“I love Pop Smoke. He’s goated,” she said about the late rapper. “I was definitely bumping him every day. That was even before I started making music seriously, in the studio. I was already rapping on some fun shit.
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“But before I started recording, I was bumping him a lot. Sheff G too, of course. Sleepy Hallow. Bizzy Banks. It was a lot of people in the drill scene.”
Pop Smoke, Sheff G, Sleepy Hallow, Bizzy Banks and other early drill artists had an aggressive, street-riddled sound when the subgenre was first introduced. Many believe Ice Spice took that sound and revolutionized the New York drill scene with her bubbly take on it.
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Ice’s breakthrough single “Munch (Feelin’ U)” gave her a major boost in popularity and added a twist to the Bronx drill scene that was bubbling with Kay Flock, DThang and more. Her following singles kept that vibe going with “Bikini Bottom,” “In Ha Mood” and more.
The 23-year-old is continuing to see even more success to the point that other “GOAT” rappers are taking notice. Nicki Minaj took to her Instagram Story on Monday (March 13) and reposted Ice’s cover with DAZED magazine.
“Gag!!! ‘The people’s PRINCESS’,” Nicki captioned her Story. “@icespice Catch it!!!”
Nicki’s comment comes after she labeled Ice the “Princess” of rap in the comment section of one of The Bronx native’s IG posts over the weekend.
“Btchs slow so I gih dem a pass. [fire emoji] Nah. Grah! No more passes Princess…Let’s go,” Nicki wrote under Spice’s most recent IG post, which contained photos and videos of her performance at Rolling Loud California earlier this month.
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Ice Spice reacted to Nicki Minaj’s support on Twitter by simply writing: “omg.” Her post was accompanied by an old tweet from 2020 where she rehearsed her response to Nicki following her.
“OMG NICKI JUST FOLLOWED ME AGHHHHH!!! [love heart emoji],” read her tweet from November 2020, which was followed by another tweet that said: “practicing.”
