Huey At Odds With Nelly Over Collaboration That Never Happened

26 Jul 2007 08:01:00 EDT

Dispute has split fans into representatives of 'new' and 'old' St. Louis.
By Jayson Rodriguez

Huey
Photo: Jive

St. Louis is smack inside of the "Show Me" state, and lately it seems like two of the city's sons, Nelly and Huey, have co-opted Missouri's motto.

The two (Huey more so) have been taking swipes at each other in interviews and on tracks over, according to Huey, a slight Nelly allegedly made toward him, when he asked the head St. Lunatic to do a collabo with him and was turned down.

"I don't beef with singers. I'm just gonna leave that alone," Huey told MTV News last week when asked about Nelly. "We're in two different categories. He's a singer, I'm a rapper."

The St. Louis upstart (who was formerly known as Baby Huey) has been making a lot of noise with his breakout hit, "Pop, Lock & Drop It," from his recently released album, Notebook Paper, but his words for Nelly in interviews have been ruffling some tail feathers in his hometown. (See Huey talk about naming his album right here.)

In previous interviews, Huey explained how he approached Nelly at a party to talk about the possibility of the two working together on Notebook Paper. But Nelly apparently wasn't interested, and Huey didn't take kindly to the way it was all handled. So Huey responded with "Down, Down, Baby," a dis track riffing off Nelly's hit "Country Grammar."

"It's a support war," Huey explained rather vaguely. "It's a difference [between us]. It's exactly what it is, if you listen to my album, you can see the difference from St. Louis now compared to then. That's not even St. Louis' style."

Nelly eventually stoked the flames with his verse on the street track "Cut It Up," with Pimp C and Sean Paul of the YoungBloodz.

"It's a new St. Louis, yeah that's funny/ I'mma stick with the old, the new don't make enough money," he spit on the song.

"Cut It Up" even caused some Lou locals to make YouTube videos boycotting Nelly. One was set at a record shop and showed people calling the Lunatics' camp the old St. Louis, while pegging Huey as part of the new Lou.

Nelly hasn't gone on record about anything regarding his track or Huey, but St. Lunatic member Kyjuan laughed it off in another online video.

"[Dudes] is mad 'cause dudes don't wanna do songs with people," he said. "We was mad [when it happened to us]. We wanted Juvenile [on Nelly's first album] but we ended up with Lil Wayne. And we was cool with it.

"[If] I don't know you from a can of paint, why would I do a song with you when I got [Murphy Lee]?" he added.

Setting aside any resemblance to a can of paint, Huey seems to be moving on as his second single, the Jazze Pha-produced "When I Hustle" (featuring Lloyd), picks up steam. The MC said the track shows more of him than just a dance gimmick or novelty. "It was a perfect setup, you know," Huey said. "It's a good look. It just shows my skills as far as me being a different artist that people don't actually know of."

Huey is currently on the road and is expected to pop up on various Screamfest '07 tour dates with T.I., Ciara, T-Pain, Yung Joc and Lloyd (see "T.I., Ciara To Headline Latest Scream Tour").

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