Nelly and the St Lunatics

Nelly Rapper Nelly, was born as Cornell Haynes Jr., and he grew up in St. Louis in the U.S.A. Before that he also lived in Spain for 3 years, but Nelly was a baby, so he doesn’t remember that. St. Louis is a dangerous neighborhood, with drugs dealers and a lot of violence. His parents divorced when Nelly was 7 years old. Nelly’s mother moved to a better place: University City. At first, Nelly stayed with his father in St. Louis, but later on he moved in to his mother’s house. There he learned to do more important things, like playing baseball, basketball and to write rimes. He has been on 8 different schools, 4 because he constantly moved, and 4 because they kicked him out. At the age of 20, Nelly became a father of his son Tré. Later on, Nelly and the mother of his son, split up. He didn’t have a job; he wanted to be a professional baseball player. He didn’t succeed, because he got involved with the wrong people. Most of them, ended up in jail, or where shot. Then together with some of his high school friends, he started a band: the St. Lunatics. They scored a regional hit with ‘Gimmie what you got’; they sold more then 10,000! When the St. Lunatics attempted to get a record deal, they got rejected. Then, as a group, they decided that Nelly would have a better chance as a single artist. They where absolutely right; Nelly got a record deal with the record company ‘Universal’, which released his debut-album ‘Country Grammar’ in 2000. It was a big success. That was the beginning of Nelly’s successful career as a rapper. Nelly has also got a clothing line, called ‘Vokal’. He started this with his friend and cousin Yomi Martin, in April 1997. That was before Nelly got famous as a rapper. In the beginning they sold t-shirts with funny prints on it, but they made a lot of money with those t-shirts, so now they even have designers who design the most ‘hottest’ clothes. The way Nelly likes to describe his clothes is: ,Clothing that speaks for itself.’’ St. Lunatics The St. Lunatics are 6 rappers called: Nelly, Murphy Lee, Big Lee, Slo Down, Kyjuan and City Spud. Big Lee is the oldest. He went to college, and when he finished that, he came back with some new ideas for the group. He said: ,,Yo, we should try it this way; we are just going to listen to the other groups and bands, and do something different then they do.’’ And that is what they did. Nelly and his group worked very hard, but they didn’t make it. Than Nelly, and the group, decided that Nelly should try it on his own. He worked in the studio for 3 years long, and finally got successful. But recently the members Slo down, Big Lee and City Spud stepped out of the group. Instead of them, they’ve got a new member: Ali. So now the St. Lunatics are 4 rappers: Nelly, Ali, Murphy Lee and Kyjuan. They also had a hit: ‘Ride with me’, in 2001.