On the Possibility of a Great New Album from Slim Shady ?
The Death of Slim Shady (Coup de Grâce), another banger?
Eminem has been pretty much my favorite rapper, aside from the abstract hipsterish stuff of Aesop Rock and others, for years. Like many others, I started listening to rap with Eminem, and still to this day, I rarely buy any rap, except perhaps from Aesop Rock or the Wu-Tang Clan, if they ever release another album (as a group, I mean), but if Eminem even hints at a new album, well, I've already been checking "new Eminem album" on Google for the last two years.
And he's got one coming. Especially with that brand of theatrical somewhat high-brow presentation that he showed in the cover art for The Eminem Show and Encore, as well as elsewhere, in his usage of "Coup de Grâce," not to mention the sort of theater poster appeal of "The Death of Slim Shady," as its title. Like, is this Eminem, or is this My Chemical Romance? (Whom I also Love.)
Anyway, with that bit of pretension that you'll sometimes get from him, the Eminem who rapped on a Jay-Z album that he maybe was just a "modern-day Shakespeare," or maybe that's what you've seen him as, I'm pretty excited to see what Eminem is bringing. I mean, his last few albums have gone from the heights of Kamikaze to the medium-heights, but still good rapping and lots of good parts, such as the great Black Thought verse, on "Yah Yah," where he gives you the Ultimate imperative ("If y'all ain't standin' up for yourself, then stay seated"), of the Musics to be Murdered By, and that trajectory, while slightly downward, still contained gems such as "Darkness," the only song memorializing the official version of an event that seems like bullshit, on some level (and with some evidence), that I will stand up and cheer for because of just how good it is. (The song is a metaphor for Eminem either being at a show about to go on or being in a place about to do something, and it wavers back and forth between which one seems more likely. It has all the pomp and circumstance of an Eminem song like "Deja Vu" from Relapse, where they took him to the hospital in the background, but in this one, it's bullshit news stories, lol. But STILL, the song's concept is executed so brilliantly that [and with such a good beat, at least a moderately good one, which you can just be relieved about, on any Eminem album, past Encore] I would put it in his top fifty songs, maybe, which is a high Designation.)
Now, not only that, but the last time I heard anyone say something about how on fire Eminem sounded, before an album, he delivered The Marshall Mathers LP 2, which got a 4.7 from Pitchfork and is also perhaps the best Eminem album, for a rapping circus, you've ever seen, or I. (And I have listened to a lot of Eminem. All of it, in fact, aside from guest appearances on other stuff, probably, and in slight cases, weird compilation albums.)
That album was Tremendous. And Can this one be as good? I think it can be perhaps literally a swan song for him, given that it's called the death of his alter ego, Slim Shady, and that it's also a "Coup de Grace," indicating some kind of final, or at least alternative, Victory. And given that his first Studio album was called The Slim Shady LP, Infinite and the EP notwithstanding, it seems that it's the death of the Character, he started with.
One of my friends just sent this to me and I thought you'd get a laugh out of it.
https://youtu.be/Wx6S6JPwzbU