The Notorious K.I.M.

The Notorious K.I.M. is the second studio album by American rapper Lil' Kim. It was released on June 27, 2000, by Atlantic Records and was her first album on her new label Queen Bee Entertainment. It debuted at number four on the US Billboard 200 chart, selling 229,000 copies in its first week, achieving Lil' Kim's highest peak and biggest first-week sales, and reached the top of the Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums chart. A commercial success, The Notorious K.I.M. was certified platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) on August 2, 2000. It was the best-selling female rap album in 2000 with sales of over 1.4 million copies in the United States. To date, The Notorious K.I.M. has sold 5.1 million copies worldwide.

The album spawned two singles that attained moderate Billboard chart success. Lead single "No Matter What They Say" peaked at number 60 on the US Billboard Hot 100 and number 15 on the Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs chart. The second single "How Many Licks?", featuring R&B artist Sisqó, performed similarly, reaching the bottom half of the Hot 100.

In a 1999 interview with BlackBook magazine, Kim stated that she was thinking about naming the album Queen Bitch, the title of a song from her debut album Hard Core, but decided against it as fellow rapper and friend Missy Elliott had used "She's a Bitch" and Kim did not want anybody being confused or thinking there was a problem between the two. In dedication to The Notorious B.I.G., The Notorious K.I.M. was in a "memorial" to the late rapper. "I felt Biggie's spirit while I was working on this album. I thought it was a perfect name for the album. Also, I am known in a notorious way, my style and lyrics. I've been known in a notorious way over the years", Kim told Jet magazine.

This album to me is more creative and more versatile than my last album. I think that's what people have been looking for. My whole image, to me, the reason why I came out with 'Hard Core,' the sexy thing, was to make me different from every other female rapper that was out. That's exactly what I'm trying to do now, is make myself different, because now we have a lot of rappers doing the same thing that I did when I came out the first time. What I'm trying to do is separate myself again from the rappers that are out now.

—Lil' Kim, MTV News

In a 2000 interview, Kim explained to MTV News that she attempted to collaborate with the original producers of Hard Core, but she was not satisfied with the final results. "Some of the producers that I worked with, they just didn't know what I wanted, so I worked with new producers this time, and I kind of told them what I wanted," Kim told MTV. Production for the album was handled primarily by Mario "Yellowman" Winans, Fury, Richard "Younglord" Frierson, Rated R, Rockwilder, Darren "Limitless" Henson, Shaft, Kanye West, and Timbaland.

The artwork used for the album was shot by David LaChapelle. The album cover was originally intended to be a picture of Kim nude and covered in Louis Vuitton logos, but the then editor-in-chief of Interview magazine, Ingrid Sischy, saw the picture at a gallery exhibit of LaChapelle's work and insisted that it be used for the magazine. Before the album's release, the image was used for the cover for the November 1999 issue of Interview.

In the summer of 1999, 12 songs from The Notorious K.I.M. were widely available through Internet file-sharing services and bootleg outlets. As a result, Kim went back into the recording studio and recorded 11 songs in three weeks. The set's release was delayed from several scheduled dates – August 17 and November 9, 1999, and April 25, 2000 – due to bootlegging and legal problems involving her record label. In a statement to Entertainment Weekly, Kim explained, "I wanted to put out the best album possible for my fans, and I needed more time in the studio to do this." Sean "Puffy" Combs also explained, "I am a perfectionist and so is Kim, and we will only put out an album when it's right."