Slim fooled me again. Over 20 years of substandard music should have taught me better but I fell for it again. “Houdini” was an exciting single and the idea of Em trying a concept album seemed like it might finally be the thing to get him to do something new. Instead, we have the same tired, pointless slop that Eminem has put out since his three classics, just slightly better.
“Houdini” just had him sounding energetic and revitalized. It mines a lot of nostalgia, but it sounds like he’s having fun and putting in effort for the first time in decades. It was the first single in a long time that crossed over from his core audience and deservedly so. Some of this even carries over to the album.
He opens the album with some of that same energy in “Renaissance.” “Brand New Dance” is fun in the way that classic fun Em songs were. There are pieces here that remind you of who Eminem was in his prime.
However, this is a lot of the Eminem problem. I would rather just listen to his old music than his current stuff. He hasn’t added anything of value to his discography in the entirety of The Death of Slim Shady and it has been a long time since the last time he did. With this album, he’s trying to evoke his great music without any of what made that music so great and while the illusion holds up for a song or two, it collapses quickly.
This is at its worst in “Temporary,” where he sings to Hailie about his imagined death. The thing is that Hailie is almost thirty now. She’s married. Audiotapes from her childhood aren’t going to change that. “Like Toy Soldiers” was almost 20 years ago. You can’t sell me on her as an innocent child anymore and trying to do so is dishonest.
He’s out of touch when he tries to recognize her as an adult too. Shilling her nepo-baby podcast on the album is embarrassing in a way that a young Em would have skewered. His references are equally out of touch. I don’t think about South Park anymore. I don’t think about Caitlyn Jenner. I didn’t even think about Christopher Reeves in the year 2000.
This is why the cancel culture conceit doesn’t work. He’s not relevant enough for anyone to care enough to cancel him anymore and he’s not plugged in enough for this album to make waves. His transphobia and whining aren’t transgressive, they’re just tired. I see too much of it and too much that’s much more hateful than Em for this album to do anything. Famous children’s book authors say things more shocking everyday.
Also, notice that Mr. “I say what they don’t want you to hear” doesn’t have a word to say about Gaza through the whole album. Macklemore had a whole song on it. How am I supposed to take any of this seriously when Eminem isn’t even the most controversial white rapper?
When you see someone jump on this bandwagon, it’s almost always a grift and I wish that I could be surprised at Eminem falling like this, but he’s tried to sell NFTs when that was hot and it’s clear now that this is who he is.
The result is that where “Guilty Conscience 2” should have been a synthesis, it’s just exhausting. He’s unconvincing in both voices and it’s because he doesn’t believe in either one. He’s just trying to find a way back into the conversation.
This is an album that desperately needed a real single too. His classic albums had a lot of filler when revisited but the best songs there are still some of the best that rap has ever had to offer. He’s living off technical ability but he’s lost fluidity in his flow and that damages his rap as much as the soullessness. Go back to “Superman” and you can clearly see that he just can’t rap like that anymore.
He litigates his GOAT status frequently here. It’s the entire focus of his second single, “Tobey.” It’s one of the better songs in the album despite an abysmal chorus and another song where you see two guests have decent verses just for Em to show that he is in a different tier altogether.
The thing he misses with this talk though is that he only ever looks at rappers. He should have aimed higher, he should have wanted to be the greatest music artist of all time. He never found the second act that musicians need to sustain. Great musicians reinvent themselves every few years. Em is still taking shots at his mother in his fifties. It’s pretty clear that he’ll never manage anything more.
Top Five Records 
Ouch. I was psyched about the album as a die hard Em fan. I am almost 42 and I was stealing meds from under my parents mattress long before I heard it in Ems song. I don’t get the concept of the album entirely. I get that he’s clean now, for 25 years or something and he ODd years ago and he’s older now. I feel the bitterness of abstaining from drugs in his music. And it’s like Slim Shady was the addict and Eminem is the clean one so he’s killing off Slim. For good. But he’s acting as if he’s already gone. I don’t know him personally but it seems since his OD, shits just been different. I think he’s punishing himself over and over as addicts do once they’re clean. But dude, you didn’t die, you lived. And you’re a great father and the kids are alright, feel me? A lot of drama here. I know ppl who hv ODd and literally it was like they had a stroke. I myself just had one and it’s life changing for sure. Not from drugs but from lack of. Benzos. The Dr “put me on like sunblock” when I was 15 and has recently passed and I’m left with seizures and now a stroke. Just wondering if he has something medically going on. I am blathering on but I feel like he’s being too hard on himself. I’m not the author, thank God so I’ll shut up. Just feel like the album is, like my “review” , all over the place and also overtly dramatic. But will always love Em. PS dude you’re not that old.