Rapper Nelly Is Making a Country Record, Because F*ck You America
That’s right, as further evidence that we will point back at the last week of April 2015 as the moment when mainstream country music made the critical turning point of becoming so devoid of anything that is actually country that there was no turning back, rapper Nelly has made it known he intends to release a country music EP called Heartland.
The news came out through an interview with Nelly’s manager J. Erving (the son of basketball great Julius Erving) published in Billboard recently.
“He’s a free agent on the label side now, and is working on a country-based ‘Heartland’ EP, which should be really interesting,” J. Erving explained. “He may be one of the first hip-hop artists to jump into that space in an authentic way with Florida Georgia Line and Tim McGraw, so we think he has an opportunity to grow that base even more.”
No word as of yet of a label mate for the EP, or a release date.
The news comes mere weeks after Nelly was making headlines in Tennessee for something entirely different. On April 11th, his tour bus was pulled over in Putnam County for not having proper tags, and a cornucopia of weapons and narcotics were unloaded off the bus in a police search. Five “rocks” of methamphetamine, a small amount of marijuana, 100 Ziploc baggies considered paraphernalia for the intent to distribute, as well as gold-plated .50-caliber Desert Eagle pistol, a .45-caliber Tarus pistol and a .500-magnum Smith and Wesson were all confiscated. One of the people in Nelly’s posse in possession of one of the guns and was also a convicted felon. Nelly himself was charged with felony possession of narcotics and booked into jail.
Despite J. Erving’s words, Nelly has never dabbled in country music, and to label his country dalliances as “authentic” is laughable. Nelly’s 2004 collaboration with Tim McGraw called “Over and Over” had nothing to do with country at all. It was Tim McGraw lending vocals to a hip-hop song, and wasn’t even made available anywhere in the country radio realm. Similarly, Nelly’s work with Florida Georgia Line on “Cruise” was for the pop remix of the song released to pop and urban radio outlets, and really didn’t have anything to do with the country version of a song that wasn’t really country in the first place.
Whether Heartland will offer anything country remains to be seen, but Nelly’s move into country is further evidence that country music is without leadership, without control or direction, and anyone can jump on board to exploit the leadership vacuum in the genre for financial gain. After what were some promising glimmers of hope in 2014 of country music emerging from the post Bro-Country era with a renewed understanding about sustainability and equality of music in regards to quality and gender, 2015 has been one piece of bad news after another.
April 28, 2015 @ 12:06 pm
He’s just defying genre, Triggerman….
(Runs away from keyboard and hides.)
April 28, 2015 @ 12:09 pm
It’s probably be more Country than anything that’s been released by Florida Georgia Line.
April 28, 2015 @ 12:15 pm
………………still more country than Sam Hunt! 😉
April 28, 2015 @ 12:35 pm
That is just always funny.
April 28, 2015 @ 1:54 pm
I propose a mass-grassroots “…….Still More Country Than Sam Hunt” meme campaign with the eventual hopes of critical mass pressuring his label to have Sam Hunt acquiesce to abandoning country radio and move to his proper place in Mainstream Top 40 and Adult Top 40 music! 😉
April 28, 2015 @ 3:15 pm
oh good, I can’t wait for the Sam Hunt/Taylor Swift “Your Girlfriend Loves Us and Now You Can Too Because We’re Not Country Anymore!” Tour
April 29, 2015 @ 5:48 am
Haha you sure?? This might be the one thing Sam Hunt MIGHT be a TINY bit more country than… if thats possible.
April 28, 2015 @ 12:16 pm
I’m debating cranking up some Stanley Brothers loud enough to go deaf and never hear this, but I’m just not sure Nelly or Aldean suck so bad that it justifies never hearing Mel Tillis or Brother Oswald again…
April 28, 2015 @ 12:18 pm
Nelly just became the only legit country music “outlaw” with any street cred.
Eric Churchs parking tickets pale in comparison to Nellys tour bus bust. 🙂
April 29, 2015 @ 9:22 pm
There’s a difference between being an outlaw and having thuggish qualities. Just sayin’.
May 4, 2015 @ 6:17 am
Exactly. Do you think a real outlaw, like Steve Earle, would ever do anything as thuggish as getting arrested on gun or drug charges?
…oh, right.
May 4, 2015 @ 7:02 am
Touche. However, the key difference between music outlaws and thugs is that the former has achieved their status because they took a stand for their art. The latter claims street cred from a criminal record most of the time. Steve Earle was a musical “outlaw” before he was a criminal if I remember correctly (and if I’m not, there’s plenty of other examples I can use).
Nonetheless, I see your point. My original comment was uncouth and I apologize to anyone who might have been offended or otherwise rubbed the wrong way.
April 28, 2015 @ 12:22 pm
Probably won’t even be a country album at all. It’ll be a rap album labeled country, and people will believe it simply because that’s what they’re told. “If it’s called country, it must be country, right?”
April 28, 2015 @ 12:39 pm
There you go ….
April 28, 2015 @ 12:49 pm
Sadly, I’ve been told those very words by people who were dead serious.
April 28, 2015 @ 12:27 pm
So where is the fake news tag trigger???? Don’t see it anywhere. Face palm
April 28, 2015 @ 12:28 pm
It’ll still be more country than “Anything Goes”.
April 28, 2015 @ 12:29 pm
the mirror image of david allan coe’s forays into rap (but this time with a hefty paycheck) ?
April 28, 2015 @ 12:30 pm
Yet another problem with “country” music. It has become the place where the has-beens of other genres come to try again. Sheryl Crow, Jewel, Jessica Simpson, Stephen Tyler…
It never fails that when someone is becoming irrelevant they either
1) Decide to get in touch with their country roots
2) Have always loved to cook and want to share their grandmamma’s recipes with fans via a Cooking Channel gig
3) Have always had a passion for decorating, remodeling, bedazzling, whatever and get a show on GAC.
April 28, 2015 @ 12:40 pm
Nailed it …..too funny
April 28, 2015 @ 4:16 pm
Don’t forget often time they also pine The American Songbook and release a “jazz” or standards album. -Ahem- Rod Stewart did it four times, I think.
April 29, 2015 @ 9:09 am
Funny story about Rod Stewart. When I was a dj about 20 years ago, he was coming to town. We had at least 50 sets of tickets to give away, but we were a current pop only station. The first contest I ran, no one called in. Not ONE single person. I ended up grabbing an intern, faking a call and using my grandmother’s name as the winner.
April 28, 2015 @ 12:35 pm
Hey guys, I just got here in my time machine. In my world, Nelly is the savior of country music. This album turns out to be a neotraditionalist masterpiece with a Rachel Brooke duet, and has brought all warring factions together in a new era of peace and brotherhood. It’s kinda like Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure, but with more steel pedal guitars. 2 guns up.
April 28, 2015 @ 12:36 pm
The words authentic and Florida George line don’t belong in the same sentence. Also, I am completely horrified by the fact there isn’t a fake news tag at the bottom.
April 28, 2015 @ 4:41 pm
“The words authentic and Florida George line don”™t belong in the same sentence.”
Sure they do, but on either side of an anatomical word not recommended for use in polite, and sometimes not quite so polite, company…
April 28, 2015 @ 12:37 pm
Now that Nelly is making a “country” record, I believe that other “rappers” & hip-hop artists, who’s vocabulary is incredibly limited to words such as n*****, b****, a**, money, & car should also make a “country” record. We can start with lil wayne. At least he is from the south.
Its highly likely that Nelly’s “country” record will be just as country as FGL and Samuel Hunt.
In which case, I cannot wait to purchase some more earplugs.
April 28, 2015 @ 7:41 pm
Cause hank 3 has never used profound language
April 29, 2015 @ 7:51 am
No, I don’t think I’d call anything Hank 3’s written “profound”…profane definitely.
April 29, 2015 @ 11:30 am
Hank3’s “Straight to Hell”, considered to be one of the best outlaw country albums ever by many.
April 28, 2015 @ 12:40 pm
Somewhere, there’s a parallel dimension where Sturgill Simpson is the biggest star in the world, and Sam Hunt is a bartender in some urban club thinking, “Gee, imagine if I was a country singer. I bet then even Nelly would think he could do it!” Then he laughs out loud at that ridiculous thought.
April 28, 2015 @ 12:42 pm
Lil Wayne w/ Flawda Georgia Line f. Keith Urban: Sipping on sizzurp & fire, DJ Snake remix.
Make it so.
April 28, 2015 @ 12:43 pm
Little known fact ..’.Shining Star’ by Earth Wind and Fire was originally demo-ed with 2 banjos in 3/4 time.
April 28, 2015 @ 12:49 pm
A Taurus .45? Really? You would think he could afford a decent semi-automatic.
Anyway, I think it is kind of sad that I would probably rather listen to Nelly than most of the artists on country radio currently.
April 28, 2015 @ 1:10 pm
LOL Joseph. I almost bought a Taurus 1911 right after they came out…
April 28, 2015 @ 7:25 pm
Haha, I was semi joking. I own two Taurus revolvers that are tanks but I have had absolute shit luck with Taurus pistols, never again.
April 28, 2015 @ 1:00 pm
Someone please drive downtown in a Range Rover and run him over before this happens.
April 28, 2015 @ 1:21 pm
Maybe he can cover Tompall’s “The Streets of Baltimore…”
April 28, 2015 @ 2:17 pm
He was born in Austin and he grew up in St. Louis.
May 4, 2015 @ 6:20 am
Uh, he’s black and he makes hip hop music. Therefore he’s an inner-city thug from Baltimore, New York or LA.
Do you even country-music-comments-section, dude?
April 28, 2015 @ 1:21 pm
reel wrds escpe mi brane. FMMFL.
April 28, 2015 @ 1:45 pm
Nothing evokes “heartland” quite like Nelly.
April 28, 2015 @ 2:01 pm
Whoooaaahhh Nelly!
April 28, 2015 @ 4:21 pm
By the way, if Nelly officially changes his name to Whoooaaahhhh Nelly, after seeing this, he owes me Fitty Cent.
April 28, 2015 @ 2:29 pm
If this Nelly can make a country record, so can I. I call “Doom Country!” My royal jester looks and sounds exactly like Tyler Hubbard, and since Tim McGraw proved we don’t need humans to sing with his ridiculous “Lookin’ For That Girl,” I’ll have one of my Doombots do the rapping parts. Because what excites pop fanatics more than a rapping robot voice? The music to this album will be drum machines (obviously) and ME on the Doom Guitar, an invention of mine that is shaped like one of those weird looking rock guitars and sounds vaguely like a steel guitar, but it is so transmogrified and electrified that it sounds like hell itself.
I announced I was going to do this, then my jester fled the country and all of my robots self-destructed so they wouldn’t have to do it… But I’ll find a way…
April 28, 2015 @ 2:31 pm
All jokes aside, this will probably be more country than anything on radio. It seems like the pop and rock and hip-hop interlopers we despise, the ‘established’ ones like Nelly and Christina and Steven Tyler, are making more traditional sounding country than anyone new to the art that is music. Trigger’s right, country officially went to the darkest depths of inescapable hell this week…. =D smile knowing it honestly can’t get worse now
April 29, 2015 @ 4:29 am
Nope. Cuz on my 20 minute drive to work, out of the 6 or 7 ‘country’ stations I can pick up, I occasionally find a song I can listen to–after much, much flipping.
(And my keeper rate is going down.)
I don’t see any Nelly song making me stop the flip.
It could be more country than 90% of what is on the radio, though. I’ll grant you that.
April 28, 2015 @ 2:35 pm
fucking disgrace to call his collection of talentless talking “country music.” I hate this bullshit. And a fucking Taurus!
April 28, 2015 @ 2:53 pm
git GeoRgeeee $trAiTTT aWN Dis REcoRD,,, AN’ Put $Um $TEeL GuiTaR && FiddLeee Yn It, an’ Ah MITe LISTen. braAAap.
April 28, 2015 @ 3:53 pm
This guy sure has odd taste in guns.
A Desert Eagle 50 AE caliber is interesting, but I wouldn’t want to own one or shoot one.
Ditto for the S & W 500. Having a handgun stress test your wrists while it flies up in the air from muzzle rize isn’t fun.
And a Taurus semi-auto (presumably this is a 45 ACP and not a 45 Long Colt) is junk. Taurus revolvers are pretty good (I have one in my pocket right now, as always), though.
As for the guy’s music, I will wait for Trigger’s CD review.
He sounds like an outlaw to me.
April 28, 2015 @ 4:27 pm
Like I said upthread, I considered buying a Taurus 1911 right about the time they came out. I had actually heard good things about them, but that particular one got away before I could get it. I ended up buying a 10mm Kimber Stainless Target II in its place….
April 29, 2015 @ 9:02 am
Sounds like you made a wise choice.
To its credit, Taurus will take chances on designs and models that the other, older, gun companies wouldn’t dream of doing, some of which come out fairly nicely.
May 1, 2015 @ 12:57 pm
Definitely guns to flaunt- that will never see range time. The gold plating on the Eagle is particularly painful to imagine.
April 28, 2015 @ 4:08 pm
haaaaaaaaaaay must be the money!
April 28, 2015 @ 4:17 pm
I’ll just wait for the Avicci remix and vomit all at once.
April 28, 2015 @ 4:52 pm
First Stephen Tyler and now Nelly, maybe Luke Bryan will be the next one to surprise us and make a country album!
April 28, 2015 @ 5:05 pm
Nelly is making a country album You got to be kidding me?
April 28, 2015 @ 10:23 pm
I wanted to make a joke here. I really tried to come up with a ludicrous analogy, but really, I can’t top nelly making a country record. Can anyone help? There has got to be a sillier thing to say (than nelly making a country record) to make my joke, but damned if I can think of it.
April 28, 2015 @ 11:55 pm
That weird moment when you realize Bro-Country was actually somewhat country music compared to this metro sounding disco R&B bullshit that has no country elements whatsoever.
I’ve said it a couple times before and will again….COUNTRY MUSIC IS DEAD. It’s history my friends.
After i seen that freak from Aerosmith is making a country album, Sam Hunt topping the charts with pop music, Eli Young Band and Gary Allan releasing pop country/metro-country singles, Zac Brown Band selling out, Brett Eldredge releasing a shitty new R&B single, Jason Aldean topping the charts with the most generic most effortless music i’ve ever heard in my life, and watched true country artists like Josh Turner, Joe Nichols, Josh Thompson, Easton Corbin, etc., recently fail miserably on the charts, I have come to the conclusion that country music is absolutely dead and it’s never coming back. They can keep slapping the “country” term on this new music but all country radio is turning into is another pop station.
April 29, 2015 @ 12:24 am
Right now, the one hope we really have is Nash Icon.
Pretty ironic how Cumulus might ultimately save true country music on the radio.
April 29, 2015 @ 12:27 am
There is one major pop star who, if she chooses to come back to country music and rekindle her original songwriting and musical style, could really save the genre and return it to its roots…
April 29, 2015 @ 12:33 am
Here’s an idea, Trigger:
How about writing an open letter to this pop star, just like you wrote to Jamey Johnson? Maybe if it goes viral, she might have a change of heart…
April 29, 2015 @ 4:57 am
If the Country music industry was aimed at being Country they would have people that would say NO to this shit. But since the Country music industry is trying very hard to not be Country this will be welcomed with open arms. Absolutely sickening, back to being true to the genre I can’t see any of Nellys Country fan base that have ever heard of Hank Snow or Buck Owens. Fucking Stupid, this is like Alan Jackson making gangster rap.
April 29, 2015 @ 5:53 am
I hope he covers Alan Jackson’s “Gone Country”…….that could be good!
April 29, 2015 @ 7:31 am
Is “country” an audience or a style of music?
This seems the fundamental question underlying all of the hand-wringing re: Sam Hunt, FGL, Taylor Swift and now Nelly.
Groups of artists, programmers, record producers (best characterized by Blake Shelton, I think), and maybe a very large subsection of the audience itself (ie, the recent football stadium crowd at the ACM Awards in Dallas) see it as the former — an audience to be….sold to, exploited, etc….
April 29, 2015 @ 8:50 am
Uggggggh! If I don’t think Colt Ford and Cowboy Troy are country, don’t think Nelly is going to convince me either. please put somebody with some country sense in charge. This is getting pathetic.
April 29, 2015 @ 11:32 am
As Nelly might say, don’t hate the player, hate the game. And the country music game is that big of a joke now folks.
April 29, 2015 @ 2:28 pm
It’s possible, just barely possible, that by coming in as an outsider (not beholden to Nashville suits), and treating it as a departure from his usual sound, that Nelly JUST MIGHT put out a decent country album.
The bullshit that’s ruining [mainstream, radio] country isn’t the result of rappers and pop stars infiltrating the country music industry. That phone call is coming from inside the house.
I actually think that these days, a star from a different genre, coming in from the outside with his own history and his own audience, dipping his toe into country because he wants to and not because that’s the only audience that will have him, may give us a BETTER shot a decent country album than some kid whose goal all along has been to become a “country music star.” And if he comes at it from a perspective of “I’m really gonna branch out and surprise some people,” who knows, he might decide that going old-school might be the best way to do that.
Do I think it’s likely? No. But I think we’re MORE likely to get a proper country album out of Nelly than we are from Music Row. If a punk rocker like Hank 3 can do it… well, stranger things have happened. I’m not exactly optimistic, but I will reserve judgment until the album comes out.
April 29, 2015 @ 2:54 pm
I’d die if it wound up somewhere close to “modern sounds in country & Western Music” or “nashville skyline”. I’d die.
May 3, 2015 @ 12:19 pm
….some good points here . I don’t know Nelly from Shelly , Jelly , Kelly or Telly …..but you make an excellent point : ” that phone call is coming from inside the house ” . It absolutely couldn’t get any worse than what’s happened in the last while .
Man ..I just heard Cole Swindle’s new song and there seems to be no point where these guys get embarrassed at releasing the same crap over and over and over again . I guess the upside is that a lot of us were fortunate enough to have been around when the greats ( writers , artists , musicians and producers ) were making the most amazing music ever and it gives us a reference point . Today’s new young demographic is pretty-much stuck with the Cole Swindles and such if they don’t take the time to seek out the legends and traditional roots that are disappearing from mainstream by the day , it seems .
May 1, 2015 @ 3:17 pm
None of this shit surprises me anymore. Before long, something even worse will come out.
May 3, 2015 @ 11:40 am
That does it, I will never give up my satilite radio. Thank you for the outlaw and willies channels.
May 13, 2015 @ 12:51 pm
You also want Country Music to be controlled. How? With what erected barriers? Flaming torches? Barbed wire? Your preachings are apalling. I read them a lot. I am a fan of country music who likes being free to listen and decide. A country fan as I am might be labeled misguided and rudderless by someone like you if you come around me anytime and my listening choice at the moment could include David Allan Coe, Travis Tritt, Kris Kristofferson, Waylon Jennings, Charlie Pride, Willie Nelson, George Strait, Darius Rucker, Emmy Lou Harris, Big & Rich, Brooks and Dunn, Eric Church, Florida Georgia Line, Miranda Lambert, the Hank Williamses, Baillie and the Boys – many, many, many people who have chosen to stamp their stylings as Country. Undoubtedly, you’d want some of these names silenced. You were probably a writing major and therefor must write. So this is where you’ve landed. But lighten up. Have a little fun. Live and let live. We all can’t appreciate and listen to the Slim Whitman style of country forever….. or should we?
May 13, 2015 @ 2:56 pm
“We all can”™t appreciate and listen to the Slim Whitman style of country forever”¦.. or should we?”
Where did I or anyone else ever pose this scenario or anything even remotely similar?
Country music MUST evolve. Quote me.
July 31, 2015 @ 2:57 am
The fact that ya’ll are just now coming the the notion and realization that Nelly has become a country singer makes me laugh. Seeing as he speaks about the dirty south and even had is first Song he ever released mainstream be titled “Country Grammer.”
Hmmm? wonder what kind of rap this guy sings guys? is it club music or country?
I love the fact Nelly for the most part aside from a few singles has been REAL throughout his whole career and the fact he is finally able to make the music he enjoys making, whether that be hip hop, country, jazz or soul don’t matter. Stop hating and just STFU. Ain’t your life, and if you don’t like his career change, guess what, click that unsub button and stop listenin assholes an stop bitching.
Props to the ones here encouraging his choice. Fuck You haters. Get a job and get off welfare before u start hatin on a man that rolly wipes his ass with the money u make in a month