Review: Eminem – Rap God

Last night, Eminem released another song from the forthcoming Marshall Mathers LP 2, and, judging from everything else leading up to the album, not even a halfhearted Mariana Trench analogy would do my expectations justice. I was ready to despise ‘Rap God’.

What followed was a six-minute technical tour de force of sheer talent, a response to every naysayer and every criticism since Relapse. Eminem set out to prove once more that he is, as the title suggests, a rap god, and he’s done it.

If anyone were to record a comprehensive guide to rapping, this would be it. Mr Mathers’ delivery goes from clearly enunciated, slow lines to inhuman rapid-fire verses that make Twista sound like Bill Clinton on Ambien. Lyrically, he deliberately does everything: cringe-worthy one-liners and shout outs to other rappers lead seamlessly to extraordinary multisyllabic, alliterative rhyming. In six minutes, he proves that he can still do absolutely everything and make it look effortless.

In fact, this is an easy contender for his most technically impressive studio recording. After multiple listens, it only gets better. Line after line, Eminem puts more effort into his lyrics than he did anywhere on Recovery, giving everyone more to listen for. It’s been some time since he’s sounded so motivated to succeed and prove everyone wrong. Maybe the backlash he’s received from his fan base is the kick he needed.

You won’t be hearing it on the radio, though. Eminem sacrifices anything resembling radio friendliness for technicality, and that’s not a bad move for him. He addresses criticisms of becoming poppier and collaborating with artists like Rihanna, defending himself on what cannot be classified as a pop song in any shape or form. It’s almost a stream of consciousness rant that, whilst being impressive, does lack the storytelling of his earlier albums. But, honestly, who cares? ‘Rap God’ is incredible.

The song does once again raise the same question ‘Berzerk’ did a few months back. How does this fit into a sequel of The Marshall Mathers LP? Again, there is almost nothing here that would indicate that it’s meant to be a sequel. The delivery is mostly an evolution of his Recovery style, although noticeably more dynamic and varied. The subject matter does have echoes of ‘Kill You’ and ‘The Way I Am’ but the production of the song is nothing like the sparse minimalism of its predecessor. On the other hand, Eminem does directly reference the song ‘I’m Back,’ reusing a line that was censored even on the album version of MMLP (“I take seven kids from Columbine, put them all in a line…”). Hearing that line uncensored, as sadistic as it is, was precisely the throwback the song needed.

With three released songs from the new album, one of which is catchy albeit not very technically impressive (‘Berzerk’), one of which is the exact opposite (‘Rap God’), and one of which is so thoroughly awful and cheesy no one would put it on chips and sell it to drunk students at 3 AM (‘Survival’), Eminem is clearly toying with us. The potential is undeniable, and judging from ‘Rap God’ alone, the only thing holding back his talent is the occasional bout of laziness on his pop collaborations. Needless to say, my faith in Eminem has been restored even if the album isn’t going to sound like MMLP.