| EMINEM - Relapse |
| Written by Luke Oram | ||
| Wednesday, 10 June 2009 13:14 | ||
The 20-track album is interspersed with short skits that fill in Eminem’s silent years – rehab and the bottle-shock memories of therapy, as well as what seems to be a morbid fascination with medication. In previous years, Eminem has suffered from a dependence on sleep meds, and ‘RELAPSE’ comes off as an almost encyclopedic chronicle of his pill-shaped demons. In past albums, Eminem has mastered the art of the tightrope walk between parody and his real-time struggles, skipping between topics that would normally scuttle even the most scandalous of mainstream rappers. In ‘RELAPSE’ Eminem continues to flirt with the dark side of humanity; homophobia, incest, rape and drugs. But where you’d normally find relief in the odd comical parody, you’re left only with another morbid turn. ‘3 A.M’ finds the rapper imagining his own worst nightmare – graphic mass murder scenes fuelled by the blindness of drugs with him as the protagonist. In ‘My Mom’, he takes a trademark shot at his mother, blaming his Valium dependence on his mother’s sneaking of the pill in his spinach as a child (“My mom loved Valium and lots of drugs, that’s why I’m on what I am, cos’ I’m like her”). ‘Insane’ is pure Eminem shock value, covering the whole gambit; incest, rape, necrophilia, murder. The album’s lead single is a breath of fresh air from dancing with the skeletons of Eminem’s closet – a hilarious celebrity piss-take reminiscent of ‘The Real Slim Shady’. It’s a timely reassurance that, graphic content aside, the real Slim Shady is a great rapper. Musically, ‘RELAPSE’ continues the great chemistry between Eminem and Dr Dre in the producer’s chair. Problem is, with rap, the onus always lies on the lyricist and while Eminem’s always been a genius at delivering his twisted poetry, this album spends a lot of time exploring the depths of the rapper’s dark imagination, fuelled by his constant need to push the boundaries of good taste for the sake of evoking a social reaction. Which is great if you’ve got the intestinal fortitude for it, but it’s definitely not an album for the party mix. |
