Say Goodbye to Hollywood

‘ Say Goodbye to Hollywood ‘ is a song that Eminem has dedicated to his fans. A song that expresses the sour aftertaste of fame. A song in which he offers us a retrospective of the drama that happened when he caught Kim cheating with John Guerra. An incident that still hurts him, but that also helped him to become more mature. Eminem has understood a lot through his mistakes. He has understood that he could lose everything if he was put in jail. He didn’t want Hailie to suffer from his own mistakes and he decided to slow down :
“I need to slow down
Try to get my feet on solid ground, so for now I’m…”

In the first verse Eminem mentions his friend Gary who was arrested the same day :
‘ Turned around saw Gary stashin’ the heater in his belt
Saw the bouncers rush him and beat him to the ground’ ‘

Gary Kozlowski drove Eminem to the club and he picked up his gun after it had dropped to the gound. No charges were filed against Gary.
Detroit DJ ‘DJ Butter ‘, Barry Yett, a friend of Marshall said about the former incident opposing Eminem to John Guerra :
“Em’s not a violent guy; he’s just on top of the world right now and people are trying to bring him down. You’ve got to think about how scary his life is right now. Too scary to not have a gun — he has stalkers, people dropping by his house — he’s got all that. He doesn’t have a public or a private life anymore.”
In the second verse, Marshall shares his anxiousness with his fans. Since the beginning of his career, he’s been through a lot of difficult situations like the incident with John Guerra, he also had to face several lawsuits.
In addition to those negative events, Marshall had to face a lot of pressure from the media, from his labels, from some annoying fans, which is very much to bear for one single man. Eminem expresses that life’s greatest gift for him is his daughter Hailie.
Sometimes, Eminem feels weak and discouraged. Sometimes he is fed up with the show business. His fame is sometimes difficult to face with, and he sometimes wishes he could escape to the public exposure of his privacy :
“For me to have this much appeal like this is sick
This is not a game, this fame, in real life this is sick
Publicity stunt my ass, conceal my fuckin’ dick
Fuck the guns, i’m done, i’ll never look at gats…”

Marshall talks to his fans in his song and he addresses them a message : he wants tham to know that he loves them ( his fans, particularly those who had the chance to see him on stage, know that those words are a 100 % true.)
Marshall loves his fans and his fans love him too. But he also wants them to realize how much he sacrificed for them. He wants his fans to acknoledge that his life is sometimes living hell for him. He has to hide his hair and his face to keep anonymous. Hailie sometimes also suffers from her daddy’s fame, she sometimes gets annoyed by people. Her life is exposed as well as Marshall’s.
Marshall wants his fans to know that it is sometimes too much for him. It is also a strong appeal for them to respect his privacy. Somebody has told me that he didn’t like ‘ The Way I Am ‘ because ‘ this song was dissing fans ‘. I don’t agree with this person at all. In ‘ The Way I Am ‘ as well as in ‘ Say Goodbye To Hollywood ‘, Eminem’s feelings come out of his chest. Happiness as well as pain and anger are feelings he shares with us.
And when he’s exceeded by some fans’ crazy behavior, Eminem is not afraid to tell it.
When he used to live in Sterling Heights, he was bothered all the time. That’s why he made up his decision to move to Clinton Township (before buying his mansion in Oakland county). Marc Hicks explains how disrespectful some people were in the past and the reasons that motivated him to move to Clinton Township :
“I guess because of the fans. He couldn’t pick up a newspaper off his porch. You had people that would take cargo vans and act like they were delivering a package to meet Eminem. You had people jumping in the swimming pool.
“He loves his fans but my God!”

The media have made a God out of him. Marshall wasn’t prepared to all that. He also stated that global fame scares him and that he never expected to get that big.
It’s high time some fans realized Marshall Mathers is a human being who uses the bathroom too. He has the honesty to expose his weaknesses to his public and he deserves a lot of respect for that.
If he could go back, he would never have rapped. But now that he’s in the rap game, we don’t want him to quit. Because he’s so good at what he’s doing.
Keep on rapping Marshall, it would feel so empty without you anyway !
“Say Goodbye Hollywood”
[Chorus]
Sayin’ goodbye, sayin’ goodbye to Hollywood
Sayin’ goodbye, sayin’ goodbye to Hollywood
Sayin’ goodbye, sayin’ goodbye to Hollywood
Sayin’ goodbye, sayin’ goodbye to Hollywood
{Hollywood}, sayin’ goodbye, sayin’ goodbye to Hollywood
{Why do I feel this way}, sayin’ goodbye, sayin’ goodbye to Hollywood
Sayin’ goodbye, sayin’ goodbye to Hollywood
Sayin’ goodbye, sayin’ goodbye to Hollywood
[Verse 1]
I thought I had it all figured out, I did
I thought I was tough enough to stick it out with Kim
But I wasn’t tough enough to juggle two things at once
I found myself layin’ on my knees in cuffs
Which should’ve been a reason enough, for me to get my stuff and just leave
How come I couldn’t see this shit myself, it’s just me
Nobody couldn’t see the shit I felt
Knowin’ damn well she wasn’t gonna be there when I fell, to catch me
The minute shit was heated she just bailed
i’m standin’ here swingin’ on like thirty people by myself
I couldn’t even see the millimetere when it fell
Turned around saw Gary stashin’ the heater in his belt
Saw the bouncers rush him and beat him to the ground
I just sold two million records, I don’t need to go to jail
I’m not about to lose my freedom over no female
I need to slow down
Try to get my feet on solid ground, so for now i’m…
[CHORUS]
[Verse 2]
Bury my face in comic books, cause I don’t want to look
At nothin’, this world’s too much
I’ve swallowed all I could
If I could swallow a bottle of tylenol I would, and end it for good
Just say goodbye to Hollywood
I probably should, these problems are piling all at once
Cause everything that bothers me, I got it bottled up
I think i’m bottomin’ out
But i’m not about to give up, I gotta get up
Thank God, I got a little girl
And I’m a responsible father
So not a lot of good, i’d be to my daughter layin’ in the bottom of the mud
Must be in my blood cause I don’t know how I do it
All I know is I don’t want to follow in the footsteps of my dad
Cause I hate him so bad
The worst fear that I had was growin’ up to be like his fuckin’ ass, man
If you could understand why I am the way that I am
What do I say to my fans, when I tell ’em i’m…
[CHORUS]
[Verse 3]
I don’t wanna quit, but shit, I feel like this is it
For me to have this much appeal like this is sick
This is not a game, this fame, in real life this is sick
Publicity stunt my ass, conceal my fuckin’ dick
Fuck the guns, i’m done, i’ll never look at gats
If I scrap, i’ll scrap like I ain’t never whooped some ass
I love my fans
But no one ever puts a grasp on the fact i’ve sacrificed everything I have
I never dreamt i’d get to the level that i’m at, this is whack
This is more than I ever could of asked
everywhere I go, a hat, a sweater hood, or mask
What about math, how come I wasn’t ever good at that
It’s like the boy in the bubble, who never could adapt, i’m trapped
If I could go back, I never woulda rapped
I sold my soul to the devil, i’ll never get it back
I just wanna leave this game with level head intact
Imagine goin’ from bein’ a no one to seein’,
everything blow up and all you did was just grow
up emceeing
It’s fuckin’ crazy
Cause all I wanted was to give Hailie the life I never had
But instead I forced us to live alienated, so i’m sayin’…
[CHORUS]
[Outro]
Goodbye, goodbye Hollywood, {Goodbye},
please don’t cry for me, when i’m gone for good, {this shit is not for me},
so goodbye, goodbye Hollywood,
{i’m not a fuckin’ star}, please don’t cry
for me, when I’m gone for good, {i’m goin’ back home}…