For more insight, click on these three words. I am very sure that it will give you better lyrical analysis than I ever could.
Here is all you need to know. "Criminal" is the last song on "The Marshall Mathers LP", Eminem's third album. Or second if you're a person who negates the existence of "Infinite". "The Marshall Mathers LP" is arguably Eminem's best album. Eminem is regarded to be one of the best rappers of all time. Have you pressed play on the video above yet?
It is a great closer to the album. It basically sums up all of the messages conveyed in the prior seventeen songs, and is spat out to you in a humorous and clever fashion. Eminem was the centre of controversy after the release of "The Slim Shady LP". Many women, homosexuals, parents, the government..... They were all very offended by what this man said. But does he care? No. Because he doesn't mean it. It is all very funny to him.
Really though, I like Eminem but not as much as I might have sounded two paragraphs above. When his lyrics and beats are on point, he is siiiiick. "Criminal" is another of the numerous instances when he is, indeed, sick.
"Cause some things just don't change
It's better when they stay the same
Although the whole world knows your name
So on a bigger stage they came to see you spit your game
It shouldn't be difficult to explain
Just why you came back again, you hate the fame
Love the game, cold as ice you remain
Fuck em' all, tell 'em all eat shit, here we go again"
"Cold Wind Blows". The first song from Eminem's 2010 album "Recovery".
"Relapse" was Eminem's first album after five years away from music, and although everyone was glad to have him back it didn't hide the fact that the tracks on there were not up to the standard that people were expecting from the rap god. Except for "Beautiful", I could listen to that track all the time.
After the album's release, Em revealed that he had so many beats left over that didn't make it onto the album. There was going to be a sequel, appropriately named "Relapse 2".
Fast forward about a year later when Eminem said 'fuck that', got rid of the concept and instead decided to name it "Recovery". Hype was built. June came. The album leaked. I downloaded it. This was the first track I heard, and the introduction above was pretty much the reaction in my head when the beat came in with the descending piano melody and the "Guess who's back's" ringing in my ears.
"Cold Wind Blows" is a bold start to "Recovery". It is another song to mark a 'comeback' which doesn't really make sense seeing that he had already done that a year earlier; it never really gave us much of a chance to miss him. Seeing as critics weren't too impressed with "Relapse", this was probably meant to be his 'real' comeback.
Nevertheless, "Cold Wind Blows" makes a few things clear. Eminem was back. People should be worried. People shouldn't try and mess with him because he will humiliate them in one of his songs. He doesn't know why he's so cold, it's probably us who made him this way.
"Cleanin' Out My Closet" was the bitter, and brutally blunt second single from "The Eminem Show" after the humorous chart-topper "Without Me" in 2002.
Up until the album's release Eminem's previousalbums contained lyrics alluding to his mother's incompetence as a parent and his crappy childhood, but this track is the culmination - basically a direct verbal attack at her. Do not worry though, it's all for justifiable reasons which he makes very clear in the song.
How's the new look? Do you like it? The whole blue and white thing was alright. But the 'simple' template was much more better than the 'dynamic' one. I hope you think it's cool. Now you can see the posts I've done before, all in the two or three clicks with a mouse.
Sorry I didn't do a post yesterday. I've done that about three times now. I'm on holiday, as you may or may not know. Finished exams and all that stuff. Yesterday I just went out bowling and chilled out at my friend's house for a while. It was nice. I realised I suck at bowling without the barriers on the side to stop the ball from going into the gutter. Yesterday was the first time I'd actually done ten-pin bowling without those barriers. I came last in one game. But I did come third in the final one we did. It was all fine in the end.
OK. So, this is the first post for today. Another one will come up, this counts as yesterday's one.
2009 was an alright year. I was in Year 9, and so really I still didn't have any important things going on academic wise. That was the final year of Key Stage 3 before GCSE work started the next year. 2009 was also the year Eminem came back into our lives after a four year absence. Sure, he featured on "Smack That" by Akon and released the compilation album "The Re-Up" in 2006, but of course that didn't count. That was more of a collaboration album with artists on Shady Records. The last we really heard from Eminem was in 2005, when he released "When I'm Gone" in a period when I remember that a lot of people thought he was retiring, and that was his "goodbye" song.
That all changed when he finally returned, firstly with "Crack a Bottle" and then 'officially' (you could say) with the single "We Made You" - the single which received the most airplay from "Relapse", and in typical fashion he was here with his wacky Slim Shady persona, making fun out of Lindsay Lohan, Ellen DeGeneres, Amy Winehouse, and all with funny accents too.
I will tell you another tale of my friends about my friends and I from school. If you read my last post you may get this. These are different friends this time, but me and two of my friends really liked Eminem and we were really happy when "Relapse" came out. Now, most people think that Relapse isn't that great of an album. Eminem describes it himself as "Ehhhh". But then, it was Eminem, it was Marshall, it was Slim Shady, it was a big deal. No one would have dared to say that it was bad.
It was one of those two friends who told me about "Beautiful". I hadn't heard the song. "Relapse" hadn't been released yet. But somehow my friend went on all these music websites where the latest R&B and hip-hop music was uploaded. He went on about how 'sick' it was, and how I should listen to it and memorise the first verse with the sample so we could sing it when we weren't paying attention in class. "Sick" is another way of saying amazing, if you don't slang.
So I went home. Listened to it. And it was sick. It is really serious stuff. "Relapse" isn't a very serious album at all, with lines such as "I was born with a dick in my brain, yeah fucked in the head" and "Bodies laying all over the floor, I don't remember how they got there but I guess I must have killed 'em". But "Beautiful" is a very introspective Eminem song. It's quite depressing. It's got a good message though, basically saying "Fuck whoever says you're not worth shit. Just be yourself." It was released as a single, as you can see the music video is above. The actual song is about 6:30 minutes, but the video cuts out a few sections for some reason.
I don't have "Relapse". I don't really want it. "Beautiful" is good enough.
