Make It Rain

At the peak of the housing boom in 2006, there was lots of money to go around, and Fat Joe and Lil Wayne came up with an ingenious idea for turning all that extra cash into club entertainment. While the phrase "Make It Rain" had been around for a while, usually a reference to hitting a lot of shots in a basketball game, Joe and Wayne popularized it to mean throwing money (literally) at a club - often a strip club.

The song caught on in the clubs, and in many cases, guys would find some high ground when it came on and produce a stack of singles, which they would then release one at a time onto the patrons dancing below. This was in a smooth motion holding the stack of bills in one hand and sliding the bills off rapidly with the fingertips of the other hand. Some songs inspired dance crazes, this one inspired the reckless distribution of $1 bills.

Fat Joe and Lil Wayne wrote this song along with Scott Storch, who produced the track. While many rapper flaunt their wealth - Joe and Wayne included - there are few producers as blinged-out as Storch. After producing hits for Christina Aguilera, Chris Brown and 50 Cent, Storch has what Rolling Stone estimated to be $70 million in earnings, and the toys to prove it. Storch owned a large collection of exotic cars and plenty of jewelry.

"Make It Rain" caused some problems because clubgoers and strippers were not always clear on the protocol, which was to not pick up the money until long after the song was over. Some high rollers got very upset when dancers bent down to collect the cash in the middle of the song, which ruined the party vibe and destroyed the image of beautiful women dancing amid falling cash. In a high profile case, the American football player Adam "Pac Man" Jones was involved in a shooting at a Las Vegas strip club after he made it rain. When the dancers stooped down to pick up the money, he became enraged and a conflict ensued. Jones was eventually suspended by the NFL for a year over the incident, some of which was captured on tape and turned into a story on ESPN where we learned that Nelly and Jermaine Dupri were also involved that night.