The Real Slim Shady

I'm not inside my own mind today...this blog might be kind of corny but I'm trying to make a point with this one I PROMISE!!!

I want to talk about someone important, someone who has broken borders and paved roads with his words and actions. I'm talking about Marshall Mathers, aka, Eminem, aka Slim Shady. Say what you will, Eminem is a polarizing figure of this generation and he is a modern day beacon of freedom of speech.

Personally, Eminem has been kind of important. I remember being in 6th grade, 11 years old. Sitting in the school library, the group of kids I was sitting with was talking about this "M&M" person... naturally being a loser kid, I bluffed my way into the conversation as they were surely as ignorant to this person as I was... maybe not though. I wanted to be "in" you know how it is when you're a dumb kid and that stupid shit matters.

Allow me to digress, my parents didn't bat an eyelash when I got my first Eminem CD... I don't know why. I mean let me really think about it for a moment. One time, I was younger by the way, after I just got Rob Zombie's "Hellbilly Deluxe" as a kid, I remember my father having this conversation with me.

Dad: "Do you really think you should be listening to this?"

Me: "It's just music..."

My father pretty much left it at that. My dad let me and my friend Billy listen to his Dennis Leary, No Cure For Cancer CD when we were like 13-14 "Don't let your mother know I let you listen to this." He said, hehehe. I'm glad he did let me listen to it and let me mention this is probably AFTER I got into Eminem... I mean I'm far from "messed up" but who is really normal these days right? My point is, my parents addressed the issue when it was apparent. I was what, probably 11-12, well before the time I was starting to actually listen to Eminem's music instead of pretending I was.

So The Marshall Marshall Mathers LP came out, and I had to have it, I bought it and I was listening to it. Honestly, I bought it myself, (as a kid, crazy I know) I was buying things for myself at that age though Mom would let me go to the mall as long as I wasn't going alone (and sometimes I could. I was a pretty independent teen) I would get video games on the occasions I had enough money or what have you. The world was a different place in the 90's... I mean kids might be able to buy CD's with graphic language on them but I don't now I'm not 13 anymore.

His lyrics were certainly extreme. Songs about killing the mother of his kid, songs about robbing banks, doing drugs, hell. I don't think that album really has one sorta mellow song... There's one of my personal favorites, Ammityville, which is a blood anthem for Detroit boasting it as Murder Capitol of America (it was again this year if I'm not mistaken...) so yes at this point Eminem was a real wealth of lyrical content

In Grade 8, I was doing homework at a classmate's house, he had Eminem's first "Slim Shady" CD, aka the one I hadn't heard yet. IT was even darker, I could see why he was such a big deal when he first burst onto the scene because some of his music was truly dark. However songs like Role Model and Just Don't Give A Fuck remain personal favorites to this day as well as many other songs from that album. His music wasn't changing me albeit, I was developing my apathy for public school at that age... that's another blog for another time.

Eminem started out as a grotesque beast... something blatant, in your face, something diabolical... it was this pure darkness that almost kind of looks like a metaphor for the late 90's as a whole with how popular violence, sex, etc was on television during that  time, Eminem... at least not directly, was a part of something and he didn't know his music was going to grow and last beyond that... He was cashing in on his 15 minutes.

How was I to interpret his music, indeed I was one of the kids he was so often citing as to influencing in his music but I didn't feel like he was portrayed as to making someone my age feel, in fact it was quite the opposite. I always admired Eminem for his ability to just speak his mind and say what he wants. He has used his music to bash George Bush and the US Government, the Media, Parents and Parenting, he's called out other rappers, he's spoken about himself (maybe?) and sure he's written borderline fantasy raps about killing, drug abuse, rape, etc, because he wants to offend you. Anyone who cant see through the Slim Shady facade is the very person he's trying to offend. I've always appreciated and respected Eminem because of his attitude (warped as it may be) toward free speech, it affected me at a young age without even really realizing it and I am better for it today.

It's not like I would go around singing the Eminem lyrics... are you kidding me? I wanted to KEEP listening to it, the last thing I was going to do was let Mom catch me blasting Criminal casually in my bedroom at 14. I think there are metal bands that raise equal eyebrows but Eminem has a reputation, especially back then, the last thing I wanted was Mom taking that CD away. I laugh about it now but if she heard the songs she probably would have questioned me about Eminem at the very least.

Allow me to digress once more... One time I was walking to work (I'm about... 20-21 in this story so fast forward.) I'm walking down passed The Lodge Motel on my way to Boston Pizza, I'm singing Everything Ends by Slipknot about as loud as someone can sing a hate anthem like that. There's a guy on the second level having a smoke, he sees me as walk by singing/butchering the words of this song, I took a look, he was speechless. There was an amusement this gave me, the gratification was something I think is somewhat similar to the feeling Eminem gets out of pissing off the entire world with his lyrical content. That's just me taking a guess... I don't know him. I don't know if I could ever feel comfortable doing something like that, singing along with a Slipknot song that has some of the worst lyrics of any of their songs and proudly boast every word from my voice box... Not without having a little bit of Slim Shady in me, so to speak.

I'm sure Eminem hasn't just affected me. There are too few people that can really speak to my age group, I'm still relatively young, only 24, and I am sure lots of kids are blasting Slim Shady on their iPods behind their parents backs just like I did. How his music affects them is really not up to Eminem, it's up to the values that have been instilled upon the child from their parents and the kids ability to realize that he's just a rapper and the bottom line is he's there to enjoy... if it's wrong to take joy from something like Eminem than I don't want to be right!

This generation especially has too few people we can really look at and say "they are an embodiment of the freedom of speech I like to have." Everywhere you look, its celebrities, drug addicts, murders, bad, bad, bad, negative, negative, negative, there's never anything good in the news anymore unless it's a "recovery" story about some bullshit celebrity or nobody that isn't worth the airtime they're given, that's a different story....

Bottom line, it's people like Eminem that I respect for saying it how it is, for saying what they want to say the way they want to say it, and simply because we can. There are too few people in this world with the courage to do so.

There's a little Slim Shady in all of us... at least so I'm told... until next time.

PEACE.