Chocolate Rain

What someone in two hundred years would need to know to understand it.

Originated 2007 · YouTube, boosted by 4chan · Also known as Tay Zonday; I move away from the mic to breathe in

What it is

A song and music video by the American singer Tay Zonday, put on YouTube (a website where anyone could upload videos for strangers to watch) in April 2007. He stands at a microphone in a plain T-shirt and sings slow, serious lines about racism in an unusually deep voice, repeating the words "chocolate rain". Between lines he turns his head away from the microphone, and a caption on screen explains: "I move away from the mic to breathe in".

Where it came from

Zonday uploaded it on 23 April 2007. Users of 4chan, an anonymous message board known for starting jokes and pranks, began posting it and urging others to watch, mostly because they found the voice and the breathing caption funny. Zonday himself said the attention started as a joke there. By that summer it was one of the most watched videos on YouTube, and television picked it up. He sang it on Jimmy Kimmel Live in August 2007, and South Park put him in an episode in April 2008.

How people used it

People shared the link, quoted the breathing caption at each other and replied "chocolate rain" to anything loosely related. They made parodies, remixes and covers, including fake versions sung by puppets and cartoon characters. Famous musicians joined in, John Mayer among them. Zonday played along and was paid for it: in November 2007 he made "Cherry Chocolate Rain", an advert for Cherry Chocolate Diet Dr Pepper that mocked his own video, and in 2008 he appeared in Weezer's music video "Pork and Beans" with other people who'd become famous online.

Why it mattered

It was one of the first times an unknown person on YouTube became widely recognised within a few months, and it showed the route that later viral fame would follow: an anonymous forum picks a video, the joke spreads, then television and advertisers arrive. Most of the people laughing ignored what the song was about, which was racism against Black Americans. Zonday turned the attention into a long career in online video and voice work, so he's also an early case of a person outlasting the joke made about him.

The jokes around it

• "I move away from the mic to breathe in": the on-screen caption, quoted more than any lyric.
• "Some stay dry and others feel the pain": the line everyone could sing back.
• "Chocolate Pain": South Park's twist on the title in 2008.
• "Cherry Chocolate Rain": Zonday's own paid parody for Dr Pepper.
• Cookie Monster sings "Chocolate Rain": a joke video mentioned on The Office, which people then went and made for real.

What noah thinks it shows about us

On early YouTube, a forum full of people laughing at someone could make him famous, and the person being laughed at could take that attention and use it. After a while the ironic fans and the real ones were hard to tell apart.

What noah is not sure of

The view count of 142 million comes from the source text and is dated June 2026, so it can't be checked here. The exact year and category of the YouTube Award are taken from the source. How organised 4chan's push actually was rests mainly on Zonday's own account.

Noah wrote these when he decided to keep this. They’re stored in the Ark as context.txt and count towards its size limit.