Kierra Setting
Mrs. Hunter
Journalism 1
January 17, 2018
Eminem Album Review/Retirement/Trump Freestyle
The world has come to know the “Rap God” of music. Coming from a broken home, Eminem has become one of the one of largest names in the music industry. Eminem released his new and final album labeled, Revival. Important factors played in this album such as artists who are being featured, the stories he wanted to tell, and knowing that this will be his final album to be released.
After waiting for four years for a new album from the talented artist to be released, fans are excited for his music to revive, hence, the title of his most recent album. The thing that fans find the most interesting about his music is the purpose and content of each song that is produced. The songs include topics that are extremely important such as people in his life and political situations. In his song “Castle,” he wrote as if he was talking to his daughter through a letter. To explain this style, in the song he says,
“December 1, 1995, dear Hailie”. This song has a major impact on how people view Eminem as an artist.
One of the other major purposes of the album is speaking about his retirement. In his song “Castle,” he clarifies that he is retiring by stating the following lyrics, “They can take this fame back, I don’t want it.
I’ll put out this last album then I’m done with it. One hundred percent finished, fed up with it, I’m hanging it up. F**k it!” Although he has made such a positive impact in the musical history, he also had a rough life with fame. When it came to fame, he dealt with things such as overdose, divorce, and hate for lyrics and foul language. In his music, Eminem expresses his opinion on politics, especially when it comes to President
Trump. Not only does he express his feelings on Trump with his album, but by major performances. His most viral video was his Trump Freestyle, also known as “The Storm”. Even before his performance video at the BET Hip Hop Awards, Eminem had been voicing his extreme hatred for President Trump. In this video, Eminem “roasts” Trump with lines such as, “Intensities heightened tensions are rising. Trump, when it comes to giving a s**t you’re as stingy as I am.” Some people believe he took it too far with the insults, but some people like Kiersten Setting believe that he has a complete right to state his opinion in his music and performances. Kiersten stated, “Makes me upset that he may lose half of his fan base just because he is telling his opinion just like everyone else in the world.” I feel that her claim is fair to
Eminem. Just because he is famous, people attack him more than others because of his opinion on the topic.
What most people are loving about this album is the variety of artists being featured: well known artists like Ed Sheeran, Alicia Keys, Kehlani and more. In my opinion, the artists he has featured on the album go extremely well with the song they are in. An interesting fact about Eminem’s collaboration with
Ed Sheeran is the amount of time it took him just to write one song. Sheeran recorded the melody and instrumental part of the song in March of 2016, but here’s the crazy part. Sheeran stated to Billboard, “... In May 2017, I was in New Mexico and heard that Eminem had already had the verses recorded and is flying to New Mexico so that’s when I got to meet him…”. In my opinion, it is crazy how fast Eminem can come up with rhymes and phrases. Before Eminem, no one knew words that rhymes with the word
“orange”. Well, Eminem managed to do that exactly. Eminem stated, “ When people say that the word
‘orange’, doesn’t rhyme with anything it kind of p****s me off because I could think of many words that rhyme with the word orange...you could say I put my orange, four inch, door hinge, in storage, who ate porridge, with georges”. It just proves how amazing Eminem truly is and how much work he had to have put into this album with factors like lyrics, artists he was featuring, and the stories he had to tell. After listening to the album, I believe this is one of his best albums, which is a great thing to say with knowing that it will be his final album.