Got lots to say about this one, sorry. Hip-hop music is often easy to generalise and slim has become generic, but this album was really special. If this was a hyped blog and I was a well known critic people might think putting this album was attention seeking but i genuinely fucking love this album. I first heard it when I was 14 and into a lot of mainstream rap. It is pretty much the only one I've been able to persistantly love and appreciate no matter how much my taste in music has changed and broadened.
It's sometimes hard to “get” Eminem’s lyrics, hard to tell sincerity from satire and vice versa but I guess there's truth in the joke, joke in the truth.
Those who saw the funny side of The Slim Shady LP found it insincere and seemingly attention seeking in vulgarity, not “real enough”. Those who didn’t see the funny side branded him Satan’s voice in music, but off the back of that Slim takes what’s relevant in his life, his demonization in the media, the responsibility of being a reluctant role model, being the “white face” of rap and turns it into a witty yet dark lyrical mess:
“blurring the distinction between reality and fiction, humor and horror, satire and documentary”,
It wasn’t the album people expected. It wasn’t a stereotypical mainstream rap album glamorising “gangsters”, he raps about what’s real for him, what he finds funny and relevant as his alter ego "slim" but there’s passion and anger in his lyrics as an undertone. The music on this album is pretty typical of a record produced by Dre, but a lot darker that most of his normal East Coast affairs. The beats and bass are slow and droning, the piano melodies simple yet fitting to each song. This album is what good hip hop is all about, passionate lyrics, breaking tradition and making his contemparies look like immature stereotypes.
The sad thing this is that 8 years later, he became everything he hated, forced to chose between losing his fame and falling into obscurity (at times with his "quitting" the industry it seemed like that's what he wanted)and selling out he fell into the same crowd as snoop, his name's bigger than his music now and he produces hits with no integrity.
On the down side it has dido and a fucking shit cover. Click the name to listen
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