taipei times

MONDAY, OCTOBER 2 7 , 2 0 0 8 PAGE   1 3

[ THE WEEKENDER ] our years ago, , one of the best-selling rappers Someone I don’t really want to be.” verses. A few of them — ones that include lyrics from in history, released his last album of original material, Jenkins said: “I think Em has an appeal that’s very hits like My Name Is, Stan and Lose Yourself — are on F Encore, and then essentially disappeared. The years everyman. That’s his natural voice in the book.” He added: perforated pages so that they can be easily removed. since have been pockmarked with personal struggles. “The guy has been out of the mix and not interacting “It reminds me of the sort of crazy scribbling and writing He entered rehab in 2005 for a dependency on sleep with a lot of people, let alone a writer. But this was an like Russell Crowe’s character in A Beautiful Mind,” said medication. In 2006 he remarried, and then redivorced, his opportunity for him to get a lot of stuff off his chest, Rosenberg, referring to the Nobel Prize-winning economist ex-wife, Kim Scott, the subject of many of his most vitriolic especially in the wake of the death of his best friend.” John Nash. “It’s an organized chaos of thoughts.” songs. And that same year his closest friend, the rapper In fact Eminem’s memories of how Proof toughened (As for any aspiring rappers thinking of appropriating the Proof, was killed in a shooting at a Detroit nightclub. him up as a young man are among the most vivid unused material, Eminem jokingly offered: “Whoever wants In his new book, , Eminem hopes to passages in The Way I Am. “As difficult as it was to talk to use it, I guess, go ahead and use it. Take my scraps.”) set the record straight. “I’m really just a normal guy. You about, I had to,” Eminem said. He also writes of how In an era when stars like Jay-Z famously do not write can ask my neighbors,” he writes in the book. “I ride a much his retreat from public life had to do with Proof’s down their rhymes, instead constructing them in their bike. I walk the dog. I mow my lawn. I’m out there every death: “After he passed, it was a year before I could head and committing them to memory, The Way I Am is a Sunday, talking to myself, buck naked, mowing the lawn really do anything normally again. It was tough for me to celebration of a sort of artisanal approach to rhyme. Tracyanne Campbell of Camera Obscura, performing at The with a chain saw.” even get out of bed, and I had days when I couldn’t walk, “In the older hip-hop he has a connection to, lyric Wall on Saturday evening. photo: Catherine Shu, Taipei Times Well, one out of three isn’t bad. “I do ride my bike, let alone write a rhyme. When I tried to put my thoughts sheets have always played an important role,” Jenkins I don’t have a dog, I don’t mow my lawn,” Eminem, 36, together — well, I wasn’t making sense when I spoke, so said. “He’s a traditionalist.” admitted in a phone interview from a Detroit studio on everyone was trying to keep me off TV and away from In 2002 Eminem released the book , Monday night last week. But otherwise he’s been living the the press.” largely a collection of lyrics — reprinted, not the original Camera Obscura life of a suburban father, taking care of three girls: Hailie, But while Eminem discusses some personal topics in handwritten sheets — that sold about 77,000 copies, his daughter with Kim; Alaina, his niece; and Whitney, the book — fatherhood gets especially lengthy treatment according to Nielsen BookScan. But that was near the Kim’s daughter from another relationship. (“Being a dad makes me feel powerful in a way that I height of his fame; this is a much less certain time for him. And now Eminem, born Marshall Mathers, is tenta- hadn’t known before, and it’s the kind of power I don’t Still, “we never worried there wasn’t a market,” Rosenberg captures the moment tively re-entering public life with his book, published want to abuse”) — he almost completely avoids other, said. “He’s certainly done enough over his career to by Dutton this week. Part autobiography, part photo more familiar subjects, like his exceedingly public battles sustain interest, even with having stepped away for a by Ron Brownlow, Catherine Shu gallery, part ephemera collection, it’s a handsome with his ex-wife and his mother, Debbie. (Next month couple of years.” and Bradley Winterton midcareer (and midlife) roundup for an artist who has Eminem’s mother will release a memoir, My Son Marshall, Staff and contributing Reporters been notoriously reluctant to discuss his personal life My Son Eminem.) Profane and preposterous anyplace but in his music. “Everyone already knows how I feel about those And now Eminem appears ready to return to the world of cottish band Camera Obscura kicked off a tour of “In a way this is the end of the first chapter of his career,” situations,” Eminem said. “I don’t want to keep putting music. He has been recording with Dr. Dre, with whom he SAsia on Saturday evening by playing to a slightly said Paul Rosenberg, Eminem’s manager. “Em’s looking Kim and the kids in everything that I do, stuff where it’s has made his biggest hits, working on songs for his next older, more bookish-looking crowd than The Wall forward now. He’s very re-energized and refocused.” not necessary.” The book, he said, is “more about Eminem album, to be called Relapse. (There are rumors that the (這牆) usually sees. The six-person lineup, led by Originally intended to be “a scrapbook for my and less about Marshall.” album will be released by Interscope before year’s end, but lead singer and songwriter Tracyanne Campbell on fans,” Eminem said, the book grew to include large there has been no official word yet.) Last week he released acoustic guitar, started with Come Back Margaret chunks of first-person narratives culled from interviews Marshall Mathers’ mementos a teaser freestyle, I’m Having a Relapse, on which he from the group’s most recent album, a melodically with the journalist Sacha Jenkins, and presented in a And so it’s the career artifacts, especially the handwritten sounds vibrant and engaged, stacking characteristically sensual and somewhat sapphic ballad that had the conversational style. “Rap is one big Fantasy Island,” lyrics, that receive a place of privilege. profane and preposterous rhymes atop one another: audience members swaying and nodding their heads Eminem writes. “It’s the place I always retreat to when For years Eminem would scribble down snatches of to lines like “Come back, Margaret, I want to adore things get too hectic in real time.” lyrics on whatever piece of paper was available — spiral It seems like every day I get a little flakier you/ Come back, Margaret, I want to explore you.” In a section about his family and upbringing, he’s notebooks, hotel memo pads — and carry them around in The medication is making my hands a little shakier The atmosphere during the less than hour-and- discomfitingly frank: “If you go back and look at the abuse a backpack. When he wanted to put together a song, he’d Hand me that 18-month-old baby to shake him up a-half-long set was congenial and relaxed, and that I took, it’s no surprise riffle through the sheets, pick out some lines that might go It’ll only take me a many in the audience were clearly familiar with I became who together and head into the studio. Second to choke his trachea the Glaswegians’ music, applauding flourishes such I am. “I collect words and then I stack them up,” Eminem as when trumpet-player Nigel Baillie put down said of his songwriting process. Often he’d write lyrics in a In one of the book’s most revealing sections, Eminem his instrument and walked over to accompany sort of code, leaving key words out. His reasoning: “If you talks about how he happened upon his signature bottle- percussionist Lee Thomson on the drum kit. Campbell leave your rhyme pad laying around, no one can make blond look, high on Ecstasy, around the time he was introduced the title song of her band’s most recent sense of it but you.” recording his first songs with Dr. Dre. It reads like a album by saying, “I hope you guys aren’t offended by More than two dozen of the sheets are comic-book origin story, his new identity presaging a path the title of this next song,” before introducing Let’s reproduced in the book, and they’re of bad behavior to follow. Get Out of This Country to rapturous applause. One impressive in both content and appearance Now that he’s preparing to re-enter the music world, fan in the front row had brought along a Scottish flag. — lyrics scrawled at odd angles, in though, will the peroxide, and all that comes with it, “Where did you get that?” Campbell asked. “eBay,” different ink colors, at lengths varying return? “My hair is back to its natural color,” Eminem said. was the reply. “How much did you pay for it,” she from a few words to complete “I don’t think I’m going back to the dye.” asked. “Too much!” shouted a fan in the back. Camera Obscura is working on a new album and played three new songs from it, much to the crowd’s delight. The set ended with the wistful, melancholic Razzle Dazzle Rose, one of the most bittersweet songs off the bittersweet Let’s Get Out of This Country. It was perhaps more of a reflection Eminem resurfaces of the audience’s temperament than the quality of the show when, unusually for a foreign band with a following in Taiwan, the curtain closed and the in new role: audience did not insist on an encore. The only downside to what was an otherwise great evening was the unusual and daft move of limiting the free drink included with the concert’s NT$1,100 ticket price to a short list of beverages, including only two beers, Miller and Coors Light, and two cocktails. Hopefully this does not represent memoirist the beginning of a trend, as Miller makes Gold Metal Taiwan Beer taste like Chimay Blanche. The finals of the German Lieder Competition Taipei 2008 in the Metropolitan Hall on Saturday Eminem has been mostly showed a Taiwanese commitment to German 19th century art-songs that was unexpected to say the silent and invisible for least. Six finalists in junior and senior sections sang nearly four years out in German, with piano accompanists of their choice, and after a pause the winners were duly after canceling a European announced — Tang Fa-kai (湯發凱) in the junior tour to enter rehab and the section and Fan Ting-yu (范婷玉) (singing only items by the daunting Arnold Schoenberg) in the senior. murder of his best friend, Both carried off, among other rewards, cash prizes the rapper Proof from of NT$100,000. Strangely, the senior contestant placed sixth failed . Now he has a new, to show up for the award ceremony. This can only visually driven memoir out have meant the six had been told the final placings off-stage, and she had been too upset to appear. If so, it was a testimony to the relentless competitiveness of by JON CARAMANICA Taiwanese society, but was unnecessary nonetheless NY Times News Service, New York — she had, after all got to the final 12 in a competition The Way I Am, a memoir by rapper Eminem, that had attracted an amazing 150 eager aspirants also known as Marshall Mathers. photo: AP nationwide. All things considered, you felt this was an event that, in all Asia, could only have happened here. PLANET

ritish music company from US$457 million the previous The trial at Los Angeles Jerry Lewis has put his foot in it, again. US telethon a year ago. BEMI reported a loss of year, is largely due to financing Superior Court is expected to last photo NY Times news service The 82-year-old King of US$1.2 billion in its first year as costs, asset writedowns and between three and four months, Comedy dropped the slur when part of the private equity group restructuring costs, the Financial and the fabled producer faces a first since the 1991 release of he was asked by a Network Ten Terra Firma, news reports said Times reported. minimum 15 years to life in prison Use of Illusion I and Use Your national TV reporter following Saturday. Jury selection was if he is found guilty of second Illusion II. a press conference in Sydney Revenues dropped by 19 completed Thursday for the degree murder. “The release of Chinese on Friday for his opinion on the percent to US$2.3 billion in the murder retrial of legendary Prosecutors are seeking to Democracy marks a historic Australian nation sport of cricket. business year music producer Phil Spector, convict Spector, 68, of murdering moment in rock ‘n’ roll,” co- “Oh, cricket? It’s a fag game. ending on March and main arguments in the case actress Lana Clarkson, who was managers Irving Azoff and Andy What are you, nuts?’’ Lewis replied. 31, according to will be heard beginning next found dead in the foyer of the Gould said. “Guns N’ Roses fans The network broadcast the earnings data Wednesday, court sources said. fabled producer’s home in the have every reason to celebrate, comment in full on its Friday released the Spector, the eccentric early hours of Feb. 3, 2003. for this is only the beginning.” evening news bulletin along with previous day musical genius who created the At his first trial, prosecutors Guns N’ Roses frontman Axl footage of Lewis handling an in an annual famous Wall of Sound recording alleged that Spector shot Rose is the only member of the imaginary cricket bat with an review by technique, was accused of Clarkson as she attempted to band’s 1991 line-up to feature effeminate gesture. Maltby Capital, shooting dead an actress in his Los leave his home after meeting on the new album, which will Lewis apologized in September through Angeles mansion five years ago. him for the first time only My Baby and You’ve Lost That include 14 tracks. last year for using the term

POP which He avoided conviction after a hours earlier at the Hollywood Lovin’ Feelin. The band has sold 90 million “illiterate faggot’’ in Las Vegas investor Guy marathon, six-month trial last year nightclub where she worked. US supergroup Guns N’Roses albums worldwide, with 42 million during his annual Labor Day Hands’ Terra that ended with a jury deadlocked Defense lawyers said Clarkson, will unveil their first original in the US alone, with the group’s telethon that raises money for the Firma owns 10 to 2 in favor of finding him 40, best-known for her role in album in 17 years next month seminal Appetite for Destruction Muscular Dystrophy Association. EMI Music. guilty, and prosecutors decided to Roger Corman’s 1985 cult classic with the release of long-awaited — featuring hits Welcome to the In a statement released a day The loss, launch a new case against him. The Barbarian Queen but whose work Chinese Democracy, a Jungle and Sweet Child o’Mine later, he described the slur as which ballooned The new jury consists of career had stalled at the time of statement said Thursday. — its most famous. a “bad choice of words.’’ New seven men and five women. her death, killed herself. The long-delayed album will go Veteran comedian Jerry Lewis York-based media discrimination Axl Rose singing at the MTV Six replacement jurors must Spector is regarded as one on sale in the US on Nov. 23 while is under fire again for making watchdog Gay & Lesbian Alliance Music Awards. Chinese Democ- be chosen before Wednesday, of the most influential figures in the title track Chinese Democracy an anti-gay slur on Australian Against Defamation, or GLAAD, racy, Guns N’ Roses’ newest when the court hears opening pop music history. In the early has already been released to radio, television similar to one he called for Lewis to again apologize. album, is to be released on statements by the defense and 1960s he was responsible for hits the band’s managers said. apologized for using on his annual — agencies Nov. 23. photo ny times news service the public prosecutor. including Da Doo Ron Ron, Be The album is Guns N’ Roses’