From Encore to Kamikaze, especially, Eminem has sounded trapped within the idea that lyricism matters more than purpose, shock more than thoughtfulness, and showmanship more than substance. There are seeds planted within every album Eminem has released over the past 20 years that capture the polarity that plagues SSLP. Still, the imprint Slim Shady LP made on the entirety of his career remains the most profound.
One year later, Eminem released his magnum opus and most exhilarating album, Marshall Mathers LP, which was then followed two years later by arguably the most mature and well-rounded project in his catalog, The Eminem Show. The outlaws of the Wild West were privy to two fates: either die legends or live just long enough to see themselves diminished from a society progressing without them. Going back to the Western trope: the gunslinger narrative isn’t a tale of heroism as much as it is a tragedy about the eventual uselessness of such a figure the more that society outgrows it. Eminem could be Jesse James and John Wayne at once: an artistic outlaw refusing to conform, and a self-appointed savior of pop culture. He was an anti-hero daring enough to poke fun at the music industry-all while garnering fame by pushing the boundaries of storytelling and shock rap. The polarizing nature of Slim Shady is what made Slim Shady LP iconic for its time. Eminem’s alter ego, as he saw it, was neither the hero or villain, but the satirical and bitter antihero channeling everything from his difficult childhood to his frustration with the music industry into one rebellious figure. The success of both Eminem’s Slim Shady persona, and subsequently the Slim Shady LP, follows the same traits of the gunslinger trope in American culture. However grandiose and unique Eminem’s entrance into hip-hop’s mainstream was, though, it became the first and subsequently most important step toward him becoming an iconic, and ultimately tragic, gunslinger figure in hip-hop. It traded in looser concepts and nonstop lyricism for darker, introspective tracks ranging from horrorcore rap to pop culture satire with a much tighter conceptual grasp.Įnter Eminem’s 1999 major label debut album, Slim Shady LP, which arrived as one of the most audacious and monstrous records of the entire decade-both critically and commercially. The Slim Shady EP was more brazen and relentless. Dre, and Interscope Records-took notice of a stark alteration in Eminem’s rhyme style. It wasn’t until the 1997 release of the Slim Shady EP that the industry-and more specifically Jimmy Iovine, Dr. Eminem could out-rap anyone else in the room, but that didn’t mean people were going to listen. Infinite, though, fell flat as a commercial jumping-off point. Marshall Mathers is a born lyricist, hellbent on maneuvering his way through rhyme patterns and metaphors with a sailor’s knot of tongue-twisting lyrics with clear influences, ranging from Ice-T to Big L to Masta Ace. Infinite was an admirable but conceptually milquetoast album filled with technically intricate and colorful lyricism, yet devoid of an engaging personality. Three years removed from his independently released 1996 debut, Infinite, frustration over poor sales and stalled buzz had begun to set in. That polarity is the foundation for his grandest achievements and his hardest falls and can be found most prominently in his earliest days as an artist. As all iconic outlaws and antiheroes of pop culture often were and are, Eminem’s career is a study in both the importance of how one becomes a legend as well as their limits. Throughout the course of hip-hop history, no artist has epitomized the tragic characteristics of the gunslinger figure better than Eminem.
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