In recent years, big-money Nashville country has been a safe landing space for faded stars from other genres; people like Hootie And The Blowfish’s Darius Rucker and Jewel have done well for themselves in that arena. And pretty soon, a man who was once the world’s most popular rapper may join them. As Miss Info points out, Nelly’s manager J. Erving tells Billboard that Nelly has a country project in the works: “He’s a free agent on the label side now, and is working on a country-based Heartland EP, which should be really interesting. He may be one of the first hip-hop artists to jump into that space in an authentic way.” Honestly, it’s surprising that this hasn’t already happened. Nelly has the strange distinction of having already scored two big country crossover hits: “Over And Over,” with Tim McGraw, and the “Cruise” remix, with Florida Georgia Line. And both of those songs are pretty good! Also, he got famous with a song called “Country Grammar.” There is a very real chance that this thing will turn out to sound horrible and desperate. But I am damn sure going to listen to it when it comes out.