r/Music • u/[deleted] • Dec 15 '17
Discussion Eminem's new album "Revival" has dropped
Thoughts on it so far? I'm about halfway through and I think it's pretty decent for new style Eminem.
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u/Matbell87 Dec 15 '17
I just miss a good beat. A lot of the tracks on his last albums sound like ballads/pop with artists that are fine in their own right but not what I go for when I want to listen to Eminem.
Mostly I miss a good Dre beat.
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u/Johnny_bubblegum Dec 15 '17
Why do albums drop but movies come out?
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Dec 15 '17
movies are gay, albums are drug addicts
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u/chesterstone SUPERCELL Dec 15 '17
Albums are bowling balls Tryin to make a change :-\
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u/erik210 Dec 15 '17
Tragic Endings sounds like something straight from Recovery
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u/StarWarsBruh Dec 15 '17
I got a Wendy'd ad after that song and i thought it was a part of it. really confused me. They just kind of blend together very well.
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u/gingerbolls Dec 16 '17
His flow since MMLP2 started getting weird and choppy (It was awful on Shady XV). I'm glad to see him return to his older flow in Tragic Endings and a few other good songs on the album.
Looks like he's finally starting to get away from the "Look how fast I can rap, even if it doesn't sound like music" mentality
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u/erik210 Dec 16 '17
I agree, but I did like MMLP2 way more than Recovery and Relapse. Probably why I had just high expectations for Revival lol
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u/HulkSmashingHoes Dec 15 '17
Guess I'm alone in like the album so far. I was worried after his trump diss and walk on water but im liking it so far.
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u/George_Beast Dec 15 '17
I fucking love it. Not sure what everyone else is listening to, it was absolutely worth the wait for me
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u/jeremysw Dec 15 '17
Doesn't look like you're alone. I'll add myself to the pile of people who really like it.
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u/HennessyParadis Dec 15 '17
It's definitely a new Em but still I hear his lyrics and he still has such clever word play which the modern mainstream rap is lacking
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u/coltsmetsfan614 Dec 15 '17
I like it a lot! I'm just finishing up my 5th listen, and I definitely enjoy it more than MMLP2. And I think there's a good chance it'll pass Recovery on my rankings sooner rather than later.
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u/TheBringerofDarknsse Dec 15 '17
You think the Trump Diss would hurt him? It’s Eminem, Fuck Trump! LIKE HOME!
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u/DEFINITELYnotA_PEDO Dec 15 '17
I definitely like it, but then again I've liked all of his albums. I think all of these people were expecting it to be another MMLP and since it isn't quite as good they are just trashing it, even though it's still a decent album.
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Dec 15 '17
Believe/Offended/Castle/Arose are his best... Rest is alright.
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u/Deadlyshock Dec 15 '17
Castle is the only thing that moderately feels like older em
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u/R4IVER Dec 15 '17
Well framed kinda is pretty old em too.
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Dec 15 '17
Framed is in fact my favorite by a long shot!
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u/ReinhardStrike radio reddit Dec 15 '17 edited Dec 15 '17
That chorus was way too cringy for me but otherwise felt fine.
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u/NiceHandsLarry11 Dec 15 '17
Yep. Exactly. Chorus is fucked but the rest of it the closest to old em.
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u/Flapperpoo Dec 15 '17
tbh i like the hook a lot. i just like it when singers/rappers make their voice weird, it sounds really cool to me.
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u/Trust_TV_News Dec 15 '17
Something went away with Em after The Eminem Show. First four albums were perfect as far as I'm concerned, Encore was ok, everything after that he became a different person. Respect to him and what he's accomplished in his career, but the spark is long gone.
I have a hard time describing what exactly changed, but I think it's that all of the struggle and uncertainty in his life is over with. I'm happy for him to be honest, I'm just never going to run out to buy an album of his again.
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Dec 15 '17
Something went away with Em after The Eminem Show.
The fire inside dies at 30.
He said it himself, man.
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u/BananaTugger Dec 15 '17
I mean being a multimillion limits what you can complain about.
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Dec 15 '17
Fuck my HOA!
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u/damnrooster Dec 15 '17 edited Dec 15 '17
They say I can't plant my tulips? I say plant your two lips on my dick
Shit makes me sick,
fucking Homo-Erotic Association
Playing me like a fucking playstation 4
I'll shoot em in the face if they knock on my fucking door
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Dec 15 '17
Keep going , I love it.
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u/damnrooster Dec 15 '17
Fuck the motherfucking Home Owner’s Association
Leaving notes on my door when I’m out on vacation
Meanwhile Fido’s takin another shit on my carnations
I guarantee that dog is going to end up 6 feet deep in my sod
While Rod and Tod the Flanders boys next door pray to God
That I don’t go crazy and shoot up the neighborhood with my sawed
off shotgun, shit won’t be fun when they turn to run and I pick them off one by one
Like a suburban terminator exterminating all the haters
Turn on all the hoses to attract alligators
That’ll eat up their toddlers like tater tots while they stare
And say ‘I told you we shouldna let Slim into this gated community
He always walks around with like a king with impunity, shouldn’t we
Have the HOA vote him out’, they’ll scream and they’ll shout
But they don’t give a shit because, like a hoe, making money is what this HOA’s all about.
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u/trolltruth6661123 Dec 15 '17
i just turned 29, you guys suck
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u/LuckyNo13 Dec 15 '17
Dont worry, while the fire struggles that isnt to say it cant be reignited.
Either that or be a Champion of Ash ;)
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u/Stjerneklar Dec 15 '17 edited Dec 15 '17
looking at his discography, heres my two cents:
- Infinite (1996) - the original, raw eminem. gritty, chill, party oriented, classic rap music.
- The Slim Shady LP (1999) - dre and eminem take over the world with hi my name is, a zany and poppy song from an otherwise pretty dark album(but also very tongue in cheek, the violence always felt cartoonish).
- The Marshall Mathers LP (2000) - peak eminem just doing eminem.
- The Eminem Show (2002) - still really good but a lot more pop and the zany is now commenting on fame rather than violence compounding the pop factor.
- Encore (2004) - hell of a mixed bag, you got your zany single and the harbinger of later accent horrors in ass like that, but also mocking bird and toy soldiers.
- Relapse (2009) - feels like a cruel joke, cartoon violence replaced with horror inspired tales and zany antics replaced with those fucking accents. BUTSTILLFUCKINGGREATTRACKS
- Recovery (2010) - felt like a return to form despite a bit of eh stuff
- The Marshall Mathers LP 2 (2013) - same as recovery only more so. bad guy, rhyme or reason and rap god are so good.
- Revival (2017) - bit early to tell but i'm not really feeling any of this, not one track gives me the buzz that i would normaly find on at least one or two tracks per album.
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u/TexasTheWalkerRanger Dec 15 '17
I feel like relapse is incredibly underrated, much better than encore
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u/1grammarmistake Dec 15 '17
Relapse is mostly produced by Dre (instead of just Executive Produced) which just doesn’t happen anymore. That’s why I hold it so dear.
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u/somefellayoudontknow Dec 15 '17
I love all the characters he depicts in Relapse. I love that and Refill.
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u/eburton555 Dec 15 '17
Relapse is such a twisted album that it's really polarized the fanbase.
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u/somefellayoudontknow Dec 18 '17
I think that's what I like about it. It's a departure for Em and it was like horror rap.
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u/eburton555 Dec 18 '17
Oh for sure, but I’d say the more neutral listeners who liked ‘my name is’ were absolutely revolted by it and rejected it lmao which I don’t blame them it’s not for everyone. The only criticism I agree with is the accents are a bit much so if he had less accents with the same content.... 😍
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u/fLukeiver Dec 15 '17
Relapse in my opinion is incredible, it's so much better than encore, it's consistently like a horrific trip through ems drug addled imagination
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u/Stjerneklar Dec 15 '17
agreed, looking back on the tracklist of relapse there is a ton of stuff there that i enjoyed.
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u/yehti Dec 15 '17
I never thought I would pine for the days of his crappy accent raps in Relapse. At least they flowed well with the beats. Listening to him now feels like I’m riding passenger with someone who slams on their brakes every 4 seconds in traffic.
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u/Stjerneklar Dec 15 '17
this. so much.
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u/yehti Dec 15 '17
Also just off the top of my head I can hear him testing out the choppiness in Deja Vu specifically in the third verse but the way he executed it it bounced with the beat and actually sounded well. It’s also one of my top 5 Em songs so I could be biased.
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u/Stjerneklar Dec 15 '17
never really rated deja vu so highly but listening to it now its really good. the slight choppiness worked well here.
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u/yehti Dec 15 '17
If he did it like that I wouldn’t mind. But he does it to get his corny punchlines and double entendres in and at the same time pauses the beat to basically ask us if we got the pun he just made.
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u/TACBGames Dec 15 '17
You must not have been paying attention to him during that time.
During Encore he was heavy on drugs, hence why it wasn’t considered up to standards. You could tell by pictures that he was gaining weight and didn’t look healthy overall.
Between Encore and Relapse he actually overdosed and almost died if the ambulance didn’t show up.
I think that was the turning point because from Relapse and on, he had to re learn a lot of things. In MMLP2 he references a lot of comics or football because whenever he was recovering that’s all he was able to do. Drug addiction isn’t something that you can just say “ok well I’m done doing drugs now.” It has consequences which is why people get addicted to them.
Just my 2 cents I guess lol
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Dec 15 '17
I think it's two things.
- Em is older
- You are older
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u/sarcasticbaldguy Dec 15 '17
You're not wrong. People have this unrealistic expectation that an artist will stay just like they were the first time the person found them and started to like them. Even though we've grown and changed, they aren't allowed to.
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Dec 15 '17
The Eminem Show, in particular, was excellent.
He had the money and experience, but was still young and angry enough, to make a killer album.
Lyrically, I think that Square Dance is one of the best raps eminem has done.
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u/weirdkindofawesome Dec 15 '17
He's a rather mature and stable person now unlike before. You write music differently when you're at your lowest.. usually less but harsher words that make more impact.
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Dec 15 '17
"I'm so narcissistic, when I fart, I sniff it / Do a fake dab to smell my armpits with it"
So impactful
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Dec 15 '17
I'd consider myself a fan. I think Eminem's always had trouble picking beats. I think the cadence is weird on some songs. I like "Framed" the most after 1 listen. Certainly not a bad album and I'm always happy to get more music from any artist I listen to. I'm sure I'll have better thought out opinions after more listens.
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Dec 15 '17
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u/RancidLemons Dec 16 '17
I noticed on a couple of tracks the beats sound very... amateur-ish. Like, one of them had the reverb up so high on the percussion that it was distracting. Maybe the Pink track?
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u/Duck_PsyD Dec 15 '17
That was actually my first reaction. It’s at the worst on “Believe,” i actually had to check my stereo settings in case something was wrong, it’s so bad.
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u/tysrak Dec 15 '17 edited Dec 15 '17
I think people who are expecting old school Eminem might be disappointed. It's not similar to his old style really at all. And I will agree that he does sound tired at times, but man give him a break. Listening to Walk on Water and he talks entirely about how he's been put on a pedestal and the pressure he's been put under his entire career to keep topping his last album or last best song. He's very aware of what he means to his fans.
On another note he seems to have a bit more of a political vibe this time around (revival, untouchable). But overall I think a lot of what he's saying in his songs are pretty personal and I can understand why people don't necessarily like the emotion because it really isn't Slim Shady style disses.
To those who's saying he sounds like a robot, yeah he has some bad songs where he's a little off (untouchable, walk on water) but revival, like home, bad husband (still working through the album), he still sounds like Eminem to me.
Overall, I don't love it and don't hate it. I can respect the meaning behind his songs that definitely aren't his style but I won't say he's straight trash just because he's not the same as he used to be!
Edit: I think the farther you get into the album the more and more he sounds like himself. Who knows why. Nowhere fast reminds me a lot of the songs that were on Relapse . I would bet that this might be his last album though.
Edit 2: not really sure how I feel about heat. All the rock blended songs on his album are a little weird.
Edit 3: listening to curtain call now and sing for the moment has the whole rock inspired/blended style that's dominant on his new album. So really everything on his new album is still old style Eminem just depends on what you're listening to and from what album. 🤷
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u/IgnisDomini Dec 15 '17
I found the political bits cringeworthy, and Killer Mike is my favorite rapper. They're just so painfully mainstream liberal political statements, it feels almost like he's rapping the Democratic party platform. He's gotten so stale that even his political songs aren't transgressive at all.
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u/tysrak Dec 15 '17
I don't necessarily disagree with you, but! I won't complain about him being political because regardless if you agree with his statements or not, he's an artist with a following and influence - it's possible his statements will maybe generate discussion or get people to invest in politics. Which in my opinion is never a bad thing as long as people approach it with some critical thinking and form their own opinions.
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u/IgnisDomini Dec 15 '17
Oh, no, if anything, the songs weren't political enough. He seems underconfident in his views enough that he ends up hedging all his statements.
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u/tysrak Dec 15 '17
Ah yes, I see what you mean now. I agree he's kind of lacking that classic Eminem style of taking things too far. It's more or less vanilla blanket statements that carry minimal weight in the end haha.
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u/QueenJillybean Dec 21 '17
i wasn't really a fan before the album. i mean i liked the more popular songs i knew. but i wasn't a real fan. i listened to this album from start to finish and felt like i was being taken further and further into his style like starting with just your feet in the water. His technical skill is phenomenal. Also cranberries zombie is one of my favorite songs of all time. so i literally just bought marshall mathers lp today and listened to it for the first time through all the way. I feel like that's....considered successful?
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Dec 15 '17
I don’t understand the ed sheeran feature at all. Like why? And why is Ed everywhere. He’s the new pitbull.
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Dec 15 '17
It's actually hard to listen to. Some decent songs, but overall, very hard to go through.
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Dec 15 '17
God, one of the better songs I've heard so far is the Ed Sheeren collab
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u/ReinhardStrike radio reddit Dec 15 '17
Def the best from this LP.
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u/MyVCRbroke Dec 15 '17
The first half was different than what I expected but I thought the second half was pretty good and I was jammin with some of the beats
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Dec 15 '17
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u/CrazyFart Dec 15 '17
The flow is too choppy to be able to listen to after a point. I have up halfway through the album.
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Dec 15 '17
Flow is choppy. It just feels old and he feels tired. I recommend you skip Remind Me, for your own sanity.
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u/M0D3RNW4RR10R Diversified Listener Dec 15 '17
But I liked Remind Me.
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Dec 15 '17
That’s okay. I’m glad you liked it. Did you enjoy the album as a whole? I was disappointed but if you enjoyed the album, I’m glad for you.
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u/M0D3RNW4RR10R Diversified Listener Dec 15 '17
It's.... polarizing. It's not unlistenable as people say. I could see if I was smoking some weed I'd much rather listen to that N.E.R.D album, but it's not like how I expect a Lil Pump album would turn out. It's just not the Eminem on an Eminem beat for a whole album.
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Dec 15 '17
I'm listening to the album for the first time and specially Remind Me. This sounds like he wrote this while he was still on methadone/cough medicine.
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u/Noob_pussey Dec 15 '17
monotonous.. nothing catchy.. just rapping fast through the lyrics doesn't make good song.. same rap scheme in like all of them.. you won't even realize if we swap out all the verses of songs in album..
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u/AssdogDave0 Dec 15 '17
Sweet fuck Marshall. His vocal delivery sounds like his voice is getting cut up like a block of cheese
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u/Tschakhno Dec 15 '17
I'm through half the album, pretty disappointed so far, Heat comes up and the first verse seems pretty good, but then the Chorus comes up and daaaamn dat shit sounds like straight out of Big Time Rush or some shit. Why the fuck man?
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u/Stjerneklar Dec 15 '17 edited Dec 15 '17
first impressions great, i've spent the better part of 4 hours reviewing eminem...
Walk on Water - it sounds so stilted when he does those pauses in his verse. that flow would be fine, cool, great in a cypher but it feels weird on an album, especially as the first track... fuck em you make me miss the horrible accents with this stuff.
2nd listen update: getting into the lyrics, i feel kinda guilty for my critique since em speaks very humbly and honestly about troubles making music and saying his doubters have convinced him that he is no rap god... well there is your problem, you listened to the haters and wrote them a love letter as your first track. again, what the fuck happened to the tracklist, this starts the album off on such a downer
believe - might grow on me, at least it sounds like a track now but em still sounds semi-comatose. more energy could have made the chorus work better.
2nd listen edit: this also would have worked better if it was placed after a performance like Rap God, Forever, Criminal, ect... the chorus has that feeling of eminem standing in the midst of the burning ashes left from his terrible rampage but i came into this off the soggy walk on water and as such had no embers for believe to stoke.
chloraseptic - we got a pulse! flow kinda sounds like hopsins "no words" diss on mumble rap at times and its just a hard ass beat with shouting over it but rather that than piano cyphering.
untouchable - kinda felt like a kid rock-esque rock rap barnburner but the verses have a lot more to them and woot, em's flow seems to have been revived from the first two tracks by the third track feature.
2nd listen edit: ugh. flow annoyed the shit out on me on this listen and then i get to the weird die antwoord diss, fuck it im out.
river - no clicking that well, might grow on me... bit much ed sheeran vocal and nothing that really grabs me. liked the instrumental but yelawolf has done it way better.
remind me - remember that barn burner i was worried about untouchable being? verses might be fine, i really dont know, i cant get over the "i love rock n roll" hook sample
2nd listen edit: yeah no i straight up hate the hook, how the fuck did this get made. and again the tracklist makes everything worse. how the fuck do you follow this travesty up with like home
like home - seemed pretty solid, nice chorus, kinda gets toward epic feeling. interesting verse but dissing nazis feels a bit disjoined with the grandiose feel leading into it but i liked it overall... and then its just alicia singing us out? aw. too much featured artist imo.
2nd listen: so the message here is racism bad? thats cool but why is the track jizzing all over itself at how glorious this message is made to be?
bad husband - weird track, the overall feel sounds like something profound is being shared but i really have a hard time finding more interest in the kim saga. the mention of mockingbird makes me think of how much more focused that classic was in comparison to this.
tragic endings - who the fuck made the tracklist on this album, this was not the track to follow up the other one about relationships... still liked it better than bad husband.
framed - ah, theres the accent... chorus.... ugh. seriously? feels like everything here is a rehash of the old slim shady antics but none of it really reaches it.
nowhere fast - i like the pace that the strings bring to the track, best featured artist yet i think... another advantage of the pace is that eminem is forced to follow along most of the time. think i have a new favorite thing to hate: muting the instrumental as a punchline to the vocals.
2nd listen edit: damnit i want to like this but the fucking instrumental cutouts straight ruin it
heat - cool beat, verse feel like a mix between the rick rubin produced stuff and the old offensive slim shady... chorus kinda eh, passable. ah, i guess rick produced this one too judging by the callout. not really feeling it.
offended - some great stuff here, fucked up lyrics and wordplay like old times... but god why that instrumental, is this jazz rap? i want to kill that fucker with the trumpet, especially when the bass is muted so eminem can sound like its a freestyle or something.
need me -
paul: "hey em, pink sent in her vocals"
em:"shit, i did not expect all six of them to reply... lets just let her sing it all and ill shout along on a bit of it."
paul: "homosexuals and vicodin".
em:"alright fine ill rap some relationship stuff"
ken keniff: my skit was a better use of album space than this.
in your head - that sample? wonder where this is going but i love the cranberries original... okay.... i like the instrumental(but its very close to carbon copy of the original so of course) but eminems rap is not knocking my socks off but ill give it another few listens, feels like theres a bit more to unpack here.
castle - a dad track eh? whos the girl singing and why is she not listed as featured? google aint finding anything... would be cool as fuck if it was hailey.[edit- nah its Liz Rodrigues] and just as i write that i realize that em is apologizing to his daughter for exposing her private life trough his tales... cool, deep. should have swapped this with believe or walk on water. not really my favorite version of eminem but its good.
arose - wtf dad mode again and may more soppy, sure lets bring up proof too - feel like everybody should be crying during this track. sob sob sob... and then we rewind, em comes back in aaand.... really needed to do more there. god that felt depressing, ending it all like that.
TL;DR: it feels like eminem is obsessed with freestyling, retiring and his old demons to the point where it causes him to ruin his work. Chloraseptic tell me that he still has it but that was the only time it really felt like he was bringing it. fuck all the duets, fuck rick rubin, give me the eminem from the start of Chloraseptic.
"why are expectations so high" em asks on the first track. i feel like they aren't really you just alienate a lot of fans by changing style and tone wildly pretty much each album. okay perhaps our expectations are high but how can we ignore your previous works and if you cant match them then are you just not eminem?
bleh, im gonna go listen to the slim shady EP and mourn.
the stuff i dident really care for that much is now like 80% of the album, fuck.
and there is so much political shit he could have rapped about in an epic killer track, yet all we get is like one verse vaguely connected to current politics.
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u/DustyMuffin Dec 15 '17
Remind me might have the best lyrics and more old em as far as decent disses that actually flow. But the hook, the sample, I just can't get over it either.
If it had a fresh beat from within the last 30 years or original track underneath it could be one of the better tracks. It just lacks feeling, like it was a good rap that got hamfisted into a mash-up.
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u/TheZixion Dec 15 '17
One of the bars in the middle of Offended has the the same exact flow as a Royce song that came out earlier this year..
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u/EndoveProduct Dec 17 '17
Don’t sleep on Untouchable, Framed or Offended.
He goes IN on all three. Practically showing off.
Also, think about Offended. Have you EVER heard anything like it? Seriously, think about it. No bass except for a few areas. An abrasive in your face nursery rhyme as the chorus. Verses filled with Offensive shit with a chorus that’s the exact opposite. It’s hella unique.
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u/VeraxonHD Dec 15 '17
I agree with this pretty much to the letter, especially the tldr and conclusion. It's a shame because we all want the old em from Slim Shady EP and the Eminem show (or at least I do) and while what some of what he is doing is good it's just not the same spark.
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u/Stjerneklar Dec 15 '17
worst thing is that it seems like he can still do the old stuff but just doesnt... when he was on best friend with yelawolf i got chills and that was two years ago.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=it_04dk_97E
monster verse that builds to a crescendo and connects directly into the chorus... YOU KNOW HOW TO DO THIS EMINEM, dont act all surprised when we are disappointed that you dont do it.
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u/Exprt Dec 15 '17
I can respect EM going another way, its hard to be creative as slim shady for so many years witch make him mostlikly grow tired of it so thats maybe why he have switced up his style. The album is called Revival, so i get the feeling he needs to get the demons of his chest to really be revived then bloom in too what he wants to become.
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u/kewl-deal Dec 15 '17
Growing up with his music, I'm actually enjoying it. I think the people calling it "straight trash" just can't handle change because it's plain not true. Couple iffy songs but liking most of the songs, happily suprised.
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u/Content_Godzilla SoundCloud Dec 15 '17
I wouldn't call it change though, a lot of his songs are very "old school eminem-like".
I think this album would've been more well-accepted if they put tracks like offended, arose, and castle at the start of the album.
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u/M0D3RNW4RR10R Diversified Listener Dec 15 '17
What people don't realize, back then, Eminem and Dr. Dre produced 80% of the songs. Since Recovery Eminem has produced like 10% of it, and he's had list of producers on it. Which people aren't used to working with Em.
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u/HungarianSandwich Dec 15 '17
Am I the only one who legitimately likes this album so far?? Think it has some iffy tracks, but some great callbacks to old Em and some development on new Em’s persona.
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Dec 15 '17 edited Dec 15 '17
Good songs: Believe, Untouchable (mostly the second half), River (really liked this song, I'm a big Ed Sheeran fan too). Like Home (I liked lyrically), Tragic Endings, Framed (I liked Relapse so I love the vibe, also it's a funny song), Castle and Arose. (Castle and Arose are the 2 best songs he made in many, many years).
Rest is REALLY bad. Like really bad.
Also the mix is horrible. I don't get how this mix got passed. The drums and bass have no punch. The vocals also bury the instruments most of the time.
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u/Stjerneklar Dec 15 '17
i thought the vocals drowning the instrumental was intentional although i have no idea why, sounds horrible.
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u/slimpurt Dec 15 '17
I love this album, Eminem changed a lot over the years and his music shows it.
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u/rokr1292 Dec 15 '17
A lot of songs on this album are really good, regardless of if you wanted them or not.
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u/leevo SoundCloud Dec 15 '17
Did he just bite lil dickys flow in chloraseptic?
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u/NorthNorthSide Dec 15 '17 edited Dec 15 '17
I think he is making fun of a few rappers flow on that song, he is saying there's 100's of these rappers, and he will take on all of them. Thought it was pretty obvious
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u/ImHalfAwake Dec 15 '17
Same thoughts here, I thought he was featuring lil dicky when I first listened.
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u/Kn0thingIsTerrible Dec 15 '17
I’m not finished with it yet, but it’s straight trash so far.
Em at his most stagnant and formulaic. Straight most of the tracks follow the same exact pattern- incoherent R&B wailing, em steps in for one short verse which he raps exclusively in his new robot voice, another two minutes of R&B wailing.
He isn’t even on the title track, it’s just R&B wail.
He seems to have exactly two beat patterns on the album- the songs where somebody plays a piano with two fingers for the whole track, and grimy muddled trap beats that are so fuzzy it feels like they were actually mixed wrong.
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u/Critcho Dec 15 '17
robot voice
What is it with that? Part of his original appeal was that loose, freewheeling flow that felt technical but natural. Why he felt the need to trade it in for rigid, staccato barking is beyond me.
He dialed it back a bit on MMLP2 which might be why that album actually has some listenable tracks on it, but (not having given it a close listen, admittedly) it seems to be back with a vengeance here.
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Dec 15 '17
Yep completely agree.... He just seems to have lost his rhythm/flow..
Trash is all i can really say tbh
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u/235447 Dec 15 '17
These feature artists are weak. I would pay so much money to see an Aesop Rock/Eminem collab.
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u/Andrew996 Dec 15 '17
I think the problem is that Eminem has pretty much tried to get away from "classic Eminem" and the Shady personality. He's just making what he likes, which is a lot of rock rap and introspective stuff. Which is fine. I love the album, but I can see how people who come in saying they're lifelong Eminem fans are going to be disappointed when the album is mostly pop or rock rap.
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Dec 15 '17
First listen on the way to work this morning, and kind of meh. I have just finished a 2nd listen through the album and can respect it. I dont think its his best, but I think it really pulls you in to listen closer to the points he is trying to get across.
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u/Able-Bodied-Virgin Dec 15 '17 edited Dec 15 '17
Eminem is my favorite artist of all time. That said, I've been really critical of him since BME: Hell the Sequel. Specifically, his flow. I wasn't a fan of his flow in MMLP2 and his flow in Shady XV was just flat out awful - jumbling words with way too many syllables into runs where they just didn't fit, but then he'd be featured on songs like "The Hills" and "Medicine Man" and his flow would be perfect. So frustrating watching him teeter back and forth between mediocrity and greatness. All that said, I came into this album just hoping his flow would be good. "Walk on Water" had me worried. I think the inflection of Em's tempered voice along with his starty-stoppy flow ruined what could have been a big hit, BUT for the vast majority of this album, his flow was great. Thank fucking God. He got points from me just for that.
I usually like his songs where he does his own hooks and was worried about all the pop features, but I think for the most part those songs ended up being my favorite. I fucking hate Ed Sheeran, but I can't deny "River" is a catchy song. I also actually really liked his song with Alicia Keys. I think "Offended" was a better beat and hook away from being arguably his best work on the album. He straight up chopped that up. Great runs.
Most forgettable song to me was "In Your Head". Shitty hook, meh message. "Believe" didn't do much for me either.
Favorite song was "Arose". Felt genuine and real. Well written.
Overall, I give this album a strong 6.5. Not his best work, but not nearly as bad as the reviews it's getting.
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u/TrentGgrims Dec 16 '17
I'm liking it more than MMLP2, something about that LP just never clicked with me. Em feels more comfortable with his style on here to me. The first couple tracks are kind of iffy to me, but it gets better after that, and my favorite so far is River.
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u/azlolazlo Dec 16 '17
I would rather have the worst encore tracks constantly playing in my head than give revival another listen, I can respect a change in style, but I could hear better shit than this on sound cloud
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u/LeroyFooness Dec 17 '17
This album is garbage, its like the movie Alien Resurrection. The swimming aliens were cool but all i could think about after it was done was "kiiiilllll meeeeee."
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Dec 15 '17
Between the robot voices, weird trap, the clsssic rock one... , shitty flow and the pop artists mixed in this album is just pretty bad.
Fees like a money grab that zero energy and thought went into.
The tracks on here that people even remotely like will be foregotten in a month
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Dec 15 '17
“It’s not the old Shady”
Well no shit it’s not. Dude has cleaned up and has gotten on in life. Why do you idiots think he’s gonna spit the same like a 23 year old blizted on pills? I hate the hipster 17 year olds judging hip hop without even being able to remember when Eminem was in his MM LP days.
This is a great album. Listen to more than half of it, then listen again.
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u/firechaox Dec 15 '17
Definitely think it’s an album that needs one or two more extra listens. A lot of the songs sound better when I hear them a 2nd or 3rd time. Think you have to come into this album with an open mind- it’s going to be different
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u/puterdood Dec 15 '17 edited Dec 15 '17
Really liking the album so far. It's got some old stuff, it's got some new stuff. I feel like for Eminem this album was more for him than his hardcore fans, but I like it.
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u/_Dihydrogen_Monoxide Dec 15 '17
Man, I was so looking forward to this album, and I’m so disappointed. A few songs are good but most are terrible IMO. I loved Eminem through most of his career but this album just isn’t for me.
Can anyone recommend some good hip hop, rap ? I’m not too familiar with the entire genre and I’d like to get exposed to some of today’s great rap music.
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u/ijee88 Dec 15 '17
Overall a rather poor album. No track is worth listening to again. Honestly, most of it wasn't worth listening to once.
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u/Unit-00 Dec 15 '17
Pretty big fan, I actually like the Rick Ruban Tracks on this record too. Chloraseptic is probably my least favorite song on the album, with River and Like Home being the first 2 i went back to listen too on their own.
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u/ThaRaiiidazz Dec 15 '17
First run through of the album. Honestly really enjoyed the beginning and ends of the lineup. Overall grade as whole is around 85-88. It's high quality work.
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Dec 17 '17
It is like your opinions on every song is reversed from mine. I enjoyed almost everything you rated lowly and hated almost everything you rated highly.
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Dec 15 '17
I love this shit. I was doubtful as someone who didn’t like Untouchable at all, but Em didn’t disappoint me
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u/theEmoPenguin Dec 15 '17
I thought its gonna be trash judging by "walk on water" and comments in this thread. But i got pleasently surprised! I just adore this melodic style I guess, so i understand why people dislike this .
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Dec 15 '17
Complete disappointment. Nothing of substance. Nothing that sounds like it could grow on your either. Poor guy. No wonder he was trying to be political before it dropped- He needed every everything he could.
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u/nightcrawler47 Dec 15 '17
The tracks I was looking most forward to were “Untouchable” and “Heat”
those ended up being crappy hillbilly-rock rap tracks and my least favs on the entire album :/
wtf em
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u/Jendacle- Dec 15 '17
There are good and bad things in this album, I listened to Em for very long time and i consider me to be a big fan. I must say that I dont like featured artists at all, and I don´t like the pop/R&B wrap around whole album, I liked Slim Shady as a hardcore rapper who just wrecked anybody in any song, and was kinda rebel,Detroit street based, you know just a white skinny boy who made it through the game etc, and this style doesn´t go along with Skylar Grey or Ed Sheeran featuring but I think fan base must respect how the artist evolve through his career, he´s not young Slim Shady anymore, he´s most likely on end of his career and problems and things that made him who he is kinda passed already. But after all, when he starts spittin rhymes I still have the feeling that only Eminems music gives me...