On this page yo can find all Nelly news since our site was started.
Just click on month and you see all Nelly news.
May 2004
April 2004
March 2004
February 2004
January 2004
November 2003
|
Nelly Labeled A Racist Over Racy Video - 28/04/2004
|
The onslaught against misogyny in rap videos advanced this week when a history professor at the all-female, historically black Spelman College published a scathing indictment of rappers calling them "racist."
Professor William Jelani Cobb took a shot at Nelly and rappers overall in the body of his dissertation, Past Imperfect: The Hoodrat Theory, saying videos like the St. Lunatic's "Tip Drill" are not just sexist, but racist too. Earlier this month, Nelly had cancelled his appearance at a planned bone marrow charity event when word got out that some students, outraged at the portrayal of black women in his video for "Tip Drill," would protest the charity event.
"All told, the students who organized the protests were not hating on a successful black man or ignoring the pressing need for bone marrow," he wrote. "They were highlighting a truth that is almost forgotten in hip hop these days - a truth so basic that I wish I did not have to state it: anything that harms black women harms black people."
Cobb also writes that rappers' treatment of black women in their lyrics and videos is comparable to the way white slave owners treated black women.
"...the sad truth is that hip hop artists' verbal and visual renderings of black women are now virtually indistinguishable from those of 19th century white slave owners," Cobb wrote.
Nikole Howard, a senior at Spelman, told an AP reporter she thought black women were going to have to stand up and "demand respect," to reverse the "sad" trend of sexism in rap videos. "It makes me realize how much work we have to do to educate women."
A spokeswoman for Universal Records, Nelly's label, told the Associated Press the female students were obviously just looking for a "scape goat," since Nelly "was not the first, certainly to do a video like that."
|
|
Nelly To Pull A Guns N' Roses This Summer, With Mase In Tow - 27/04/2004
|
It's almost like clockwork: Every couple of years, Nelly drops an album in the summer, and it goes on to sell a gazillion copies. In 2004, the king of St. Louis is once again planning a summer release date, but this time he's hoping to receive double the love.
Nelly is embarking on a first for a major hip-hop artist. Unlike such rappers as Outkast, Wu-Tang Clan, Tupac, Jay-Z and Notorious B.I.G., who have dropped double albums, Nelly will release two different LPs on the same day, August 17, and sell them separately.
According to his rep, Nelly's albums will be dissimilar thematically: One is more melodic and party-oriented in the vein of records like "E.I." and "Tip Drill," while the other is described as having a harder edge. In advance of the LPs, the captain of the St. Lunatics will put out a single and video from each disc. Album and song titles have not been announced, nor have names of collaborators. A source close to Bad Boy's golden-boy-turned-pastor Mase, however, says that the retired (but rumored to be returning) MC has recorded a new song for one of the albums.
While Nelly's game plan is relatively new for hip-hop, rock artists have trodden this path before. Most notably, Guns N' Roses released Use Your Illusion I and Use Your Illusion II simultaneously in 1991, and a year later Bruce Springsteen put out the albums Lucky Town and Human Touch on the same day.
|
|
Trina Beds Ludacris, Nelly, Trick Daddy — In Song, That Is - 08/04/2004
|
What's good for the G.O.A.T. is good for the gander. Inspired by "Big Ole Butt," LL Cool J's 1989 anthem for women with junk in the trunk, Trina, hip-hop's "baddest chick," recently released an ode to her well-endowed male peers called "I'm Leaving You (Big Ol' D---)."
The libidinous tune finds her rapping graphically about having sex with everyone from Ludacris to Nelly to Trick Daddy.
"I went in the studio with the Trackboyz [producers of J-Kwon's 'Tipsy']," Trina said last week."And [they played me] 'Big Ole Butt.' It was a great thing, and I was like 'I'mma just revamp it and do it over in my way.' Once I did it, it was kinda bland because it was [about] the regular John Doe, Tom and Henry."
Bored by her remake, Trina decided to spice up the track and raise eyebrows by inserting the names of some high-profile rappers.
"I was trying to do something that was going to stir up conversation and give props to those leading the game right now," she said. "That's how I came up with all the males I used in the song — I listen to their music and I'm a fan of theirs as well. It was one of the most fun songs I did."
Not surprisingly, Trina's verbiage about her male conquests' bedroom skills has not garnered any complaints from the MCs she mentions in the record.
"I got a couple of calls from a couple of the guys, but it was all good," the Miami native said, emphasizing that "it was all out of the love and respect I have for them: It's not personal, I didn't sleep with them. Ain't no personal relationships going on. I couldn't [name] every male in the industry, I got the best ones possible. Everybody is feeling the song."
True to her lyrical MO, Trina's pillow talk isn't ending anytime soon. She says her forthcoming third album, The Glamourest Life, due this summer, will have a bunch of "sexy records."
"[There are] a lot of records where the guys are going to be, 'Yo, it's like that?' " she said. "I just wanted to go back. This album is like the advanced version of the first album [2000's Da Baddest Bitch]. On the second album, I kind of laid down a little bit because there's a different respect level, people want to know if you're classy or if you're still raw. So I didn't know what people wanted to hear, and I tried the clean type of thing, but it's not really what's happening. [The new album] is about the streets. It's a new elevation, I just wanna be that bitch."
Helping Trina's climb are producers Cool & Dre, Just Blaze, Kanye West, Swizz Beatz and Scott Storch — a roster befitting a true hip-hop glamour queen. But what is a life of glitz if it can't be all-encompassing? She's also working on an album with Trick Daddy, tentatively titled T-N-T ("We're working on that," she confirmed. "After I go on tour, we will go in the studio. We're in negotiation about that because I know a lot of people want to hear it."), as well as a sitcom called "Friends Like These."
"It's almost like a 'Clueless' kind of thing," she explained. "It's like me and my girls, we run into a bunch of money and we're just doing it real big, living it up. One of my friends got major, major man drama, and I'm running this little beauty salon. I'm excited to see how it turns out.
|
|
Nelly Forced To Cancel Bone-Marrow Drive On College Campus - 02/04/2004
|
Nelly and his foundation, 4 Sho 4 Kids, were forced to cancel a bone-marrow drive scheduled for Friday (April 2), on Spelman College's campus in Atlanta, Georgia. MTV.com reports that the historically black women's college pressured the rapper and his foundation into canceling the event because they were upset with the way Nelly portrays women in his music videos. Vice President of Student Affairs Dr. Zenobia Hikes said, "Spelman is concerned about the negative images of women in popular culture, particularly the misogynistic lyrics and images that constantly portray women in a sexual nature." Students were reportedly taken aback by Nelly's "Tip Drill" video, which features the rapper swiping his credit card through a woman's buttocks. The video has been airing online and on local rap video shows. Students from Spelman and Morehouse Colleges were planning a protest but after hearing of the students' plans Nelly and his foundation pulled out. Nelly has been conducting the bone-marrow drives to increase awareness of the need for marrow and blood-stem cell donors. The rapper's sister, Jackie Donahue, was diagnosed with leukemia and is currently in need of a donor. Calls to Nelly's label, Universal Records, were not returned at press time. Nelly is currently working on a new album which will be released in June.
|
