A McDonald’s Bag Full of Cash: Nelly Reveals How Taylor Swift Paid Him $50,000
· Vice
In 2011, Taylor Swift fans got a huge surprise when Nelly joined Taylor Swift on stage in Houston. Nelly himself was surprised enough to receive the phone call, but even more surprised when he received payment. On October 28, 2026, the iconic 2000s hip-hop artist appeared on The Breakfast Club podcast and radio show to promote his new reality show, Nelly & Ashanti: We Belong Together. Aside from promoting his new show, Nelly told this bizarre story about flying from his home city, St. Louis, to join Taylor Swift on stage.
On the episode, Nelly stated, “I’ve known her for a long time. Her pops, her management. I’m gonna tell you what really threw me, right? She called me one night, just out of the blue, and said, ‘Yo, Nelly, listen, me and my friends, we made a routine to ‘Hot in Herre’ last night, and I wanna ask you a really big favor.” Nelly explained, “Now, I’m in St. Louis, and she’s in Houston. She said, ‘I got two shows in Houston tomorrow and the next day. Can you come down to Houston and just perform it? I don’t wanna disrespect you. I don’t really have a budget like that.’
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He added, “Now, listen to her. She says she doesn’t really have a budget. But she said, ‘What I will do is send my plane. I’ll get your room and all of that. And we only have like $50,000.’ I said, ‘Can you put that in a McDonald’s bag?’ I said, ‘But I would’ve done it for free.'”
Nelly Joins Taylor Swift In Front of 56,000 Fans
Nelly told The Breakfast Club hosts that the money wasn’t an issue. Taylor Swift kept her word and treated Nelly and his family, while her management handed over a McDonald’s bag of cash. “The plane picked me and the kids up and flew us down to Houston because she was doing three or four nights at the baseball stadium, with 56,000 people. They had them rammed in there! We did it, and she was like, ‘Yo, three minutes, three minutes!’ Her manager, Robert Allen, comes out and tosses me a McDonald’s bag with $50,000 in cash.”
“But she was just like, ‘Yo, the jet is there whenever you’re ready.’ And she got us the presidential suite right there. I think it was the Four Seasons, right there by the stadium. Had the whole top floor. We never even saw the room. We went from the show right back to the airport, or whatever the case may be.”
Nelly joined Taylor Swift for a cover of Nelly’s 2010 hit, “Just A Dream”. It was the rapper’s biggest hit since 2005. This isn’t the only time Nelly joined Taylor Swift on stage. In March 2013, Taylor Swift brought her Red Tour to Nelly’s home city, St. Louis. Nelly joined Swift on stage at the Scottrade Center, which has since been renamed the Enterprise Center, to perform “Hey Porsche”. Nelly once again joined Taylor Swift on stage in 2015, during her 1989 World Tour stop in St. Louis, to perform Nelly’s signature hit, “Hot In Herre”.
Photo by Dilip Vishwanat/LP5/Getty Images for TAS
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