Nelly recently faced criticism from fellow St. Lunatics member Ali, who claimed the "Hot in Herre" artist "hustled" him and the rest of the group back in the day. Now Nelly has defended himself during a visit to the St. Louis radio show Wat Up Doe, claiming Ali initially signed on to the group as a manager and wasn't a performer.

"There's three people in this group that's been a Lunatic since day one; Nelly, Kyjuan, and City [Spud]," Nelly explained, as HotNewHipHop pointed out. "We all went to school together. Alright? Cool. When we first started the Lunatics, Ali was not in this group. Stop me when I'm lying."