"I think throughout my career, I've said enough to piss enough people off. Still, he says, not everyone is going to like what he says. "If two people care about each other or love each other, they should have the right to be equally miserable," he says. His rhymes contain fewer public jabs at celebrities and he's even publicly stated support for gay marriage. Recovery showcases a more mature, more tolerant Eminem.
"There are a lot of rappers who have complicated rhyme schemes that are out today, that have been out over the years." His lyrics have drawn comparisons to the work of great poets, but the rapper, while flattered, says it's strange for him to hear. He says he's turned the weaknesses he discussed on the album into strengths. "You know, it just reminds me of how I was feeling and why I would never want to go back to that place."Įven so, Eminem says that talking about his struggles - in songs like "Going Through Changes" - has been empowering. "When I first recorded the record and dumped it all out, it was a little difficult to listen back to," he says. It's also one of his most personal and most honest. His latest release, Recovery, is being praised as one of his best yet. "I felt like I did a lot of growing up, and I don't really feel like the last album really reflected where I was at mentally," he says. He released an album called Relapse in 2009, but says it didn't reflect his new life of sobriety. I knew I couldn't control it anymore."Įminem has been sober for just over two years. Music is so therapeutic for me that if I can't get it out, I start feeling bad about myself - a lot of self-loathing. "I felt like I had a really bad case of writer's block. when I got home, I went right back to using again."ĭespite going back to drugs, the rapper says he was scared. "I don't think I actually realized the totality of what had happened," he says, "so after I got out of the hospital. His drug habit intensified in recent years and even led to an overdose in December 2007. In an interview with Weekend All Things Considered host Guy Raz, Eminem says he struggled with addiction throughout his career. His new record is called Recovery, and it tells the story of a man coming to terms with his inner demons. He's won 11 Grammys and an Academy Award, and holds the record for the fastest-selling solo album in history. Throughout his career, Eminem's controversial work has attracted both criticism and accolades. His name is Marshall Mathers, but he's better known as hip-hop musician Eminem. I feel like a human being again.This song contains explicit language not suitable for all ages. I hated myself worse than anyone could ever hate me. "I hated myself when I was in my addiction. And that was cool, but I've kind of flipped the page." It was a lot of punchline-y, funny, shock value – kind of going back to The Slim Shady LP. Making Relapse, I was still working the drugs out of my system, so there was a lot of.
"The new material is definitely different. "Now I'm going for songs instead of one-liners," he said. Some of these early tracks will appear on an forthcoming Relapse bonus disc, but the new material, recorded with Dr Dre in Hawaii, "has knocked out all the old songs". Almost 19 months sober, the rapper has scrapped the original version of Relapse 2 and started from scratch. Now, Eminem said he is "more focused than I've ever been". I became more on-point towards the end of recording the album." It wasn't until it got into songs like Stay Wide Awake that it felt like my mind got sharper. "If you were to take a song like My Mom or Must Be the Ganja, those were cool – but they were the beginning stages of me coming out of the. "My thinking became sharper again as I went along," he said. Even Eminem admits the comeback record, his first in five years, does not show him at his quickest. "I want to make records that you could play a hundred times, a thousand times." Unfortunately, this wasn't the case with Relapse, an album most critics deemed average at best. "I don't want to make shit that you hear once and then the joke's over," he told Complex magazine. With the sequel already promised for next year, the rapper says he has now "flipped the page". "I was still working the drugs out of my system," Eminem has admitted, acknowledging the weaknesses of his "jokey", critically maligned comeback album, Relapse.