198: Eminem (F)

Eminem in tier list

There’s a lot to unpack here. I’ll do my best. I think the cleanest way for me to start is to say what listening to this has made me think about the music, and what it’s made me think about the man. 

The music isn’t my jam. I didn’t think it would be, and I was right. I can almost, in some circumstances, for some songs, start to see what about it is attractive to people. It’s not super compelling, the barebones 8 beat loop without any real melody or harmony still has a hard time holding my attention. But there are times where I like it, and there are times where I feel like I almost get it. 

I’ve been thinking a lot recently about blues. Blues music is arguably, depending on how you categorize and who you ask, the first music genre original to the States (or to what would become the States). It’s the foundation of so much modern music, both mainstream and not. It’s taken me some time and some practice listening, but I feel like I’m finally at the point where I can hear and appreciate it pretty easily in rock, where it’s obvious to me, where I’ll listen to rock and go, “Oh, yeah, that is blues, duh. This part and this part and this part and the whole thing, for sure”. I’m starting to get the feel for it in other places; more and more I’m understanding the “Blues” in “Rhythm and Blues”. More relevant to Eminem, I also think I’m starting to hear it in hip hop, in rap. I’m not all the way there yet, but I feel like an unveiling is beginning, I feel like my ears and my awareness is on the verge of something new for me. There’s a connection between so much music that can be traced via the blues, and I feel like I’m starting to get a finger on some of that pulse. 

Not enough to like Eminem, though. To be clear, I think that’s by far more an Eminem thing than a blues thing. Or rather, a rap thing before it’s even an Eminem thing. I’m still not sold on rap as a style of music. Sometimes it leads to interesting rhythm and fun hooks, but mostly I think it’s the most stripped down, basic kind of pop. I feel that, musically, there’s little to no point to it. I’d almost rather listen to it a cappella. The only part of it that’s interesting to me is the lyrics, is the spoken word. If I tune out enough that I’m not listening to the lyrics, I care approximately zero for the song. It’s not worth listening to for the backing track, for the music. It’s just not. I guess I’m open to being convinced otherwise, but it would take some convincing.

Another rap thing I think Eminem does in a way I particularly don’t like: sampling. I don’t like it, I’m not about that. I remember seeing a YouTube video about how Dua Lipa stole one of her big radio hits from some indie band, that her main chorus guitar loop is the exact same as theirs just more poppified. I’m absolutely alright with that, that’s fine. Steal like an artist, go to town. Riff off of everybody, steal everyone’s chord progressions, steal everybody’s rhythm, steal everybody’s cool harmony, steal any piece from any body, make yourself into some shrine to the thief gods amalgamated from whatever you could get your hands on. Stealing ideas and recreating them in your own work, that’s art, that’s music. That’s a test of the ear, to identify what is interesting and what is cool and find a way to incorporate it into your own thing. That recreation process forces you to make adjustments to make the idea fit to you. Those adjustments are all hugely important: the microadjustments and macroadjustments both. Sampling is a completely different type of theft. Sampling doesn’t involve the recreative process. It’s copy paste. Or rather, I should say it doesn’t have to involve the recreative process, it can be copy paste. There are exceptions: Kanye West is particularly noteworthy for how he popularized his way of manipulating samples in his songs. Frankly, I tend to enjoy West’s production. But that’s because of how much he reimagines his samples to make them his own. And even then, I’d rather he remade the sound from the ground up. 

And all of that nuance is mostly an aside here, because Eminem’s sampling is just copy paste, most of the time. I’m inclined to dislike samples for many of the same reasons I dislike covers. I think that’s pretty intuitive, you’re literally putting somebody else’s song in your song. Whether that’s written into the credits or not, I think that’s lazy and confusing. I do not like it, I don’t like sampling, and I think Mathers is particularly egregious in his usage of it in his songs. He’ll use the samples as the focal point of the whole song. He’ll steal whole choruses and use them as hooks such that I find myself thinking, “Oh, I like this song,” before I think about it and realize I just like the song he sampled from, and there’s actually nothing at all I like about the song that came from Eminem. Maybe that’s a trapping of rap, a standard of the genre and the culture. I don’t really care, I think it’s bad, and Eminem does it. 

If I think of this music, and of rap in general, purely as a type of performative poetry rather than as a type of music, I find myself much more able to enjoy and appreciate it. There are interesting rhythms, there are very cool turns of phrase, there is a quality of wordplay that I think is undeniably impressive. There are two glaring issues. One, it’s not presented as performative poetry, it’s presented as music. As music, I think it’s pretty unenjoyable to listen to. Two, if it were presented as performative poetry, I’d have to put way more attention into the words and the meaning, which would not bode well for Slim. 

Which brings me out of what I think about the music and into what I think of the man.

Marshall Mathers aka Eminem aka Slim Shady is intentional with lyrics, theme, message. I think in a lot of ways, it’s really effective. I think in a lot of ways, it really isn’t. What’s interesting about rap isn’t the music, it’s the lyrics, it’s the motive and the story. Not even so much the stories within individual songs, though those are neat too, but the story that’s revealed about the rapper and the story that the rapper is trying to tell about the world.

Listening to Eminem, I did have a few similar moments to when I first listened to Childish Gambino, where I had to stop and go, “Oh, okay, I’ve got to listen up to this, there’s something here”. Sometimes that something is a clever turn of phrase. That’s neat, but it’s not a huge deal. Usually it’s a moment where I feel like I’m clicking with something personal to the speaker, something that makes me understand what, to them, is real. I didn’t enjoy listening to Eminem. I don’t think he really wanted me too. Being inflammatory is a huge part of what he wants for his art. When he looks around at the world, he sees it burning. That’s not what he believes, that’s not his interpretation, it just is: Eminem lives in a world on fire. And he wants to make that clear, he wants to show the world that it is on fire. He wants to convince the unbelievers, and he wants to show the ones who already knew that they’re not alone, that he also knows the world has gone to hell. Being inflammatory is super effective for that purpose. People who like it will say they like it, that they appreciate somebody else who sees what they see, who feels what they feel. People who hate it will say they hate it, that such horrific, nauseating music being made and being popularly recognized means the world is going to hell. Eminem wins either way.

I don’t enjoy it. I probably lean toward the camp that feels “that such horrific, nauseating music being made and being popularly recognized means the world is going to hell”. Mathers doesn’t care. Again, he wins either way, and so his art is justified. The story it paints and the structure it builds is ugly, but it’s undeniably solid.

Except, it isn’t. 

I think there’s a version of Eminem that says all the disgusting, vile, wretched things he says, who says them for the sake of being disgusting, vile, and wretched— and who gets away with it, who constructs a piece of art that is unassailable not in spite of its horror but because of it. That’s not the Eminem we got. The Eminem we got goofed, and he did it over and over. One of Mathers’ favorite things to rap about is that he’s just making entertainment. He makes the argument that people have to learn to separate rap and real life, and appreciate hip hop (his hip hop) for it’s entertainment value. That’s the dumbest thing I think he could say. If that’s what he’s making music for, I don’t give him credit for art. If I separate it from real life, if I call it entertainment, I think it’s pretty shit entertainment. I’ve been over that pretty thoroughly. There are heaps of musical reasons I don’t like Eminem. I was willing to restrain myself from despising his choice of lyrical content for the sake of art, for the sake of intentionality, for the sake of some kind of purpose. But if he wants me to separate rap and real life, I will. And dude, listening to slurping blowjob noises isn’t my idea of a good time. Listening to you talk about rape and murder in graphic detail isn’t my idea of a good time. Very little of the sounds you present even come close to being my idea of a good time.

I think there are authentic, valid arguments that Mathers makes. But I also think that he’s intermixed that with bullshit and said, “Sort it out, if you don’t get it you’re a stupid little bitch”. And like… nah, man. I’m not about that. That’s dumb. That’s not just inflammatory, that’s lazy. I could live with you being inflammatory, I could have supported that pretty far. But I’m not gonna support you putting the burden of proof onto everybody but yourself. 

So I’ll judge how I feel it’s appropriate to judge, not how Mathers does. He thinks he’s self aware, I think. Maybe he is. He makes a point to be, or to look like he is. He demonstrates that he at least knows what he does. I don’t think that’s enough. Being self aware doesn’t undo the damage you’re aware you’re doing. Frankly, I’m not sure I would even call it being self aware. Being able to parrot back the criticism you receive isn’t the same as acknowledging its validity as criticism. Especially not when it’s so often parroted back alongside some kind of defense, a defense which often occurs as mockery and derision of the critic. I do think that Eminem gets better with time, that he gets more polished, that he grows as a person in a pretty real way. It’s not enough though, when that doesn’t really change behaviors. 

OKAY.

That was a lot. I will explain- no, there is too much. I will sum up.

There are a lot of things about this music I have issues with. A lot of them (particular issues with how he interacts with rap as a medium) are things I’m really not qualified to talk about at all (as someone with extremely limited authority or knowledge of rap). Here’s what I’m comfortable saying about the music: 

One, I don’t like sampling, in general. It rubs me the wrong way in the same way covers do. Eminem is particularly terrible with how he samples. 

Two, I don’t particularly like hiphop or rap as music genres in general. As poetry, as verse, as performance of the spoken word, yeah, I’m down, super cool. As music? I’m not convinced. At least, not this hip hop, not Eminem. Eight measures on loop with extremely limited melody and harmony, it does not feel like music. 

Three, I don’t like the words. I want to be clear, I think the lyricism is pretty great, the rhythm and the feel and the wordplay is all pretty stellar. But I can’t stand the content. I could’ve written another couple thousand words about the specific things he says and why I think they’re terrible, but I’m trying to keep this simple, and I don’t think that would actually be very useful. 

So with regards to the music, as far as Eminem is trying to provide “entertainment”, as discusses explicitly in many songs, I think it’s shit entertainment. I don’t enjoy it. I don’t particularly want to enjoy it. I don’t think it’s a particularly healthy or useful thing to enjoy.

And to summarize what I think about the man, about the artist: I don’t think Eminem actually communicates a clear and effective message. That is, as far as Eminem is an artist trying to convey a message, I think the message is messy, whether or not I agree or disagree with it. I think he mixes up being inflammatory for the sake of making a real point with being inflammatory for the sake of inflaming for its own sake. I think he does that often enough and to such a degree that his meaningful inflammatory moments are no longer meaningful, they’re ineffective. 

So yeah. F for Marshall Mathers, the one and only Eminem. Will the real Slim Shady please sit down?