While checking out the latest from Eminem I realized that I am a subscriber to your token “white backwards hat wearing frat guy dude” in terms of my hip hop likes. Beastie Boys, Kanye West, Childish Gambino and yes, Eminem are all staples in my collection (Although I will say I really only listen to the former three on a regular basis. Sorry Slim!)
In terms of hip hop, I’m not an expert. I just know what I like. Black Sheep’s A Wolf In Sheep’s Clothing is probably one of my all time favorites but then I go straight to Ice Cube’s Raw Footage or the CB4 soundtrack. In conclusion, I’m all over the place. But enough about me, we’re here for Marshall!
In short, the Rick Rubin/Dr. Dre-produced album sounds forced and contrived. Remember when Korn reunited with Ross Robinson and released III: Remember Who You Are? Of course you don’t because it was awful. Same thing here. You can never go home again and as an artist, why would you want to?
“Bad Guy” starts off The Marshall Mathers LP 2 promising enough and brings to mind the dense opening track from My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy but like most of the bloated tracks you’ll come to experience here it soon devolves into a juvenile rant that would’ve been fine on Eminem’s debut but here in 2013 it just sounds silly (Ooooh! Stan’s younger brother has come back to seek revenge!).
There’s moments of course like on “Rhyme Or Reason” featuring a familiar sample of The Zombies’ “Time Of The Season” or, actually no, those “moments” are few and far between. It’s a lyric here or a beat there but mostly TMMLP2 is a been there, done that record of forgettable nonsense that doesn’t hold a candle to Em’s peers. I won’t even begin on the the laughable and already panned “Bezerk”! I mean, c’mon, your first single is getting sold to a video game off the bat?!?! Or “So Much Better” because we needed another song about how awful your life life is and how another blonde betrayed you. You’re 41 for chissakes! Get over it or at least start making better choices.
I had this epiphany about halfway through the album which was maybe I’m just getting too old to appreciate a new record from Eminem but at the end of the day it’s like I said: I know what I like and I know I don’t like this!