Nicki Minaj admits getting butt injections at start of career

Nicki Minaj got injections to enhance her butt at the beginning of her career after fellow rapper Lil Wayne made jokes about its size.

The Starships hitmaker revealed that she underwent the aesthetic procedures in the early days of her career after being influenced by the Lollipop rapper, who discovered her and signed her to his Young Money record label.

"At that time, I had never had surgery. I had a*s shots," she told fellow rapper Joe Budden in a lengthy interview. "At that time, Wayne, he (was) talking about big booties. Wayne would have a new chick in the studio every session so it was always a new big booty there. They were his muses. But I just was around them all the time and I was like the little sister with Wayne and Mack (Maine)... All I would hear them talking about is big butts and I didn't feel complete or good enough... because I'm like, 'Oh my god, this is what you're supposed to look like in the rap culture,' and I don't look like that."

Budden interjected and asked if she made the decision herself or if others pressured her into getting the shots, and she admitted Wayne's jokes about the size of her bottom affected her more than he realised.

"They never told me that - well, no. I'm lying. I think Wayne, I think they said stuff sometimes jokingly," she shared. "But to a young girl or up-and-coming rapper, when it's from someone like Lil Wayne, it matters. Even if they're joking, they don't know that the person that is there in that room with them is not finding it funny."