The Marshall Mathers LP is the first of ten number one albums for Eminem. It went platinum in a month and would go 7x platinum in just eight months. Eminem was on top of the pop music world even if he hated being there. At least that’s what he proclaimed.
Eminem’s lyrical content created loads of controversy, lots of handwringing, and calls for censorship by the usual suspects. I wasn’t listening to much rap/hip hop at the time, but I couldn’t help noticing Eminem’s presence. His skin color didn’t hurt his ascent nor did the fact that Dr. Dre promoted him and served as producer lending Mr. Mathers a ton of cred.
This is the first time I listened to this album as a whole. Some of the lyrics trouble me but overall, the record is outstanding. Eminem has a great flow and is an exceptional songwriter. The beats are amazing.
I have to admit that some of his stuff disturbs me. Like “Kill You”. He spends four minutes describing a fantasy about killing a woman (‘Shady will fucking kill you’) and then laughs it off in the final few seconds saying, “Ha-ha-ha, I'm just playing, ladies
You know I love you”. Is this line delivered as Eminem, Slim Shady, or Marshall Mathers? As the alter ego character Slim Shady on this song Marhsall spits out some pretty vile stuff. Saying he’s just kidding at the end is insincere in my view.
But that song is overshadowed by “Stan”. Em samples Dido’s “Thank You” to great effect here. And I think this is one of the best songs from the early Twentieth Century. in Entertainment Weekly, Wil Hermes gave high marks to “Stan” as “an epistolary exchange between the artist and a dangerously obsessive fan, may be the most moving song about star worship ever recorded.” He went on in his review to highlight Dr. Dre’s production asserting, “Mathers refines the state of the art in funky, minimalist hip-hop beatmaking.”1
Hermes concluded his review by expressing how complicated it was to enjoy the album. This summary jibes closely with how I feel about the album: some moments of brilliant genius marred somewhat by moments of true hideousness.
But like rifling through cable channels with your thumb on the remote, it’s tough to appreciate the pearls amidst the swine. For many, the bilious spew of ”bitches,” ”sluts,” and ”faggots” will render the record’s achievements invisible and irrelevent — despite Mathers’ disingenuous public disclaimers that he doesn’t have a problem with women and doesn’t hate gay people.
In the end, it’s impossible to separate the art from the ugliness, the hilarity from the viciousness, or the ”realness” from the calculation. The Marshall Mathers LP is a fun-house mirror held up to an artist’s pain, anger, and selfish ambition, as well as to the three-ring media circus in which we live. And it’s beyond one-shot grading. Media savvy: A+ Moral responsibility: D+ Overall artistry: A-2
I want to love this album, but Marshall won’t let me. And he says he doesn’t care. But I think he protests too much. My rating:
In 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die, Miles Keylock wrote:
The Marshall Mathers LP exploits the furor (over Eminem catapulting rap music into white Middle America)… (his first album The) Slim Shady Show created into a Grammy-winning, meta-rap masterpiece of shock theater that blurs the distinctions between humor and horror, satire and documentary. Now Em gives us three personas to deal with - the real Marshall Mathers, cocky MC Eminem, and that whiteboy bogeyman rapper Slim Shady.
But it is as his real self, Marshall Mathers, that Eminem really ruptures nerves, taking hip hop to new emotional territory in semi-autobiographical rants What makes the murder balled “Kim” so utterly terrifying is not all the blood, guts, and cussing (“Now Bleed! Bitch Bleed!”), but its deeply honest, deeply tragic humanity (“I swear to God, I hate you, Oh my God I love you”).3
Enjoy and listen without prejudice. Cheers!
Prime Playlist: 188. The Marshall Mathers LP by Eminem
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For details about this project, read this: Project 1001 Albums
Charts
• Peak on Billboard 200 album chart: #14
• Singles on Billboard Hot 100 chart:
> “The Real Slim Shady” #4
> “The Way I Am” #585
• RIAA certification: 11x Platinum | March 8, 20226
Released on May 23, 2000. Here’s what else was happening:
Pop Culture
• Number one song: “Maria Maria” by Santana featuring The Product G&B7
• Number one album: No Strings Attached by *NSYNC8
• Number one movie: Dinosaur by Ralph Zondag and Eric Leighton9
• Most watched TV programs: Who Wants to Be a Millionaire (Tue.), Who Wants to Be a Millionaire (Thu.), Who Wants to Be a Millionaire (Sun.), ER, Friends, NFL Monday Night Football, Frasier, 60 Minutes, The Practice, Touched by an Angel10
• NYT bestseller, fiction: Before I Say Good-Bye by Mary Higgins Clark11
• NYT bestseller, non-fiction: Tuesdays with Morrie by Mitch Albom12
Some other albums released that month
• Bachelor No. 2 by Aimee Mann
• Pay Attention by The Mighty Mighty Bosstones
• My Music at Work by The Tragically Hip
• Hot Rail by Calexico
• I Wanna Be with You by Mandy Moore
• The New America by Bad Religion
• Smile by The Jayhawks
• This Time Around by Hanson
• We Are Motörhead by Motörhead
• Binaural by Pearl Jam
• Farmhouse by Phish
• The First of the Microbe Hunters by Stereolab
• NYC Ghosts & Flowers by Sonic Youth
• Oops!... I Did It Again by Britney Spears
• Mad Season by Matchbox Twenty
• Masterpiece Theatre by En Vogue
• Please Come Home... Mr. Bulbous by King's X
• Brave New World by Iron Maiden13
Sport
• May 20 125th Preakness: Jerry Bailey aboard Red Bullet wins in 1:56.00.
• May 20 English FA Cup Final, Wembley Stadium, London (78,217): Chelsea beats Aston Villa, 1-0; Roberto Di Matteo scores 73' winner.
• May 24 8th UEFA Champions League Final: Real Madrid beats Valencia 3-0 at Saint-Denis.
• May 28 Indianapolis 500: reigning CART champion Juan Pablo Montoya leads for 167 laps to cruise to victory; first rookie winner since Graham Hill 1966.
Notable Births
• May 2 Thomas Dean, British swimmer (Olympic gold men's 200m freestyle, 4x200m freestyle relay), born in London, England.
• May 27 Jade Carey, American gymnast (Olympic Gold medal floor 2020, Team USA 2024), born in Phoenix, Arizona.
• May 31 Gable Steveson, American wrestler (Olympic Gold freestyle 2020), born in Apple Valley, Minnesota.14
Historical Events
• May 24 Israeli troops withdraw from southern Lebanon after 22 years of occupation.
• May 30 35th Academy of Country Music Awards: Shania Twain, Faith Hill & Tim McGraw win.
• May 31 US competition game show Survivor hosted by Jeff Probst premieres.15
Notable Deaths
• May 7 Douglas Fairbanks Jr, American actor (Prisoner of Zenda; Gunga Din), and decorated US naval officer (WWII Beach Jumpers), dies of a heart attack at 90.
• May 21 John Gielgud, British stage and screen actor and director (Arthur, Hamlet, Ages of Man), dies at 96.
• May 27 Maurice ‘Rocket’ Richard, Canadian NHL star (Montreal Canadiens, MVP-1947), dies of abdominal cancer and Parkinson's disease at 78.
• May 31 Johnnie Taylor, American R&B and multi-genre singer ("Disco Lady"; "I Believe In You"), dies at 66.
• May 31 Tito Puente, American mambo and Latin jazz bandleader ("Oye Como Va"), dies at 77.16
Ibid.
Keylock, Miles, 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die, Fifth printing, ed. by Robert Dimmery p. 869.
Ibid.