The Shrine nightclub, an urban hot spot in Chicago, was buzzing with anticipation late one night last month as well-dressed revelers waited for Nelly to make his appearance.

It was the Chicago stop of the St. Louis rapper's party tour, an event sponsored by Vibe magazine and Crown Royal and loosely based around Nelly's 10 years in the rap game, as well as the 10th anniversary of his debut album, "Country Grammar" (2000), the best-selling St. Louis album ever.

A DJ warmed up the already-hyped crowd with songs by Janet Jackson, N.E.R.D. and Snoop Dogg before the muscle-bound man of the evening, wearing dark shades and a bright smile, walked into a VIP area above the bar flanked by his usual crew, including St. Louis' first family of rap, St. Lunatics.

"Anybody wanna go up there and hang with Nelly?" the DJ teased as the crowd squealed.

Nelly, who brings the tour to Home nightclub Friday night, rapped over Junior Mafia's "Crush on You," ad-libbed to Beyoncé's "Get Me Bodied," danced old-school St. Louis-style to Too Short's "Blow the Whistle" and threw out various shout-outs.

And, naturally, he sipped on Crown Royal, dubbed Derrty Royal for the night.

Then, St. Lunatics rapper Ali said, "If you don't know this, just leave," before Nelly broke into "E.I.," one of the early hits from his "Country Grammar" CD.

No one left. A rap music fan would have to have been under a rock to not know "E.I." or any of the other hits to come from "Country Grammar."

Since its release June 27, 2000, "Country Grammar" has sold more than 9 million copies in the United States, according to the Recording Industry Association of America, and cranked out a number of hit singles including the title track, "E.I.," "Ride Wit Me" and "Batter Up."

The album, with its Midwest-meets-Southern swag, introduced the world to the first hip-hop star from St. Louis (not counting Domino, who preferred to claim Long Beach, Calif.).

From Day 1, Nelly proudly claimed St. Louis, surrounding himself with his homies on stage and behind the scenes, filling his lyrics with St. Louis references and even drawing heavily on St. Louis' urban dialect, including those extra R's in words.

In a 2000 interview with the Post-Dispatch before the album's release, he predicted he'd be the one to put St. Louis hip-hop on the map.

"I think I can do it, for sure," Nelly said then. "That's what I want to do, and that's the plan."

Nelly, whose new album, "Nelly 5.0," is scheduled for a September release, wasn't available for an interview, but he gave this statement to the Post-Dispatch:

"It's always good to come home. ... We've been all over the world in the last 10 years but we've always been glad to call St. Louis home."

If hip-hop fans knew nothing of St. Louis before "Country Grammar," they did when Nelly exploded on the scene. The CD, which drew fire locally in the mayor's office over some lyrics, wasn't perfect, but it was a perfect fit for that time and space.

We take a look back at the CD that electrified the city and the rap world, with perspectives from some who were there. We also chat with Chingy, the biggest St. Louis rapper to benefit from Nelly's reign.

Jane Higgins, St. Louis publicist

Jane Higgins was easily one of the more memorable early characters behind Nelly.

She was the one who looked like she didn't belong, a fact that didn't get by her or others. Higgins, a middle-age white woman, managed Nelly's media locally, and she took the good with the bad.

"That was a beautiful time for me," Higgins says. "It was so different for me, so new, and I thank a lot of those people for letting me be a part of it."

A friend, lawyer Scott Rosemblum, and his wife introduced Higgins to Nelly's manager, Tony Davis.

"I hadn't experienced anything like that before," Higgins says. "I'd lived in what I can now call an all-white world and never experienced African-American culture. I feel lucky they let me be a part of their world."

But Higgins had to get used to people asking, "Who's that white lady with Nelly?" Someone once referred to her as the "popcorn kernel in the raisin bowl."

"I was proud of that," she says.

Unfortunately, Higgins says, "there were challenges with my own culture. There was a backlash. I was ostracized. But it didn't bother me. I didn't care."

After working with Nelly for four years, Higgins moved into doing publicity for athletes, including St. Louis native and New England Patriots running back Laurence Maroney. She also has kept working with musicians, including St. Lunatics' Murphy Lee, Boston rapper Zac White and Notifi Records' Ira DeWitt.

DJ Kut, disc jockey

DJ Kut felt incredibly proud going from city to city as Nelly's tour DJ in 2001 and 2002.

"We were getting acknowledged for our music in all these different cities, and shutting the place down," says Kut, who was there when Nelly and St. Lunatics toured with Destiny's Child, Eve, Jessica Simpson and 3LW. Nelly had the slot right before Destiny's Child, the headliner.

"It was great to see that," says Kut, who is credited with being the first DJ to play St. Lunatics' "Gimme What You Got" in 1997.

It was that support that made Kut a natural when it came to hiring a tour DJ. But when Kut was first asked in 2000, he'd already accepted a gig touring with Cedric the Entertainer and had to turn down Nelly's invitation.

"It wasn't a problem, but there was always a little something there," Kut says of his decision to keep his obligation to Cedric the Entertainer. "They held a few little things against me after that."

Kut was invited to appear in the "Country Grammar" video but coudn't because of his radio mixing duties that day.

"After that video, I was never (asked to be) in another video. There was underlying resentment because I wasn't there," Kut says.

Later, New York DJ Funkmaster Flex was used in the "E.I." video.

"And that's a guy who said 'Country Grammar' was wack and he would never play the record," Kut says.

"We went through our little things," he says of Nelly. "But at the end of the day, I was proud, and I'm still proud, of what they accomplished. We're all from St. Louis and want to see our city make it."

Today Kut is a DJ on WBLS-FM (107.5) in New York.

Joe Edwards, owner of Blueberry Hill and the Pageant

One night in 2000, at an invitation-only preview listening party for "Country Grammar" at Blueberry Hill's Elvis Room, Joe Edwards figured out that this guy named Nelly was going to be huge.

Universal Records was previewing new music from several artists that night, but Nelly's was the only music Edwards remembers.

"After they played that album, there was no doubt in my mind he would be big," Edwards says. "I just never dreamed he would be as big as he is. But that night I saw a certain charisma about him, an energy, and when that album played, it captured everyone's attention.

"When the other albums were played, it was, 'Oh, that's nice.' But the other albums didn't have that magic. Nelly's music touched a nerve."

TV monitors were brought in to watch videos that night, Edwards says, and all the movin' and groovin' going on during the "Country Grammar" video led to one of them getting knocked to the floor.

Its shattered remains created an odd yet gorgeous sculpture, Edward says, so he and Nelly each put a foot on the pile and took a picture. It still hangs in Blueberry Hill.

Not long afterward, a Nelly in-store event was held at Streetside Records down the street.

"It was so crowded, I didn't bother to go in," Edwards says. "But the fans electrified the Loop in a positive way."

Wendy Washington, national publicist

Wendy Washington, as a senior vice president for Universal Music, had the task of introducing the nation's media to something they hadn't seen before: a bona fide hip-hop star from St. Louis.

Washington says hip-hop magazines were hesitant to cover Nelly, especially after hearing him borrow from a nursery rhyme in the "Country Grammar" single.

"The sing-songy element of Nelly's music had people resistant," she says. "His music was different from what they knew. When people tried to get into his music, they just heard the children's rhymes, so a lot of them were dismissive. A lot of critics were skeptical, to put it politely."

The broader problem was that critics had no context in which to put Nelly because no hip-hop stars had come from St. Louis, Washington says.

"Being from St. Louis was just odd," she says. "With Snoop, you had the (West Coast) context of NWA. But coming from St. Louis, you had nothing there."

Washington got the national media to fly to Nelly's stomping grounds — University City, the Arch and the hood — and capped it with a performance by Nelly and St. Lunatics.

"We gave them the St. Louis experience," she says.

Washington also remembers the issue of what the first single should be from "Country Grammar," the title track or the pop-oriented "Ride Wit Me."

"I wanted 'Ride Wit Me,'" she says. "It was catchier. But 'Country Grammar' was undeniably big. It helped writers take a second look at him."

Washington worked with Nelly through his 2004 "Sweat"/"Suit" project, before moving on to become executive vice president for media relations for Jive Records.

Tom "Papa" Ray, Vintage Vinyl co-owner

Tom "Papa" Ray remembers when, long before "Country Grammar," a young Nelly — then known as Cornell Haynes Jr. — would pore through the racks of Vintage Vinyl's hip-hop section checking out the CDs.

Years later, it warmed him when he watched "Country Grammar" sell like hotcakes out of his Delmar Loop store.

"I recall thinking, finally, in the world of hip-hop, there's a St. Louis name that's going to shake the charts and have people all over the world thinking about St. Louis and hip-hop in the same sentence," Ray says. "It was a beautiful seller."

Unfortunately, Ray also remembers that when it came time for Nelly to do a local in-store appearance, Vintage Vinyl was overlooked, and he went to Streetside Records.

"At the time, I was very bitter about it," Ray says.

Vintage Vinyl has since done in-stores for both Murphy Lee and St. Lunatics.

Nick Loftis, clothing designer

Nick Loftis partnered with Nelly early in both of their careers to start the Vokal fashion line, and Nelly proudly wore its clothing in many key appearances, including an MTV Video Music Awards performance.

But Loftis says some of his more vivid memories are from earlier times.

"I remember the grassroots part of it mostly, sitting up in the back of nightclubs while they were performing, clubs I can't even remember their names, and setting up tables and selling T-shirts at the local concerts and the fashion shows," he says.

Thanks to Nelly's hands-on involvement with Vokal, "he gave us the opportunity to live out our dreams and take the company onto a national scale. Him wearing the product was so significant. He had more Vokal than anyone. He had custom pieces."

Loftis says fashion industry elite were flying in with six-figure checks.

"It was really interesting to go from being a locally owned indie brand to having an office in the fashion district in New York," he says.

Vokal went on to earn $25 million in sales before Loftis moved on to focus on Apple Bottoms. He's now CEO of Greedy Genius, a footwear company.

Wally "Beamin" Yaghnam, record producer

Producer Wally "Beamin" Yaghnam likes to refer to the glory days of "Country Grammar" as "good trauma," referring to the idea that when people go through traumatic events together, they're forever connected.

"But we went through 'good' trauma together," he says of that period.

Basement Beats, with Yaghnam, Jason Epperson, City Spud and Koko as its core members, made beats for St. Lunatics well before they hit the big time, and Nelly stuck with Basement Beats for "Country Grammar."

They all hoped he'd sell just 500,000 copies of "Country Grammar" so they'd be able to do a St. Lunatics album.

"When he sold (his first) million copies, Jay (Epperson) and I became so inspired we came up with beat after beat after beat," Yaghnam says.

Basement Beats recently opened a street operations branch in St. Louis called Basement Streets, distributing music for up-and-coming artists.

Chingy, multiplatinum rapper

"Right Thurr" rapper Chingy says he was 20 when "Country Grammar" was released, rapping in a trio called 3 Strikes that used to open for Nelly and St. Lunatics. Thanks to Nelly and "Country Grammar," Chingy saw that all things were possible.

"It influenced me in a big way," says Chingy, whose 2003 CD "Jackpot" was loaded with its own share of hits including "Holidae In" and "One Call Away."

"It opened the door and let me know, at the same time I was doing my own music, that you can be an artist from here and make it in a major way," he says. "I saw it and said someone from St. Louis can actually be serious, and get it done. That's the importance of that album to me. It was a lot of encouragement there."

Chingy says he never tried to imitate "Country Grammar" on his debut, as he has been accused.

"We came from the same place, seen the same things, did the same things," says Chingy, who defines himself as more of a party rapper. "I was just recording and making my music and doing my thing, and I wasn't looking at it as I need to go down the same lane Nelly did."

Chingy is working on his fifth album, tentatively titled "Minor Setback for a Major Comeback," which may include collaborations with Nelly, St. Lunatics, Jermaine Dupri and Drake.