How Many Good Albums Does Eminem Really Have? The Dirty Secret of Eminem’s Career… Part 2 of 3 By: Nick Zablocki

How Many Good Albums Does Eminem Really Have? The Dirty Secret of Eminem’s Career… Part 2 of 3
By: Nick Zablocki

            Welcome back, if you’re a die hard Eminem Stan, than this article is not going to be for you. As readers of Part 1 may recall, I wasn’t super high on any of the four albums discussed, but Em still managed to leave the article with a score of 3 good albums to only 1 bad album. That will not be the case for this article. Some of you are gonna leave with sore feelings. Sorry.[1]

            Encore. (2004)
            My favorite thing about this album is that Stans will defend it till they’re as blue in the face as Encore’s album cover. “Bro, it’s pure genius. If you listen, it’s still bars. He still has bars.” And that is Eminem in a nutshell, sure, these are technically well executed bars, at a technical level. But, the content is bullshit. It just leaves me saying, “Ugh, I mean I guess that’s technically a bar.” Encore feels like Eminem having a psychological episode. A lot of the content is juvenile. This album is littered with fart noises, childish voice inflections, and even a song titled “Big Weenie.” Yup, you read that right, there is a song called “BIG WEENIE” on this album. Need I say more? No. Am I going to? Yes. “Ass Like That” is absolute trash. I just re-listened to 12 seconds of it to make sure I was recalling it correctly. Shit just makes me mad. This is y’all’s G.O.A.T., fuck outta here. “Crazy In Love” seems to be where Eminem fell in love with horribly sampling classic rock songs. “Mosh” is kinda cool cause political Em always made some interesting points. But, who really gives a fuck about George Bush in 2018? No one. Inherently, the song hasn’t aged well. Two things we can take away from this album. 1: Eminem was clearly on way too many pills at this point. 2: Eminem had too many yes men around him. Someone needed to step in and say “Em, you sound like you’re 8 years old on half these songs, you’re not putting this shit out.” I’d love to see what Sigmund Freud would have to say about Eminem on this album.
Good: 3 Bad: 2
Curtain Call. (2005)
            Since this is just a “greatest hits”[2] project, I won’t technically count this one for, or against, Eminem. But, this is the project that also gave us “Fack” which in my *humble* opinion is LITERALLY THE WORST SONG EVER MADE.[3] Ever. This song alone excludes Eminem from all G.O.A.T. discussions. If you say “Shove a gerbil in your ass through a tube” on a song, you are automatically not allowed to be in the consideration for the greatest rapper of all time. It’s just a policy I keep. If Jay-Z said it, then he’d be out of the conversation. If Kendrick Lamar said it, then he’d be out of the conversation. But, they didn’t say it, Eminem did. FUCK this song is terrible. I have been blessed more than once in my life to show someone this “song” for the first time. Both times the interactions went remarkably similar. I said to the person “Have you ever heard ‘Fack?” They responded with “I might’ve, I’m not sure.” and then I said back “OH, YOU WOULD KNOW IF YOU HAD HEARD ‘FACK’ BEFORE. YOU DON’T FORGET ABOUT ‘FACK.’” Then I played it for them and I got to see horror spread across their face. They’re were confused. They were disgusted. They agreed it was the worse song ever made.

Relapse. (2009)
            After almost 5 years being out of the spotlight, Eminem returned with this serial killer inspired album in 2009. Strangely enough, I kinda like Relapse. I don’t revisit it as much as I used to. But, Relapse is okay to me. The accent gets a little tiresome. It’s a classic example of Andrew Hatt’s theory that if most albums were like 4-5 songs shorter, they’d probably be better.  Perhaps I’m being hypocritical in sort of enjoying parts of this album, I mean, it does contain a lot of violence against women. I will grant you that it does. But, none of it feels real. It feels like a movie. I dig the serial killer vibe of this project. I dig some of the nonsense that is said on this album. This isn’t a great album by any means, but, in my opinion, it’s in the upper third of Eminem albums. This one is the toughest for me to rate. Fuck. I guess I’m doing it.
Good: 4 Bad: 2
Recovery. (2010)
            Look, I’m as surprised as you are to see me give Relapse a spot in the “good” section. It was the toughest call to make, but, I went with my gut on it. Recovery will not be so lucky. This shit is poppy trash. This is where Eminem started to slowly spiral into mediocrity. The production is so radio friendly. The features are so radio friendly. Sure, this album is filled with technical bars, but they’re hollow. This album just leaves me feeling empty. It’s really bad, I don’t know what else to say. It just has the same shallow, glossy glow that a Walmart has. The sort of manufactured, inorganic nature that makes you wonder, “Is this giving me cancer?” This is bad album. The pacing of it doesn’t exist. One song will be talking about his trials and tribulations with drugs, the next one is filled with women bashing, then a radio friendly hip-pop song. It just feels haphazard. This is a bad album, if you had’t picked up on my opinion of it yet. 
Good: 4 Bad: 3



[1] I’m not really sorry.
[2] *cough*
[3] I’m just mad this song actually happened. You know? Like, how did not one sound engineer say, “You know what, we’re not fucking doing this!” Where was Dr. Dre on this. Someone needed to intervene on our behalf. Do you think this song was done in one “moment of inspiration, or did this take multiple sessions to complete? I hope it’s the former, but, I get the sense that it was the latter. SMH.

Comments