The success of the album "The Slim Shady LP" takes the boy from being an unknown local underground rapper to a global mainstream rap star. Interscope finances a national tour and allows him to create his own record label, Shady Records, and the young man decides to sign his friend Proof. Eminem promotes his album on tour and the notoriety distances his friends, doubts those who remain and leads to several lawsuits filed against him. A few months after the album's release, the young man marries Kim Scott and flies to Amsterdam where, through excessive drug use, he finds inspiration for the lyrics of his new album. Production is divided between Dr. Dre, Mel-Man, Eminem and the Bass Brothers now known as FBT. The 45 King produces one track. The guests are Dr. Dre, Snoop Dogg, Nate Dogg, Xzibit, RBX, Sticky Fingaz, D12, Bizarre and, last but not least, Dido.
The album starts with a skit similar to the introductory one of his previous album, then Dr. Dre & Mel-Man build the rhythm of the first real cut, "Kill You". The artist's success has led him to be recognized as one of the most controversial and negative characters in the music industry. As the first track of his new album, to demonstrate that success has not softened him like any MC Hammer, the boy insists very strongly on misogyny, creating a violent cut: sample interpolated by Jackques Lussier's "Pulsion", dry syncopated drum sparse, soft bass line, sweet keyboard, calm rhythm that contrasts with Eminem's sick execution that destroys the cut and rides the controversy.
Eminem's next track is "Stan", which already has legendary contours. It's a rare narrative that makes sense from the author, inspired by letters received from his real fans: during the song, Eminem responds to a letter from a die-hard fan who starts losing his mind and goes crazy as the story unfolds. The song boasts a rare direct sample in Dr. Dre's post-NWA catalog and the reason is simple, it's not him behind the keyboards, but Mark the 45 King, who creates the beat for the song. The sample comes from Dido's "Thank You", from the year before, which opens the song. The sample breathes calmly, with that sad guitar riff accompanied by a rough bass line and a harsh drum. Eminem enters with a flowing, slow, almost spoken style, interpreting Stan and one of his letters addressed to him in which the fan confronts the rapper and writes him in a friendly way.
Melancholic chorus by Dido that introduces the second verse, another epistolary contribution by Stan who begins to get angry with his idol, continuing to compare himself to the rapper. The author recites this text again with an almost spoken style, regular, calm. Chorus, third verse, this time in the form of an audio cassette, Stan has lost his mind and is recording an audio intended for the rapper while driving in the rain after kidnapping his girlfriend, who he wants to kill. Eminem enters with a more determined, angry, concentrated, fluid, flowing rap, describing how Stan ends up with the whole car (with his girl in the trunk) off a bridge into a river, thus unable to send his cassette to the artist. Dido's last hook for Eminem's final verse, as himself, who now answers the letters received from the fan, reciting his letter with a regular, slow, rightly spoken style, creating a classic cut. It's one of his singles most appreciated by fans and critics, moreover he's the creator of a new original noun, "stan" precisely.
Dr. Dre & Mel-Man create the beat for "Who Knew", bouncy, sparse production, the rapper drops effortless bars in what is destined to be the album's lead single, shelved by Interscope executives in place of something more catchy. The first attempt is precisely "The Way I Am", preceded by a skit that explains the pressure the label has put the Detroit emcee under to churn out a record that is as palatable as possible for the mainstream pop audience. Soft vibrant bass line, snappy bare hi-hats, dark piano loop, sparse midtempo drum, Eminem's self-produced masterpiece rhythm left to breathe. The boy drops three hardcore verses going against critics, fans and radio hosts with an never heard delivery style in a rap tune, in particular he uses the anapest, giving life to a piece one of a kind, as well as being among his best lyrics, rhythms, rapping and hook of his career.
After a classic comes another classic, because here comes the return of Slim Shady at choice number eight. This is the second attempt to create the lead single of his album and in the end Mathers manages to satisfy the executives of Interscope definitively, because they are not satisfied with "The Way I Am", despite the quality of the song. Dr. Dre & Mel-Man on the beat. Liquid synths, funky keyboards, sick piano in loop, fat bass, poor drum midtempo. The rhythm should not work, but it does. Eminem delivers three verses with some of his most dynamic and spectacular flows giving life to another immortal piece in his discography.
The ninth choice is "Remember Me?" where the author is joined by RBX, affiliate of Dr. Dre who collaborated on "The Chronic" and "Doggystyle", signed to Aftermath, and by Sticky Fingaz, member of Onyx. Dark and gloomy production by Dr. Dre & Mel-Man, soft tender bass line in the background, slow dry midtempo drum, curious sounds in the background. Simple hook by RBX, the boy delivers an abstract verse with an atypical metric scheme and a slow, extravagant rapping style. Snarling and shouted chorus by Sticky Fingaz, who enters the track calmly, then his flow becomes ruthless, angry, powerful, unstoppable, dropping a tough verse with a fantastic style and stealing the scene from Eminem, who comes later. Hook by the Detroit rapper and his final verse in which he proves to be among the masters of alliteration. Out comes a sublime cut among the most underrated and least considered of his discography, arriving directly after two extraordinarily successful singles.
Mel-Man joins Dr. Dre in producing the next choice, "I'm Back", a personal track by the author in which his alter-ego Slim Shady makes his way again. The rapper delivers with a calm, quiet style, close to spoken word on a bright production, dark boom bap, dry drum, prominent bass, West Coast vibes. Hook almost lethargic, as if he had been anesthetized, then he delivers his favorite verse on the record with an unstoppable style at breakneck speed, and returns for a final stanza. The author returns to write a personal piece to coincide with the title track, self-produced together with his historical producers Bass Brothers aka FBT. The themes describe his reaction to the sudden success that overwhelmed him shortly after the release of his previous album, also dwelling on the lawsuit filed by his mother for the way she was described in several songs on that album.
Sarcastic intro referring to family and friends, then Marshall Mathers creates a sort of new chapter of "Just Don't Give a Fuck", inspired by a guitar riff by Jeff Bass. The production is beautiful. Sweet acoustic guitar riff, elegant piano, hook almost whispered by the rapper, who enters with a spoken style in the track, escorted by a tender bass line, then accelerates and his rapping takes energy and anger, fueled by dusted cymbals, after more than a minute a minimal uptempo drum makes its way, while Eminem begins to throw arrows against other artists after comparing himself to Cartman from South Park. Short bridge, then second verse during which he dedicates himself in particular to the Insane Clown Posse, with whom he has a rivalry. The boy closes the personal song by returning to focus on the behavior of his family after discovering Eminem's fame, drawing down bars also against the hip-hop magazine XXL. Instrumental outro with electric guitar licks, great tune. A homosexual sketch follows that the author uses to disses his rivals from Insane Clown Posse.
"Drug Ballad" is produced by Eminem and Bass Brothers: light boom bap, dry midtempo drums, solid bass, Dina Rae accompanies singing in the background. The artist creates a ballad by delivering slow and steady, accompanied by a sparkling piano, in a piece in which he describes his relationship with drugs. "Amityville" has a rare non-interpolated sample that comes from a Power of Zeus track. Dry midtempo drums, keyboards, tense violins, a strong bass line in the background, it stays in the ballad area. The Detroit emcee enters calmly and offers a hook that is as simple as it is memorable. Then, he provides a short verse with slow, hardcore rapping. Chorus, verse by Bizarre, a Detroit rapper friend of the author and member of his group D12. The guest builds an absurd ultra-violent horrorcore verse not for the weak hearts and especially the weak ears, with a delivery so calm, cold, glacial and effortless that it makes you shiver. Eminem ends the track with a violent verse. Originally, the song features Pacewon and Young Zee of Outsidaz as additional guests, however, Dr. Dre feels that the album features too many guests and in agreement with Mathers, the contributions of the two are removed from the CD. The choice is not taken very well by Pacewon, who in the following years engages in a series of dissing songs against the Detroit emcee.
We are towards the end of the album when a historic posse of Eminem arrives. After about a quarter of an hour after the last time, Dr. Dre returns behind the keyboards to propose his last production in the third LP of the rapper. The piece is a sequel to a song by Snoop Dogg released the year before for his album with No Limits "No Limit Top Dogg", which also features Nate Dogg and Xzibit on a production by Dre. The rhythm is similar to the original. Beautiful. Silky bass line phat, dirty drum dusty midtempo, perfect, cautious horns, magnificent synths keyboards. Intro by Snoop Dogg and Dr. Dre, the latter then launches the posse with the first verse, good entrance, hardcore delivery energetic inspired confident lively. In the wake of Dre enters Snoop Dogg with his relaxed style and a fast and flowing rapping, then slows down and returns to a colloquial delivery, leaving with elegance, fantastic. Short chorus by Nate Dogg with a last line by Snoop that launches the third verse by Xzibit: the boy makes a memorable entrance and delivers with energy, inspired, confident, flowing. Double hook by Nate Dogg, Eminem completes the song with a dynamic extra-verse in which he pays homage to the original piece. Double chorus by Nate Dogg, outro by Xzibit. A masterpiece piece, also it's the only song in which Snoop Dogg and Eminem appear together.
It's followed by "Kim", a song written by Marshall Mathers in 1998 as a prequel to his piece released the year before "97' Bonnie & Clyde" for "The Slim Shady EP". Production by FBT: paranoid, dark, claustrophobic tension piano keys from a horror thriller movie, heavy dirty hard drums, fat bass, guitar licks. It's an ideal soundscape for Eminem's concept, who after a whispered intro, raises his voice and begins to scream for six minutes against the Kim company, of which he plans and executes the murder in three verses, with an angry execution. Hook sung out of tune with a rocking bridge, originally the chorus was created to welcome a guest, then Jeff Bass decides that Eminem's execution does even better than a guest could do to maintain the disturbing mood of the track and leaves this hook. Over six minutes, because Eminem takes the trouble to load the girl's corpse into the trunk of his car, completing the concept and joining the song to the sequel released in 1997. It's hard to find a more raw, violent, angry and terrifying song than this in Eminem's catalog. It's scary, horrible, sick, and at the same time one of the best horrorcore songs you can listen to in the nineties. The song becomes a media favorite and is the first cut created by the artist for the album. It's considered too explicit to make a clean version and is therefore replaced by the South Park-themed track "The Kids".
Continuing to show irony and sarcasm in his music, Eminem places a fun, carefree, lively and light-hearted song after the most violent, heavy, dark and gloomy song of the album. The Detroit artist leads his group D12 in a battle on a light and discreet production of the Bass Brothers: boom bap, dry drum midtempo, sample interpolated by Michael Jackson's "Give in to Me". Intro, hook and first verse by Eminem who delivers with a loose and smooth flow. Swifty McVay in the wake delivers the following stanza with a regular rapping. Hook, then Bizarre, calm, icy, it stays on extreme themes. In the verse number four Proof tears the cut with a good flowing rapping, Kuniva follows with a regular style, sixth and final stanza provided by Kon Artis, who brings the cut to the end of these minutes with a regular rapping. Eminem returns to address the controversies caused by his songs in "Criminal". Splendid piano line, robust bass, metallic drum midtempo, simple boom bap. The rapper delivers three verses with a dynamic, flowing style, switching from rapping to spoken word, sometimes calm sometimes angry, creating a sort of "Just Don't Give a Fuck 4". Long hook, second verse that follows the dictates of the previous one, this time with a more regular, confident, energetic style. An unexpected skit interrupts the song: Mel-Man replaces Dr. Dre in this skit in which Eminem does a bank robbery with murder, returning to drop bars on the beat for the final verse with relentless rapping.
Final Thoughts
The album is finished at 16 tracks. The executives aren't happy. They expect the boy to be the first to sell one million physical copies in the first week. And there are no singles on the album that they have heard. They want another "My Name Is...". Eminem returns to the studio and records "The Way I Am". It's not designed for radio and TV singles. Days later he also comes out with "The Real Slim Shady" and finally satisfies the executives with what is a perfectly fitting sequel to "My Name Is...". The album obviously flies.
Recorded over a period of two months in different studios in Detroit, the album stays true to the line previously set by Eminem on his previous LP and mixes hardcore and horrorcore themes, trying to lighten them with a marked sarcasm, also featuring introspective lyrics that reflect Eminem's thoughts on his rise to fame, the criticism of his music and the estrangement from his family. These same writings are received negatively by critics due to their often excessively violent, misogynistic, criminal and homophobic language, and yet they are widely praised by most of them, who seem to have obvious problems making peace with their own brains. From a musical point of view, the first part of the album is almost entirely produced by the duo Dr. Dre & Mel-Man, who build a personal set of raw, skeletal, sparse rhythms, in order to better reward the author's energetic lyricism. In the other half of the product, the two are replaced by Eminem and FBT (Bass Brothers), who maintain more or less the same musical line and give life to a quite cohesive project. The 45 King is the only producer outside of these four to be used on the album, thanks to the beat he provides for the hit "Stan".
Released by Interscope, Aftermath and Web Entertainment, distributed by Universal, the album became one of the best-selling in the US, with 1,78 million copies in the first week, breaking the previous record that was still held by Snoop Dogg with his debut "Doggystyle" (1993). In the following weeks, the album continued to grind out copies and at the end of the month it had 3,65 million copies, becoming one of the few to sell over half a million copies for four consecutive weeks. It became the second best-selling CD of 2000 in its homeland, the first in Canada and the seventh best-selling of the decade in the US. In 2011 it was certified diamond by the RIAA for ten million copies sold. It remained at the top of the Billboard 200 for two months, an event for a hip-hop album.
The album's enormous success allowed Eminem to become a crucial figure in American pop culture, increasingly legitimized by the music industry: "The Marshall Mathers LP" doubled his previous effort and won the Grammy for Best Rap Album. Eminem thus became the first to win twice, and consecutively. In addition, his single "The Real Slim Shady" was awarded the Grammy for Best Rap Solo Performance. Critics hailed it as one of the best rap albums of the season, but in retrospect it's even more elevated as a breakthrough album and one of the best CDs of all time in all genres, often earning perfect scores from most music reviewers.
Rating: 8.6/10.
No comments:
Post a Comment