Global rating of the product: 4.75 stars

Maybe Good Friday is the ideal time for reviewing Eminem’s recent work with hip hop legend Dr Dre. with the numerous death and resurrection symbols it contains. Eastern time is the ideal time to meditate about the very meaning of life.

In many regards, Eminem resembles the spirit of his hometown that symbolically rises from its ashes: just when you think he just run out of musical ressources, the man totally redeems himself with some amazing, creative stuff.

Meet a depressed Dr Dre at the beach. While being caressed by the relaxing sound of the sea, Andre Young, now a mature man, has some flashbacks about the glorious time of NWA, his marriage, his kids, his Up In Smoke Tour, his complicity with Slim Shady…
When you’ve been through hard times ( Dr Dre was unlucky enough to lose a 23 year old son who was found dead, unresponsive in his bed), you sometimes question yourself about what really makes sense in your life. If you are too harsh in your judgment towards yourself, you might be tempted to commit suicide. In the video, Dr Dre is deperate to that extent. As he drives faster and faster through the mountains’ heights, his car suddenly crashes…total blackout…opration table…meet Dre between life and death, in his coma, an aetheric creature sings the refrain : ” I need a doctor…” Musically speaking Skylar Grey’s soft voice contrast with the electric guitar accords and Eminem’s rough voice. Eminem recalls the good times and how Dre literally saved his life by believing in his talent and signing him to his label…his voice is strong enough to reach Dre who needs slowly gets back to life.

He needs to learn how to walk again, little by little and moreover to believe in himself.

Have faith. Don’t look for miracles outside of yourself: miracles happen from within.

Great Eminem-Dre collaboration. Watch it here.

Copyright© by Isabelle Esling
All Rights Reserved

Thanks for the music!

Back in the days, Eminem used to say, in a very provocative way: ” I don’t promote violence, I just encourage it.” In fact, it is not the first time that the painful thread of domestic violence appears in Eminem’s music. It goes back to the ‘ 97 Bonnie and Clyde song, taken out of the Slim Shady LP, in which Eminem even involved his little daughter Hailie Jade, 2 and a half years old at the time, making a somber accomplice of her in the dark fictional murder of Kim.
Again, the Kim song from the Marshall Mathers LP depicts violence and murder against Kim.

Then again you see Eminem in Love The Way You Lie acting as a violent man, being involved in rough domestic disputes.

One could easily jump to the conclusion that Marshall Mathers is a violent man in real life and that he probably beat his ex wife up all the time.

However, the attentive listener needs to take some distance from Eminem as an artist. His texts need to be analyzed within the specific biographical context of his, in which he struggled to get his girlfriend back and wrote her a very strange ” love letter”, using shock value and violence for Kim to take his pain into account.

I admit that this is not a very conventional way to express love, but whatever…Eminem is a complex artist and he would ridicule anybody who would be tempted to take his music too literally. In addition, Debbie Mathers, his own mom ( despite all the arguments that ever opposed both parts) testified publicly that her son never ever” laid a finger on Kim”.

The reason why the video Love The Way You Lie exists is to raise people’s consciences, especially women, for them to understand that domestic violence is never the answer. No matter your background, age and how much you pretend to love somebody, if a man starts beating you up, leave him straight away. He’ll never change.

Copyright© by Isabelle Esling
All Rights Reserved

Since the release of Relapse, Eminem’s music has taken a new artistic direction. More introspective, Marshall Mathers decided to give his public a glimpse of the real him. No more evil Slim Shady disguise, no other character to spit his rage on Recovery.
The very positive point of the whole album is certainly the return of the talented lyricist. As a matter of fact, many listeners had felt left down by the artist since the release of Encore that did not really meet the standarts that you’d usually expect from a good hip hop album.

Relapse was quite surprising in its concept: Eminem took the risk for his album to be overlooked in its depth, even by die-hard fans. It nearly happened to me, but after a second listen I discovered Eminem’s artistic intent. I thus became more appreciative of his lyrical and musical effort in Relapse.

From Infinite to Recovery, Marshall Mathers offers his audience a long path made of personal experiences and reflexions. Wordsmith Eminem always was and will stay.

Not Afraid embraces a powerful violin background while Eminem faces his public with sincerity. Of course it cost Marshall Mathers a lot to face his demons, to admit his mistakes during his career path. The song unleashes loads of dynamite. It is probably one of the best songs of the album. Eminem also promises not to let his fans dow. However, and despite the huge lyrical efforts set on his brand new album, we are entitled to ask: “Who are Eminem’s fans at the moment?” Undoubtably, they are probably not the same kind of people than the ones that supported the artist a decade ago (with a few exceptions, of course). It can be partly explained by the fact that the different albums’ tones and topics vary from album to album. A lot of Slim Shady LP and Marshall Mathers LP listeners actually think that Eminem lost his edge. Well, while I am a long term, adult fan and supporter of Eminem’s music and also very appreciative of the artist’s lyrical effort, I must admit that- musically speaking- the Recovery album barely meets my expectations. Where have the catchy beats gone, where have the mischievousness and the dark humored spirit of his former albums gone?
Too many metal and rock’n roll influences spoil too many songs in my opinion. While it is true that many hip hop artists used diverse varieties of other musical genres to compose their albums,their album’s main musical base remained mostly hip hop sounding.
Moreover, Recovery’s mood is morose and constantly self depreciating.

Cold Wind Blows starts with some icy lyrics. Eminem’s voice hits high notes. Dark guitar and piano sounds are combined with rhythmic claps. Em’s generous word mastery enlighten the song. Good flow too. This is another good song.

Talking To Myself: Time for instrospection on a keyboard background. I don’t understand why Eminem admits envying Lil Wayne and Kanye. He has nothing to envy massive commercial hip hop album sellers such as them. Maybe I would have preferred a wicked diss of both emcees. I probably would have felt better.

Won’t Back Down features pop artist Pink. Eminem excels in his art of rhyming. Unfortunately, the harsh musical background kinda spoils the well written song. I like Eminem’s flow on this one.

Going Through Changes is made of a soft bitter chorus. Marshall Mathers recalls pains and regrets, ancient memories, regrets about family life that didn’t really work out. The song’s tone is quite depressing. Why is Eminem crucifying himself all the time?
He can see clear in his life, realizes his mistakes, but I am not sure he is ready to fully accept himself the way he is. Get rid of this heavy self laceration and you’ll feel better, for sure!

On Fire is one of the tracks I enjoyed most-lyrically and instrumentally as well. However, when Eminem addresses critics, he seems to really miss the point. Why would he ask them to spit rhymes? A critic is there whether to point out a positive or a negative opinion 5or both) aboutr an artist’s work, in order to share some constructyive criticism with his readers and the artist. To each his/ her own: let the artist create and let the critic do his/ her job! This little point being raised, the song is great: good beats, nice chorus, nice instrumentals, nice flow, astute punchlines: in short, Eminem at his top. I recommend this song.

I’ve been disappointed by Cinderella Man and No Love. They are definitely not my type of songs. Eminem really good on Love the Way You Lie, but I don’t like the Rihanna chorus at all. It spoils the song in my opinion.

Globally speaking Eminem’s efforts to be closer to his fans, his lyrical craft, his matured analysis of his personal mistakes really need to be appreciated. That’s why I chose to rate my review differently. A little bit disappointed by the instrumentals and musical genres that are used in the album, I nevertheless still admire Eminem’s lyrical genius.

Copyright© by Isabelle Esling
All Rights Reserved

He performed some older famous songs like Stan and some more recent songs like “Forever”. But to the pleased listeners’ ears (that included French singer Marc Lavoine) he performed a brand new song taken out of his upcoming album, Recovery.

Any person who has been following Marshall Mathers since his beginning, from the Infinite album to now perfectly knows that is private and public paths have been far from easy. Despite his overwhelming success since 1999, Eminem has been facing loads of personal difficulties. He often complained in some of his songs about his demons spoiling his life. How many times has he tried to fight them? His desperate efforts to face his drug addiction sometimes made him look like Cervantes’ hero, Don Quixote de la Mancha fighting his windmills.

Year after year, drugs were slowly destroying him. In 2007, Eminem nearly lost his life. His near death experience made him realize that he needed to change, to be honest with himself, to have a clear vision of his addiction and to face his past mistakes with serenity.

Once you begin to accept your past and to learn the lessons from it, once you begin to love yourself with your weaknesses, a lot of things begin to get unstuck in your life. Eminem had the courage to do so in 2009. His Relapse album was the first step of a slow recovery. Today Marshall Mathers is back, offering his public a glance of the real him. No Eminem, no Slim Shady. On this live show, only the real Marshall Mathers was there. He looked different: slender, back in shape, he was able to offer his public the gift of a reborn, more matured and peaceful man.

That glance of the new, empowered Marshall Mathers, raising his hands towards the public and telling them publicly that he was “not afraid” really moved me. It gave me courage to go forward with my own life. The new album also promises to be lyrically sharp.

Let’s celebrate Eminem’s recovery. Be on the lookout for his new album!

Copyright© by Isabelle Esling
All Rights Reserved

The flow and lyrical creativity are undeniably here, but I find Em’s voice weird…I don’t get why he choses that kind of strange accent…let me know what you all think…

Feel free to add your comments:)

Eminem recently stopped by his Shade 45 radio station for DJ Whoo Kid’s birthday bash and he ended up giving some details on his upcoming “Relapse 2″ album. “Me and Fif did a couple of records, couple of months ago in Vegas, one song for my record and another for his,” Em revealed in an interview.

Em then went on to give details on the 50 Cent collab. “We just wanted to like, I just had an idea to like ‘Yo, why don’t we do something we ain’t done yet.’ And kinda go back and forth, we’ve kinda done it on other records but not to the extent of what we’re doing on this one.”

Before he left, Eminem also talked about production for his upcoming LP. “The way that it’s going now, K’Naan has two [produced] tracks on the record and Just Blaze has four, possibly five…I definitely feel like I’m in a little different space right now. I don’t know, with the last record, it felt like a lot of it had to do with me being sober…With Relapse 1 — a lot of that album, I wanted to rap at fire and do punchlines.”