It’s called Drop Dead Gorgeous but it’s no relation of the great tune of the same name by Republica although both could claim to blend elements of pop and punk filtered through in-your-face feminism.

 

Princess Nokia (aka Destiny Fraqueri) is an interesting artist: a New  Yorker of Puerto Rican descent and indigenous Taino ancestry, she lost her mother to AIDS when she was only two and practises the Santeria religion.

 

Fraqueri began performing under the names Destiny and Wavy Space before taking the stage name Princess Nokia from the Lifeline Program initiative introduced by Obama to give low-income earners a free Nokia phone.

 

Identifying as queer and bisexual, she has released several mixtapes and albums, initially as a rapper on tunes like Tomboy (celebrating her “low titties and fat belly”), and also founded a podcast, Smart Girl Club, that discusses healthy living and urban feminism.

 

As in this video irony plays a strong part in her feminist-centric lyrics: in the early Diva, she sang: “I feel like Beyonce, I feel like Shakira / Lemonade, I’m juicy, hips don’t lie, Selena / Britney, Christina, rest in peace Aaliyah / I feel like a goddess, I feel like a diva” before reminding us: “I don’t compare to nobody, don’t compete… Ain’t about the money, ain’t about the fame.”

 

Fraqueri is perhaps best known here for the time she punched a male fan during a gig at Cambridge University for mouthing “dirty obscenities” at her, saying afterwards: “That’s what you do when a white boy disrespects you.”