Review Summary: Relapse features an Eminem who can't decide with he's 36 or 26, can't decide if he wants to give a mature commentary on the danger of drugs or take cheap shots at celebrities for shits and giggles. Eminem really is a troubled artist. A talented, troubled
Rap is a young man's game, that cannot be denied. There is just something about the aggression, temper, passion, and will of youth that is evident in a lot of rappers first one or two albums when they are relatively new to the game. Picture Ice Cube hollering about the police, picture Nas coming in talking rapidly about the N.Y. State of Mind. They had something that they would never capture again, even in they're later, (and strong) works. Same thing with Eminem.
Slim Shady LP had all of the hungriness and desperation of Infinite and a insane persona that I would probably say is something like Tyler Durden's in Fight Club. Combined with genius rhymes, one-liners, and stories that anyone who has had an annoying girlfriend can relate to. Eminem essentially had something that all hungry, young men - and women - could relate to.
And now, after the deserved, but bloated success of MM LP and Eminem Show, and the disastrous Encore, Eminem has all the money he could want. He's so distanced from his SS LP material, so distanced from the "If I Had" desperation, that he can't write about being broke no more. In rap, they say 'keep it real'. You can only rap successfully about what you really live. So what can Eminem do now? He can only rap about his demons that plague him as an artist and a grown man (drugs, his mom, Kim, the media). But he's done that. He could try to connect with teens everywhere again, but that's much harder than it was in '99. He's thirty-six and we're older now, we're not going to look to him as the Great White American Hope and we're not going to get shocked by his rhymes. He could write from the "Watcher" perspective, about what it's like aging in the rap game, about what it's to struggle to hold on to your glory days. And he does this in Beautiful, one of the successful songs on the album.
The idea I'm trying to convey is that there aren't that many options for a artist like Eminem who has already done so much. It's like trying to write a book in a genre where everything has been done so much that it's all hackneyed. And so, Eminem, instead of picking one approach, tries to scattershot it. While MM LP was a thematically consistent album about the pressures and effects of fame on Eminem, and about Slim's thoughts on the world that both embraced and hated SS LP, Relapse is all over the place. There's poppy nonsense, like Crack a Bottle, there's Same Song and Dance, which is supposed to be satirical or ironic in that it's a club banger that girls will dance to without listening to the lyrics, which are about murdering girls. There's Deja Vu, which is a mature look at how drugs ruin lives. Then there's Eminem spending the first half of the album acting insane, talking in a really annoying accent that ruined Encore, and talking about taking drugs and serial killing. And of course, there's Eminem trying to make us vomit with Insane. And Eminem spends 5:20 explaining to us that he had a bad mother, over a decent beat, but an obnoxious chorus.
It's like Eminem wasn't sure where he wanted to go. He had a good idea - the idea that he was relapsing into his Mr. Hyde, Slim Shady, Hannibal Lector, etc, persona that we once loved or hated. And then as the album progresses, it would make sense if Marshall Mathers slowly fights against the SS for control. That would be a good set up too for Relapse 2, which could be from the perspective of Marshall. Unfortunately, Eminem is trying to do too many things. He ruins the flow of the album by shoving petty songs like Bagpipes from Baghdad and Crack a Bottle in between decent, relevant songs. We Made You has some catchy rhyming, but it's just not what this album needs - random shots at female pop stars in an obnoxious accent? While We Made You is certainly better than Ass Like That, much better even, thematically it is no more advanced. Old Time's Sake is a song that is there just for... old time's sake. While Em and Dre have solid charisma, they aren't really rapping about anything, which makes this their weakest collaboration, especially when compared to the genius Guilty Conscience or solid Forgot About Dre. It seems that the best way to pay homage to the old days would be to rap about something they would have rapped about in their young days.
And then there's all of the fetus-digesting, raping, and other acts of grotesque, random violence. It worked in SS LP because it was hilarious, as in As the World Turns, or something that we could relate to. I wanted to impregnate the Spice Girls ten years ago. Now it's just too much - I can stomach it, that's not the problem, the problem is it is Eminem being offensive as a tactic. He's trying to shock us with his serial killing because he is desperate to capture the same feeling as he did in SS LP, but he just can't. Well, except on the last track Underground, where he does capture the feeling of Slim Shady perfectly and raps in good voice that sounds energetic and not tired like the rest of the album.
But I gave this album a 3 and that means I thought it was good. So what's good about it? Quite a few things, actually. Eminem's lyrics and wordplay that first blew me away on Infinite (the song) are still there. Insane, a song about how his stepfather raped him and about how it has made him insane, features Eminem's normal voice and a really good flow, especially on the second verse. I'd even be willing to give Insane a generous 4.5/5.
It's interesting - extremely annoying, yes - but interesting how he rants about his mother. A psychologist will tell you that just about all problems come from the absence of a father figure in a boy's life. Roger Waters, over the span of his Pink Floyd and solo career, talks about the effect of his father's death in WWII on him. So I do believe that Eminem's mind truly still is on his mother and his father. And as I said earlier, you can only write about what's on your mind. We may not want to hear another song about Eminem's mom, and Em even acknowledges this, but he gives My Mom to us anyways. I'll not take an issue with it because at least Eminem is being relevant here and although he's being whiny, it is plausible that his mother could have had that effect on him. Plus it is kinda funny when he retorts "Go get a white crayon and color a ***ing zebra."
Stay Wide Awake has a foreboding beat, a good chorus, and some twisted rhymes. It's just a shame that he has to have this track, 3 AM, Hello, Medicine Ball, Same Song and Dance, and Underground covering essentially the same material. Okay, we get it Em, you chop up lesbians. All of these songs I listed are pretty good - especially Underground, but I really wish there was one or two of them. Maybe just 3 AM and Underground, which would free up space in the middle for some serious songs.
Deja Vu - After a plot-driven skit, where Marshall Mathers gets CPR, signaling the revival of Marshall and temporary withdrawal of the lunatic Slim Shady who pops vicodins like he's a viking, this song comes in with a subdued, depressed feel. It's mature, reflective, and a bit depressing. Eminem, however, is being honest and with some good lines like "See me and you almost had the same outcome, Heath," this song is an important part of Relapse and a solid 4.5/5
Beautiful is not like any other song on the album and at first I didn't like it. I had grown used to Eminem's complex lyrics and Beautiful just seemed simplistic. And it is, with cliche's like walking a mile in each other's shoes, and "always be yourself man." But it is genuine, catchy, and inspiring. After the depressing Deja Vu, when you feel worthless, Eminem is saying you are still worth something, you just have to swallow the troubles and move forward. I'd give it a 5/5, but it's still not really up to par with songs like Sing for the Moment, and while I like Beautiful, at times it seems like an inferior version of a song like Lose Yourself. 4.5/5
Crack a Bottle isn't worth acknowlegding, and I think that Deja Vu - Beautiful - Underground would have been a stronger ending to the album if it wasn't interrupted by the forced simpleton that features a boring Em, a old Dre, and a limp 50.
Underground, however, makes the bad parts of the album seem that much worse. Kind of like We As Americans or Like Toy Soldiers showed us that Eminem is capable of great songs, and knowing that made us so much angrier with crap like Ass Like that. Underground starts off with a Still Don't Give a *** or Criminal beginning, with the classic "A lot of people ask me..." It's nostalgic and when you hear it, you hope Eminem will proceed to deliver with the same brutality and fire that he brought on Still and Criminal. He does, it's that simple. The beat is complex, rocking, and Eminem grips it perfectly. His voice sounds... good. It's angry, yet its not high pitched. Eminem isn't rapping about anything overly meaningful, but he really nails the psycho-killer persona in Underground, the same way he did back in the day with songs like American Psycho from D12 or Kill You. He nails the 'relapsing into my psycho days' so well here, that it makes all the other numbers, like Hello, Same Song, Stay Wide Awake, unnecessary. 5/5
Conclusion: This is a good album because while Eminem's head may be in disarray and while he may be futilely trying to incite the same controversy that once came naturally to him, his rhyming ability is still great. He wastes it on some tracks by taking shots at Nick Cannon, Mariah Cariay, and Hannah Montana. Some of his hooks are just incredibly annoying. Eminem still manages to come out on top my the end, with the strong outweighing the weak, because he's still much more interesting that the cliche rap I hear on the radio and he still has some of the genius that made him such a megastar. Hopefully Eminem can be himself for the rest of the next album and not waste time busting a nut to Hannah Montana and trying to make club bangers, because he IS onto a good concept here with Relapse. Hopefully he has found the fire that you can tell he has on some songs in Relapse and doesn't on others for Relapse 2. I'm looking forward to Eminem picking up where he left off on Underground for Relapse 2.
All in all, you have to give this album a full listening through and try to put yourself into Eminem's shoes, even if it is difficult. If you can, you'll find a good album that is plagued by the troubles facing aging artists - and a few problems that are specifically Eminem's, but problems that you as a listener will find it worth dealing with to get to the moments where Eminem is, for lack of a better phrase, on fire.
