What to Know about “Music To Be Murdered By – Side B (Deluxe Edition)" by Eminem?

“Music to Be Murdered By – Side B (Deluxe Edition)"

Eminem's new album. Photo: Popular Online

Two years after releasing his album Kamikaze, Eminem surprised fans by dropping his 11th album, Music To Be Murdered By on January 17, 2020.

The rapper announced the shock drop on Twitter, writing: "It’s your funeral."

Eminem’s surprise album release may bear the Hitchcock-referencing title “Music to Be Murdered By,” but, yes, as you’d expect, “Music to Murder To” might be a more apt description. The 20-track LP, his tenth since soundtracking the turn of the millennium with 1999’s “The Slim Shady LP,” finds the Detroit rap legend in an alternately rancorous and pensive mood while showcasing his still obliterative rhyming skills, a penchant for controversy and even a provocative turn of questionably executed advocacy for gun safety.

Featuring everyone from Q-Tip to Ed Sheeran, Anderson.Paak and the gone-too-soon emo-rap icon Juice Wrld, the album poses the question: When you’ve been raging against the world for a half-century, is there anything left unscathed? Eminem takes listeners on a tour of gripes familiar and occasionally new, ranging in theme from domestic abuse to copious opiate use, various rap feuds, staying culturally relevant, euthanized childhood pets and a preoccupation with mass shootings. as reported by Variety.

Although Eminem’s impish affectation has been replaced over time with a far more grouchy demeanor, don’t let the Hitchcock references, dad beard or Simon and Garfunkel samples fool you with illusions of maturity or subtlety. He wants you to know that he very much still does not give a f—, as promised way back in ‘99. Some of Eminem’s references in his diss-topian rhymes — JonBenet Ramsey and Ayatollah Khomeini, for example — may have been best left in the last century, but it’s his commentary on a far more persistent phenomenon that has the Internet ablaze.

Eminem's "Music To Be Murdered By" Review

So far fans have a mixed response to the album. One wrote: "This is somewhat ambitious at times and sometimes it doesn’t sound too bad...but then there tracks like Those Kinda Nights, which is like the new WTP. Awful. Truly awful. Some of the instrumentation is actually cool, The Sun cited.

"It’s just a shame that Eminem, who is so inconsistent on this record, is the one rapping and singing over it."

This one was loving it: "This is Eminem’s best album since the second Marshall Mathers LP.

"Not only does it feel like a better and more concise version of the best parts of Kamikaze and Revival, but he also nails the reprise of the Slim Shady persona throughout and expertly blends his insane god-tier lyricism and knack for selecting feature artists with the theme of the album, Alfred Hitchcock-inspired glamorified gore, which jives with Slim Shady perfectly."

While another said: "It’s pretty clear that Eminem is starting to let critics get into his head.

"As a fan of his, he really needs to take time off and stop rushing out mediocrity because I know he has a Relapse-level album inside him.

"And after all the dark things Eminem has said over the years, that Ariana Grande line was genuinely shocking."

Forbes said the album "repeats the worst mistakes of its predecessors, including leaden beats, insufferable choruses and tasteless punchlines that are devoid of humour".

Who is Eminem?

Eminem. Photo: When Waffles Attack

Rapper, actor and music producer Eminem is one of the best-selling musicians of the 21st century and one of the most influential rappers of all time.

Born Marshall Bruce Mathers III in 1972 in Missouri, Eminem had a turbulent childhood. He dropped out of school in the ninth grade and worked odd jobs until finally making it as a rapper upon the release of The Slim Shady LP in early 1999. The album went multi-platinum, garnering Eminem two Grammy Awards and four MTV Video Music Awards.

In 2000, Eminem released The Marshall Mathers LP, which was noted as the fastest-selling album in rap history. Two years later, he delivered the Academy Award-winning song "Lose Yourself," from the semi-autobiographical drama 8 Mile.

In 2010, he released the Grammy-winning album Recovery, a highly autobiographical attempt to come to terms with his struggles with addiction and experience with rehabilitation.

The Marshall Mathers LP 2 (2013) also garnered numerous accolades, and the rapper later followed with Revival (2017), Kamikaze (2018) and Music to Be Murdered By (2020), according to Biography.

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