Review Summary: Eminem loses it
Its weird to think that one of the best selling artists in the world has released some absolute stinkers. I suppose that’s just how Eminem works, once you get recognised as the best rapper in the game, you’re bound to keep selling records no matter how terrible your work is. Sure he has many, MANY die hard Stans who will worship everything he ever puts out but you’ll be hard pressed to find someone who actually thinks Encore is a great LP. Because frankly it’s pretty repulsive. Recorded at the height of his drug addiction and fresh off the heals of the 27 million smash hit ‘The Eminem Show’, Encore is at times amazingly fresh and solid and often aggravatingly terrible.
The record’s production, often just as solid as Eminem’s flow and lyrics, has taken a backseat on this album. Gone are the rock influences that coated ‘The Eminem Show’ and the gritty urban bass heavy sounds of ‘The Marshal Mathers LP’, now replaced with a more restrained keyboard heavy sound. While it’s retained on songs like the anti Bush anthem ‘Mosh’ and call for peace in the Hip Hop industry ‘Like Toy Soldiers’, a good chunk of the record feels noticeably lighter in sound than the three records that came before it (Infinite is just as soft, if not more). Added to the mix are string parts (most noticeably on opener ‘Evil Deeds’ and fan favourite ‘Yellow Brick Road’) and much more prominent synth parts (‘My First Single’ and ‘Crazy In Love’ in particular) which further add to the album’s less energetic and angry feel. Still, the production is fairly forgettable with some tracks featuring a basic 4-4 beat with the occasional diluted sample played over ad nauseam (‘Rain Man’ In particular). Now this wouldn’t be a problem if Em’s lyrics and delivery were good right? You see where I’m going with this?
Revival may have been a stinking ***fest, but at least its terrible lines were so bad you could remember them, hell, at least they meant something. Encore has some of the worst and most meaningless bars in the man’s entire career and that’s saying A LOT. Entire songs are bizarre drawls where Em simply chucks in whatever comes to mind and calls it a day instead of actually trying to build bars around the topic at hand, with puns and double entendres. A good chunk of the middle of the album suffers greatly from this. After an early mix of the record was leaked, Em and Dr Dre quickly recorded several tracks to fill out the space of the leaked ones. In doing so, they removed what could’ve been some of the album’s best moments and left us with such gems as ‘Big Weenie’, a droning, childish and utterly flat diss at The Source Magazine and the utterly insane ‘Ass Like That’ which features Em dissing Triumph, The Insult Comic Dog in a ridiculous shrill Indian stereotype voice over a Bollywood styled instrumental. It’s so absolutely insane and weird that it transcends criticism and becomes this impenetrable fever dream.
Now the album isn’t all bad. In fact, the first 5 tracks are, generally great. While ‘Evil Deeds’ has some weak bars and flow, the sharp instrumental and the occasional bursts of lightning fast flow even things out. ‘Never Enough’ sports a great 50 Cent verse and a solid hook from the late great Nate Dogg. ‘Yellow Brick Road’ and ‘Like Toy Soldiers’ are dark and personal but relentlessly catchy, with the latter being one of the most earnest and touching things the man ever released. ‘Mosh’ is heavy and aggressive and shows Em encouraging political and social change, which admittedly is pretty funny coming from someone like him. But then, once you hit ‘Puke’ with its vomit sfx and inane lyrics (‘I knew I shouldn’t go and get tattoo of you on my arm. But what do I go and do? I go and get another one’) and it’s downhill from here, only perking up with the gentle and oddly sweet ode to his daughter Hailie on ‘Mockingbird’ and the D12 posse cut ‘One Shot 2 Shot’. The lead single ‘Just Lose It’ is a cookie cutter comedy rap song which just sounds like a weaker, tossed off variation of ‘Without Me’ and is easily skiable along with the fairly flat and boring ‘Spend Some Time’.
All in all, Encore is pretty awful. While it starts strong, things quickly spiral out of control and never really fully recover as dumb meaningless joke tracks quickly fill up the record’s middle and bog it down dramatically. It’s honestly pretty ironic that this record ends with Em killing himself. Despite a wealth of solid material that could’ve been put on here (the club jam ‘Shake That’ or the enraged political rant ‘We As Americans’ stand out particularly. There’s also ‘Fack’ which, y’know maybe not), Em and Dre chose to stack this one with a load of hot stinky trash. Please, keep the curtains closed on this one.
Standout tracks:
Never Enough
Yellow Brick Road
Like Toy Soldiers
Mosh
Mockingbird
