Her song "Brisé" garnered traction on YouTube, and a duet with rapper Fababy, "Love d'un voyou", resulted in her charting in France for the first time.
She released her debut album, Journal intime, in 2017, followed in 2018 by Nakamura, which was certified diamond in France and has sold more than 1.2 million copies worldwide.
The same year, she beat the record held by Édith Piaf since 1961 as the most-listened-to French-speaking female artist in the Netherlands.
Two years after its release, Nakamura surpassed a billion[2] streams on Spotify, making the singer the most-listened-to French-language female artist on the platform.
On 23 September 2017, she participated in La Nuit du Mali at Bercy, in order to celebrate Malian Independence Day.
She shared the stage with Oumou Sangaré and other Malian artists, such as Cheick Tidiane Seck, Lassana Hawa, and Mokobé.
[12] On 6 April 2018, Nakamura released "Djadja"—the first single from her second album—which stayed two consecutive weeks at number one on the French charts and was later certified Diamond.
Nakamura became the first French female artist to reach number one in the Netherlands since Édith Piaf with "Non, je ne regrette rien", in 1961.
[14] "Djadja" was also the first Francophone song since 2009 to reach the top of the Dutch charts, the last one being "Alors on danse" by Belgian artist Stromae.
It debuted at number one on the French singles chart[citation needed] and achieved Gold status in two weeks.
On 26 March 2021, Major Lazer released a deluxe edition of their album Music Is the Weapon containing the song "C'est cuit", which features Nakamura and Swae Lee.
[49] Nakamura's music draws on genres such as pop, R&B, zouk, and Afrobeats, with Shamira Ibrahim of Pitchfork calling her "fearlessly genre-bending".
[50] She writes her own lyrics,[51] which are in French and make frequent use of argot as well as expressions borrowed from other languages such as English, Arabic, and Bambara.
[51] On the other hand, linguists tend to defend her work; they view it as part of the broader tradition of French poetry and songwriting that helps keep the language alive.
[53][54] In November 2020, deputy Rémy Rebeyrotte of the centrist party Renaissance cited Nakamura during his argument in favour of a law that would ban discrimination based on accent in France, saying that the way she "reinvents" French expressions is "remarkable".
[55] Nakamura herself has expressed frustration over constantly being asked to explain the meaning of her lyrics and believes that this may be related to misogyny, as "there are [male] rappers who invent much worse" in her opinion.
[7] Rokhaya Diallo wrote in The Guardian that her persona "may be why she draws such a hostile reaction in a country that tends to demand humility and gratitude from minorities".
[11] Malian singer Oumou Sangaré has praised the way that Nakamura "built a name for herself in a male-dominated world" and considers her an inspiration for young people, while French fashion designer Simon Porte Jacquemus, who has worked with Nakamura, views her as representative of her generation, "whether ... men or women, black or not".
"[59][60] Politician Marine Le Pen, the former president of the National Rally, also criticised the rumoured decision, deeming it a "provocation" and a "humiliation" on Macron's part.
[64] On 15 March, an investigation into racist online posts towards Nakamura was opened following complaints filed by the LICRA and SOS Racisme.
[63] In April, Macron stated that Nakamura "speaks to a good number of our fellow citizens" and that he thought she was "absolutely in her rightful place in an opening or closing ceremony".
[66][67] At the opening ceremony on 26 July, Nakamura performed a medley of her songs "Pookie" and "Djadja" with Charles Aznavour's "For me formidable [fr]", from his 1963 album Qui ?, accompanied by the French Republican Guard.