Robbed hit of the week 11/13/23 - Busta Rhymes' "Make It Clap"...

 

 

"Make It Clap" - Busta Rhymes featuring Spliff Star

from the album It Ain't Safe No More... (2002)

Billboard Hot 100 peak: #46 (three weeks)

 

This week's "robbed hit" comes from rapper Busta Rhymes, whose fifth studio album Genesis had spun off a pair of singles that crossed over to Billboard magazine's Hot 100 Top-40 with "Break Ya Neck", and the Grammy-nominated "Pass The Courvoisier Part II", with the latter coming a notch from making the top ten in the spring of 2002. At the close of that year, Busta returned with his second release on J Records, It Ain't Safe No More... The lead single from the set was the party record "Make It Clap", which featured his "hype man" from the Flipmode Squad William "Spliff Star" Lewis. Written by the rapper (under his birth name Trevor Smith) with producer Ricardo "RickRock" Thomas, the lyrics are a lot of wealth boasting as well as Busta bragging about his prowess with the ladies on the first verse, and Spliff Star taking the second doing the same. The pair split the third betweem themselves.The production uses hand claps to ground the grooves (the Chopin's Prelude in C Minor sample opener is a nice touch) while the pair are low key over it. With a music video that was a little off from his usual quality, but still reached his fanbase...

While "Make It Clap" climbed to #17 on Billboard's R&B Singles chart, and #14 on the Rap Singles list, it stalled under the top-40 on the Hot 100 in January of 2003. On the radio, the song peaked at #15 on the Mainstream R&B/HipHop Airplay chart and #29 on the dance/R&B-oriented Rhythmic format. Internationally, the single reached the top-40 in the Netherlands (#15) and the United Kingdom (#16). The It Ain't Safe No More album, released in November of 2002, stalled under the top-40 on the Billboard 200 sales tally at #43, and crested at #10 on the R&B Albums list, but it was his second longest-staying stay on both charts, though it only sold over a half-million copies. He would end up pairing with another huge pop star (like he did with Janet Jackson in the last decade) to revive the album.

(4/10)

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To attempt to juice the single a "remix" was done adding up and coming reggaeton star Sean Paul, and a new video was even shot...

The trio appeared on MTV to perform the single...