I had been putting off writing this particular review mostly
because at the time I needed to focus my attention on developing my working
knowledge of the Spanish language in a summer class. But more than anything, I
did actually make several attempts to write this review, but none of the
finished products were to my liking. So, I decided that rather than editing
down bad reviews, I’d start fresh again, much like what Eminem did with Relapse/Recovery. What I find
interesting about these two albums is that when I think back to how much I
liked them when they first came out and what I think of them now, it gets me to
question my own method of critiquing. What I mean is how fresh and inspiring
these albums sounded when they first came out, but today when I listen to them,
those feelings are long gone and now I’m left with just…songs. Not that they’re
outright mediocre, it’s just that their longevity has nothing on Em’s early
millennia albums.
Obviously, I’m not going to count The Re-Up as an official Eminem release because it’s more of a
haphazard compilation of Em and his friends goofing off in the studio while he
was stoned cold on pharmaceuticals. I doubt he even remembers assembling it,
much less drawing the cover art. Some pertinent backstory: after Encore, Em decided to retire the Slim
Shady persona, and released Curtain Call:
The Hits shortly afterward as a retrospective swan song of sorts. During
this time, he was addicted to every pill from Ambien (which he was introduced
to on the set of 8 Mile), Valium, and everyone’s favorite abused
pharmaceutical, Vicodin. For the five years Eminem fell of the face of the
earth, he struggled with waning success, alarming weight gain, an increasingly
stronger taste for drugs, and the harshest blow of all: losing his best friend,
Proof, in a nightclub fight where he was fatally shot in 2006. Likewise with
any addict, Em’s depression sent him spiraling into overdose after overdose
until finally he got sober in 2008, and hit the studios with longtime
friend/mentor/producer-in-crime, Dr. Dre. The outpour of material Em had come
up with warranted a double album. However, it wasn’t released that way. When it
came time to assemble the tracks for what was “Relapse 2,” he realized it could be better, so he holed up in the
studio again, but with varying producers in an attempt to prove he could be
even more marketable and accessible than he ever was. And to add that final
twist, Em announced on his Twitter page that, “There is no Relapse 2.” This
cryptic message ultimately meant that the album title would be Recovery, to fit better with the overall
theme of the songs. All in all, these two albums mark the beginning of a new
era for Eminem, as he tries to prove to the world that he has retained his
remarkable talent for rapping, and gained new skills in the process. This
review is meant to discuss Eminem’s relevance in a new decade where the game’s
players have changed dramatically, as well as rap itself, and also to question whether his newfound sobriety makes him less of the rapper he once was.
Structurally, Relapse
is far more consistent in its production, sound and themes. The best way to
think of these two albums is to compare them to The Slim Shady LP (1999) and The
Marshall Mathers LP (2000). Relapse
is essentially the album that marks the return of Slim Shady, while Recovery is the return of Eminem, just
like how Slim Shady introduced us all
to the mischievous character, while Marshall
Mathers gave us an introspective view into Eminem’s true thoughts. The same
holds true to Relapse and Recovery.
On the whole, Relapse
and Recovery are worlds apart as far
as content and even sound is concerned. For one thing, Relapse finds Eminem on comfortable and familiar ground with
producer Dr. Dre handling most all of the production work. On “Beautiful,”
Eminem takes center stage again like he did in his days of The Eminem Show, and “Déjà vu,” clues us in on what happened the
night he overdosed. And like The Eminem
Show, he confesses past struggles and emotions towards aspects of himself
that he despised and would rather forget. Clichés aside, it is an emotionally
heavy track in an island by itself with far less serious and more gruesome
comical tunes.
I’ve found that fans and critics alike have criticized Em
for adopting an indiscernible accent on Relapse,
but what they have to understand is that is not necessarily Eminem rapping on Relapse. Isn’t that what drew us to the
charisma of Slim Shady in the first place? This idea of an uber depraved alter
ego whose arch-solipsism was terrifying with black comedy overtones that were
actually funny? On Relapse, Slim Shady
is funny in a very different fashion. For instance, in songs like “Brain
Damage,” we have relatable revenge fantasies acting as the vehicle for his
appeal, but on tracks like “3 a.m.,” and “Insane,” we have murder and rape
fantasies that aren’t relatable at all, nor are they terribly funny, but at
least Em is mustering every effort he has to make the rhythms of his words
co-exist nicely with the beat. My personal favorite track that displays this trait
would be “Stay Wide Awake,” where Slim Shady raps with a sardonic smile, “I see
my target put my car in park and approach a tender/ young girl by the name of
Brenda and I pretend to befriend her/ sit down beside her like a spider hi
there girl you might’a/ heard of me before see whore you’re the kinda girl that
I’d a/ ssault and rape and figure why not try to make your pussy wider/ fuck
you with an umbrella then open it up while the shit’s inside ya.” Sure, rape
isn’t the funniest topic, but given its immense emotional gravity, it would
only make sense for someone like Eminem/Slim Shady to try to put a comical spin
on it. To put it in perspective, compared to the recent remarks of Rep. Todd
Akin regarding legitimate rape, Slim Shady’s views seem more sensible.
What can really bog this album down is the length. At just
over 76 minutes, you begin to realize that this sounds suspiciously close to an
Insane Clown Posse album. I consider that hilarious when the Marshall Mathers title track rips them mercilessly.
It is one of Em’s longest albums, but somehow feels longer because of him
wanting to cram in every spit and insult he recorded. So obviously it’s not on
the same level as Marshall Mathers, Eminem Show and definitely not Slim Shady, but at least it doesn’t have
the same amount of blatant and subpar filler tracks of Encore.
But never fear, if you don’t care for endless murder
fantasies with standard and frankly, lazy, Dr. Dre production, by golly, Recovery is for you. I found that
critics were pretty evenly divided with this album, and really, their opposing claims
were both right. If I had to sum up the scope of all of their valid arguments,
I’d say the following: it was okay. To be more specific, I just had to laugh
over how enthusiastic and consistent they were about Eminem’s new sound, but
off to the side, and sheepishly, they also said: maybe his rapping is a little
past his time. Ouch.
Unfortunately this holds true, but optimistically speaking,
it is by no means an outright terrible Eminem album. Even though Eminem is
practically using puns and asides as crutches, he eventually wins his own race
to convince himself he’s back on his prime. Seriously, I have never heard him
spit so much in what seems like a unnecessarily harried pace. I suspect he
knows amazing breathing techniques so he can pull this off at live shows. In
“Talking 2 Myself,” he acknowledges that he feels guilt for becoming a
suicidally depressed pharmaceutical addict who did next to nothing for the past
five years. And in the tracks to come, we are bludgeoned with that aspect of making
up for lost time.
The first quarter of
the album kicks off well enough, but starts its path to monotony with,
“W.T.P.,” where he actually does a pretty accurate mimic of Insane Clown Posse.
Going back to “Talking 2 Myself,” we are presented with a good idea of some of
the lows he experienced, but is magnified with “Going Through Changes,” which
if it didn’t have that sappily utilized Black Sabbath sample as the main beat,
would actually have a wrenching impact. Then what dignity that song had
vanishes with lead single, “Not Afraid,” possibly one of the worst rap songs
I’ve heard. Horrible beat courtesy of Boi1da, and has the gall to diss Relapse, which ironically has more fun
and sincere pride to it. Every claim he’s not only back, but even better than
ever starts to become your typical alpha-dog rapper boast. I almost have to
laugh in the following tracks like “Seduction,” where he rapid-fire spits one
syllable raps and complicated rhyme schemes that are more dizzying than
awe-inspiring. “No Love” employs Haddaway’s “What Is Love?” as the basis for
the entire song, and having Lil Wayne as a guest in this song makes you realize
just how similar his and Em’s rapping styles are. Which leads me to ask, is
Eminem content with using corny humor for the rest of his career, just like
every other rapper out there?
It gets worse: the music to songs like “Space Bound” (god,
that awful fucking chorus…), “25 to Life” (god, that awful fucking intro and
chorus………………..the whole fucking thing’s just terrible), and “Love the Way You
Lie,” (which rehashes the content of “25 to Life” with the sappiest beat in
history) sound like they belong on a Drake album. No, scratch that. I wouldn’t
wish these tunes on any rapper, much less Drake. What scared the shit out of me
is when DJ Khalil, the producer for “Lie” did “I Need a Doctor” for Dr. Dre,
and seemed like it might be on the legendary still-unreleased Detox. Listen to the two back to back
and see how DJ Khalil plagiarizes himself with the same hokey emo music. But
all three of these songs on Recovery see
Eminem get in touch with his romantic side, even if he’s threatening to kill
his mate if she plans to leave him. This probably has something to do with how
he remarried Kim in 2006, and lasted for about a year before they realized they
could never truly be together. Oh,
and “Cinderella Man,” has no discernable purpose so you can definitely skip it.
Even the only Dre track on here, “So Bad,” just adds to sinking feelings about
inconsistency.
It all comes together with “You’re Never Over,” where Em
summons his rap powers to provide a summary of what the album was about, that
is if you forgot the first million times. For all the inspiration we could find
in this song, Em is STILL using corny metaphors to drive his rapping, “Excuse
the corny metaphor/ But they'll never catch up to all this energy that I've
mustered.” To its credit, the music isn’t that bad, and you have to admire
saving Proof’s tribute for the climactic track. Its this song that brings you
up from the miles of muck and reminds you that Recovery is a good album, but only if he had a diligent and stern
editor. The idea behind “You’re Never Over,” confirms that Em is going keep at
his rap game until he dies for real. So regardless of whether he’s still going to
keep going on this mediocre path to recovery (even the album cover screams
generic), we’ll just have to grit our teeth and bear with it. Hopefully, he’ll
realize that his rapping works best with storytelling. But I’m not betting on
it.
Who wins?
Relapse definitely.
Recovery was only interesting during
the summer it was released, but hopefully Eminem will release another album
some time within a year so that maybe he can redeem himself yet again and prove
he can be diverse and engagingly cinematic. My advice to Em would to be glad
that he got the chance to work with other producers for a change, but recruit
the Bass Brothers and his D12 cronies for a more consistent and endearingly
dirty rap album. Heh, maybe next time around he’ll even diss Recovery for being sappy, calculated and
stunningly corny. Nah, I wouldn’t bet on that either.
Relapse: (71%)
Music: 7
Meaning: 6
Lyrics: 8
Length: 6
Significance: 8
Overall Impression: 7
Recovery: (54%)
Music: 5
Meaning: 5
Lyrics: 5
Length: 5
Significance: 6
Overall Impression: 6
Remaining Eminem albums ranked:
1. The Marshall
Mathers LP (89%)
Music: 9
Lyrics: 9
Length: 8
Meaning: 8
Significance: 10
Overall Impression: 9
2. The Slim Shady LP
(85%)
Music: 8
Lyrics: 9
Meaning: 8
Length: 8
Significance: 9
Overall Impression: 9
3. The Eminem Show (83%)
Music: 8
Lyrics: 9
Meaning: 9
Length: 7
Significance: 9
Overall Impression: 8
4. Relapse (71%)
5. Encore (63%)
Music: 7
Lyrics: 6
Meaning: 6
Length: 6
Significance: 6
Overall Impression: 6
6. Infinite/The Slim
Shady EP (59%)
Music: 7
Lyrics: 6
Meaning: 5
Length: 6
Significance: 5
Overall Impression: 6
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