Eminem
by Thomas Matich
“Drugs really got a hold of me,” Eminem rapped on his 2000 song “Drug Ballad.” Now, the rapper born Marshall Mathers is a recovering addict. While many of Eminem’s crazy lyrics were hyperbole, the substance abuse references foreshadowed his eventual dependence on sleeping pills, among other things, that caused him to stop touring in '05. The subsequent ’06 slaying of his best friend and D12 bandmate, Proof, pushed Mathers into a deeply reclusive, self-loathing state that saw him relapse into drug abuse. During his absence, fans wondered about the future of the once dominant musical force that was Eminem, Dr. Dre and 50 Cent. But after a long hiatus, Mathers returns with his first album in five years, the ironically titled Relapse [followed by a second record, Relapse 2].
In '99, Eminem shocked the world as a supremely gifted white rapper with controversial lyrics that attacked everyone from his family to pop stars. After a decade of Saw movies, the Internet, war, economic collapse, George Bush and now Barack Obama in the White House, maybe we’ve become desensitized to Slim Shady. What does a new Eminem album mean in '09? After giving Relapse a few spins, taking in Eminem’s carefully crafted, swift and sick rhymes coupled with classic, ambitious Dr. Dre production, Eminem has upped the dosage to maximum strength. Real Detroit spoke with Eminem about the road to his return.
I interviewed Jeff Bass [of Bass Brothers] a while back and he mentioned working with you on new tracks.
Yeah, we recorded a lot. The four years that I was away, I did a lot of recording with Markey and Jeff, but at that time, I was going through a pretty rough period in my life.
Was it good to be around those guys and get back to how you started in the old days, just writing rhymes and being in the studio with them?
Yeah, it definitely helped. In the beginning, when I started recording tracks again for myself with them, I wasn’t writing a lot of shit down. I was kind of freestyling it. For some reason, I’ve always been the type of artist who writes everything down but I guess maybe it was a phase I was going through when I was working with them and trying new things.
And when you began working with Dr. Dre for what would be Relapse, was there a moment when you guys looked at each other and knew that you were on fire?
I had a really bad case of writer’s block for the few years that I was away. There were times where I was literally doubting myself if I’d ever actually be able to write anything good again. I guess a combination of like, you know, the drugs that I was taking and, you know, losing Proof ... Everything at that time was just spiraling around me so much that my head was just not clear. I would sit down and try to write and nothing that I wrote was worth recording. There wasn’t really a specific time sitting in the studio with Dre, but a couple of weeks before we took the trip to Orlando, I called him and told him, “I think I’m starting to come out of this writer’s block.” Because within them couple of years, we had gotten together five or six times and left the studio with nothing. If we did have something, it wasn’t up to par with our standards.
Did Dr. Dre have a dry stretch at some point because people keep asking when is Detox coming out?
It’s really hard to say, "Was it Dre? Was it me?" If I had to pick one, I’d say it’s more so me than Dre, because Dre is always great at what he does and he’s constantly cranking out beats. I think that no matter what he would’ve came up with, I was pretty blocked up and there wasn’t anything anybody could do. I had to go through my own personal stepping stones to get back up to where I needed to be.
You’ve been addressing your struggles with Proof’s death and I read a quote where you said you’re much happier now. How did you learn to cope?
Well, I think that a huge part had a lot to do with me getting sober, and also as time went on, I learned to be able to deal with it better in the sense of no matter how much I dwelled on it nothing was gonna bring it back. There were times where I would literally sit and beat myself up over had I been there when the incident took place, had I spoke to him earlier that day — because I didn’t speak to him that day — I wonder if things could’ve been different. But I had to come to the realization that nothing is gonna bring it back.
Are you at peace now?
Yeah, I’m at peace with it. I miss him everyday, especially the last couple of days … I get days where I really miss him. I try not to get depressed about it anymore. I'm just kinda like, “Aww shit, I wish he woulda been there for this.” Getting back out there and starting to perform for MTV and shit the past week, I’m not gonna lie, I miss him. It’s strange doing things without him.
Not having him on the side of you?
Yeah, and always being around to bring me up and cheer me up if the day’s long. Proof was always that guy to make you laugh in the worst of situations. I get days every now and then when it feels a little gloomy without him.
Your struggles with drug addiction and Proof’s passing were in the public eye. Looking back to when you came out with your first two albums, you were dominating MTV with artists like Britney Spears. Were you surprised that your lives would ever parallel at some point, with the struggles she went through and the comeback to music that she made?
Yeah, it kinda surprises me a little bit. I was pissed off when I went to the hospital and she stole my hospital thunder [laughs]. But nah, it’s weird, you know I watched a little bit of what she was doing and obviously I can appreciate somebody who strayed off the right path and gets their life back in order. But as far as like a parallel, I don’t know exactly what Britney’s addiction was or anything like that. For me, the biggest thing was me being able to come to terms with “I’m an addict,” because I never really wanted to admit it before ... like it was kinda like when I went to rehab, I was making excuses for it, like, “Maybe I just have a sleeping problem.” At the end of the day, who really wants to admit you’re an addict? But when you do make that realization, your life is a lot easier. If she is an addict, I would’ve appreciated it more if she would’ve came out and said, “I am an addict.” For me, I go to meetings. I have a sponsor. I do all the steps to stay sober.
One of the themes I’m gathering from talking to you seems to be about turning your life around. During the Final Four you did a segment reciting your “Letter to Detroit” and you talked about the city’s resilience in the face of adversity. How do you feel about the troubles we’re having in the state? What do you think we can do to turn Detroit around?
Well, I wish I had a great answer for that. I don’t know. It’s fucked up what’s going on. I get that. But I almost feel like it should be our responsibility to make everybody understand how what’s going on here affects regular people, because I think all the people see right now is the car companies failing, executives who lined their pockets and mismanaged companies and shit like that. But I don’t know if everyone else actually sees that these are real people who live here who are losing their fucking jobs, food is being taken off their tables. These people who have worked at these companies for years building cars with their bare hands, they’re losing their jobs and houses and it’s fucked up.
You said in an interview that T.I. and Lil' Wayne were two emcees that kept hip-hop progressing forward. How so? Did you hesitate coming back to compete with these younger stars of the genre?
Well, honestly, as far as that last question, I don’t really worry about trying to compete with any other rappers in the game. I kinda compete with myself more so than anybody. I’ll say this about Lil' Wayne. He just kinda shot out of nowhere and got really good and he started elevating and you watched him care about the craft more and more. T.I. is a fucking great rapper and if you watched him when he first got in the game, you could see the potential and you could see where it was going and then you watched him just elevate it. Also, I like Kanye, too. He was really doing his thing with the beats when he first came out, his first album was good lyrically then all of a sudden, it just shot to great. What I listen for is wordplay, to see who’s actually taking time. When you see something that [makes you say], “Damn, they spent a lot of time on that,” you can appreciate it.
I’ve been listening to the new songs and what struck me about “Crack A Bottle” is that you introduce yourself, Dr. Dre and 50 Cent before each respective verse. I was wondering if you felt that you needed to reintroduce yourself to the world?
I don’t know if I was thinking about it that deep. I think it was more reintroducing myself in that I feel like me again. In case you forgot, this is me.
The production is very cinematic and “3 AM” is the same way — something that could come from a movie. Is that any precursor to Detox and Dre’s new sound?
Yeah, I definitely think you could say that. There was somewhere — it might’ve been Orlando — but it was somewhere we kinda rounded that corner when I came out of the writer’s block, Dre was doing different things. Production-wise, I think this is my best album. The beats are just so far above anything right now.
I’ve noticed with “We Made You” and “3 AM” that your flow is different; it’s more rapid and polished and comes across very well.
Oh, well thank you. I feel like with Dre trying different things with the beats, I’ve been trying different things lyrically. I think that on this record, more so than ever, I’ve been trying to push myself to take each rhyme to the next level. What I mean is like if I start a rhyme, I want to just keep going with whatever words I’m rhyming. I’m challenging myself to see how far I can push that rhyme, see if I can take them all the way to the end of the verse no matter how ridiculous it may seem.
There’s a line on “We Made You” that goes, “Never has there been such finesse and nostalgia.” Is Relapse a nostalgic Eminem album?
I wanted to go back to what made me famous in the first place, The Slim Shady LP and The Marshall Mathers LP. I listened to those records quite a bit while I was away and wondering if I should return to this. I had a conversation with Dre a few months before we went to Orlando and I asked him 'cause, you know, people were saying if Eminem comes back he needs to reinvent himself — so I asked Dre what he thought and he said, “People want to see you wild the fuck out and lose your mind again.” | RDW
Eminem’s Relapse is in stores now.
You haven’t gotten behind the mic in a few years, what made you decide to rap on Relapse?
When me and Em get together and that fire starts, anything can happen. We were both pushing each other to that next level, and when I heard him on the mic on those two beats, both times I said, “Yo, I got to be on this.”
Can you describe the chemistry you and Em had on Relapse and how this played out in the studio when recording songs?
We were in the studio together a couple times just trying shit out, seeing what was gonna happen. I could feel it wasn’t the right time yet ... but I knew it was coming. Em’s talked about how he had to deal with some of his shit, too, and once we got back in after that, it was on. When we’re both in that zone, the songs come faster than we can record them.
After working with Eminem on practically this entire album and going through the ups and downs together for the past few years, how has that affected your relationship as friends and musicians?
Me and Em are always cool, and when he’s ready to work and I’m ready to work, we do our thing. That shit doesn’t change.
Being that you are the doctor, can you make a prognosis as to what is going on with Slim Shady on Relapse? His lyrics are crazy!
I’m probably the dude who’s used to it the most, because I get to hear all of it when he’s recording. But then we’re in the studio and he puts something down and I’m like, “What the fuck did he just say?” Every time I think there’s nothing crazier he can come up with lyrically, he does it. I don’t know where he gets that shit from ... man, I don’t want to know. | RDW
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