Eminem Music to Be Murdered By
Eminem is like a magician out of tricks. He’s tried just about everything he’s got up his sleeve: big name pop crossovers, awkward sequels, meandering freestyles, and surprise album drops. But it’s all smoke and mirrors - the truth is that nothing can make up for the fact that Marshall Mathers is simply not the artist he was twenty-five years ago. His most recent sneak attack is Music to Be Murdered By, and rest assured, the only surprising thing about it is its sudden release. It’s a double album (goodie), chock full of tired violence, rambling tongue-twisters, and embittered diatribes. There are exactly zero revelations to be had here, and the album goes down much easier if you abandon all hope that you’ll find any. In its own perverse twist, Music might be the most listenable Eminem album since 2004’s Encore, and that’s not because it’s predictable, but because it’s consistent in its predictability.
With groan-inducing opener “Premonition,” Em picks right back up where he left off on 2018’s Kamikaze: “they said my last album I sounded bitter / no, I sound like a spitter.” The verse that ensues is muddled, largely nonsensical, and yes, bitter, a state-of-hip hop address that confusedly name checks LL Cool J, Tech N9ne, JAY-Z, 2 Chainz, Michael Jackson, and Tom Brady. It’s the sound of Mathers throwing everything he’s got at the wall and hoping something sticks, a technique that works to varying degrees on the rest of Music. The most convincing tracks are the ones where he settles into the caricature he’s become, lobbing one cringey, overcooked punchline after another. It helps that his work is padded by contributions from more vital artists, including Young M.A., Travis Scott associate Don Toliver, and the recently departed Juice WRLD. The production is also consistently engaging, bolstered by input from longtime mentor Dr. Dre.
The worst moments here are the ones where the rapper tries to break loose of the formula he’s constructed for himself over the last decade-and-a-half. Single “Darkness” is legitimately painful to listen to, a grossly incompetent take on America’s gun culture, structured around a cheesy “The Sound of Silence” sample. It’s cheapened all the more by the Manchester Arena punchline that arrives several songs earlier, a glaring signifier that Eminem is hopelessly detached from the world around him. His concept of “real hip hop” hasn’t evolved since the nineties (as evidenced by the irritating presence of Royce da 5’9”), and the violent misogyny of his lyrics has aged even worse than you’d think (see grating Ed Sheeran collab “Those Kinda Nights”). He’s a legend in his own right, but he’s stuck in his own time.
For this reason, Music to Be Murdered By will not change any minds on Eminem. It’s not a great album, and it’s probably not even a good one. It just happens to be the first in a long time where the rapper sounds comfortable, steadfast in his refusal to change. Let him keep yelling at clouds. D-
