This is easily one of the most unpleasant albums I’ve ever heard, in terms of content. The gut punches don’t ever relent, but none of them quite reach the opener’s dizzying heights. And like “Stan”, the result is a masterful gut punch. The first track, “Bad Guy”, makes it painfully obvious how much emotional bloodletting is going to happen on the album – by mirroring the structures of past violent odes like “Kim” and “Stan”, and borrowing themes and lyrics from “My Name Is”, Eminem crafts what sounds like yet another wildly offensive Slim Shady escapade… until it becomes obvious that Shady has become legitimately insane, and half of the song devolves into the lyrical equivalent of plumbing the depths of madness. It becomes obvious after the first track that Eminem isn’t coasting on his reputation, and has created what is easily the most deeply cutting of his albums. Does the world really need to revisit the dark, hellish world of Marshall Mathers? That’s the major question posed by Eminem’s sequel to the album that catapulted him to instant legend status back in 1999, even more pressing than the question about whether he made Marshall Mathers 2 for a quick cash-out.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |