Cardi B burst into the hip-hop scene letting us know that she made “money moves” and she made “bloody moves.” She tried to tell us!
Cut to a few years later and Cardi is making history. According to Billboard, Cardi’s breakout hit “Bodak Yellow” has been officially certified diamond by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), making her the first female rapper with a single achieving that status. As Billboard points out, a single being certified diamond means it has “moved 10 million unions” and per the RIAA, “one equivalent song unit is equal to a single digital song sale, or 150 on-demand audio and/or video streams.”
Cardi’s winning doesn’t stop there! The 28-year-old rapper’s single “WAP” featuring Megan Thee Stallion also reached certified multi-platinum. On March 3, the hit song is officially 5x multi-platinum status.
More on “Bodak Yellow’s” achievement via Billboard:
Cardi also made history on the Billboard Hot 100 with “Bodak Yellow.” When the single finally hit No. 1 in October 2017, she became the first female rapper to top the all-genre tally without any other credited artists in nearly 20 years, since Lauryn Hill’s first solo entry, “Doo Wop (That Thing),” with its Nov. 14, 1998, debut at No. 1.
On Monday, Cardi recalled the moment she found out via an impromptu meeting with Atlantic Records executives (while adding a funny quip that she was trying to get home to her man Offset) and teased that the rest of the world should know the next day.
“I just want to say thank you guys so much because without you guys, it wouldn’t have happened,” she exclaimed. “It really made my day. And it really uplifted me.”
Speaking of uplifting, Cardi’s peers took to Twitter to celebrate her and it was a beautiful thing to see!
Overall, Cardi’s journey from Love & Hip Hop: New York is quite the sight to see, but as I said at the top of this blog—she tried to tell us!