--- title: Student Loan Rap Music Video by Dee-1 Goes Viral description: 'I finished paying Sallie Mae back / Mae back' canonical: https://time.com/4229508/student-loans-rap-dee1/ author: Samantha Grossman article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-02-18T20:21:32.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T07:30:14.930Z og:title: This Rapper Made a Brilliant Music Video About Student Loans og:description: 'I finished paying Sallie Mae back / Mae back' og:url: https://time.com/4229508/student-loans-rap-dee1/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: This Rapper Made a Brilliant Music Video About Student Loans twitter:description: 'I finished paying Sallie Mae back / Mae back' twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- # This Rapper Made a Brilliant Music Video About Student Loans by [Samantha Grossman](https://time.com/author/samantha-grossman/) ## Samantha Grossman Feb 18, 2016 8:21 PM UTC by [Samantha Grossman](https://time.com/author/samantha-grossman/) ## Samantha Grossman Feb 18, 2016 8:21 PM UTC Like so many young, college-educated Americans, New Orleans-based rapper [Dee-1 ](https://www.facebook.com/dee1music)found himself facing a mountain of student debt after graduation. For a while he’d make the minimum payment each month, until he got a record deal and used part of his advance to finish paying Sallie Mae back completely. Then, he decided to write a song about it. This month, he posted [the music video](https://www.facebook.com/dee1music/videos/10154044962797275/) on Facebook, where it has racked up more than a million views. The song is simply titled “Sallie May Back.” The song is a completely joyful anthem about the moment when he finally paid off his debts. “For those who doubted me, yeah this is payback,” Dee-1 raps. “No sir, I don’t drive a [Maybach](http://www.caranddriver.com/mercedes-maybach/s600). But guess what I did? I finished paying Sallie Mae back.” Oh, and the people at Sallie Mae have seen the video—and they’ve sung its praises. “We’re all in the office singing along with you!” the company [commented](https://www.facebook.com/dee1music/videos/10154044962797275/?comment%5Fid=10154049239217275&comment%5Ftracking=%7B%22tn%22%3A%22R4%22%7D) on the Facebook video. “Love, love, love the hook. Congratulations on your success!” ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4229508/student-loans-rap-dee1/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4229508/student-loans-rap-dee1/"},"headline":"This Rapper Made a Brilliant Music Video About Student Loans","datePublished":"2016-02-18T20:21:32.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T07:30:14.930Z","description":"'I finished paying Sallie Mae back / Mae back'","url":"https://time.com/4229508/student-loans-rap-dee1/","keywords":["Newsfeed","viral"],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Samantha Grossman","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/samantha-grossman/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-newsfeed/","name":"Newsfeed"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4229508/student-loans-rap-dee1/","name":"This Rapper Made a Brilliant Music Video About Student Loans"}}]}] ```