So why is Eminem’s The Slim Shady LP on this best 1,000 albums ever thing?
WWhen I was trying to think about the hook, as we say in the biz, for this piece on The Slim Shady LP – the highest “ranked” Eminem album on this here best 1,000 albums ever – I made a connection that ties to The White Stripes.
I was thinking about the first time that I ever heard an Eminem song. It was on the radio, and it was “My Name Is.” This was back when I listened to terrestrial radio, which I did a great deal of in those far-gone days.
I had never heard anything quite like it before – familiar in a way, with the bombastic wizardry of Dr. Dre producing, but wholly new in the way this white kid from Detroit could snark and make jokes and flit agilely from character to character – from making believe to hard truths and back again – all with supernaturally talented rap skills right out of the gate.
I had a familiar feeling when I heard “Dead Leaves and the Dirty Ground,” also on the radio, just a few years later: incredible music that’s both familiar and unique at the same time that immediately makes you think about music forever in a small but spectacular way.
I still love the looping, loopy funk of “My Name Is,” but there are aspects of The Slim Shady LP that I’m even more impressed with these days.
Like he would do later with masterpiece tracks like “Stan” and “Lose Yourself,” “If I Had” is an early version of this Eminem mode: dead serious, playing “himself” through and through (as he would in 8 Mile the movie), and most importantly rapping in a way that is absolutely absorbing and engaging.
Every time I throw on “If I Had,” I recognize it as a showcase of superior writing that any aspiring scribe could learn quite a bit from. The genius is in the details, the specificity, which is completely honest and relatable.
I’m blown away by the section where Eminem takes us through all the things he’s tired of, and the way things land on the same damn Nike Air hat.
I can picture that Nike Air hat in my mind: it might look different for you, but for me it’s white, and it’s dirty with sweat stains, and it’s on the floor next to his bed. That’s the clear picture that this guy I’ve never met and will never meet is painting with his words here.
I’m tired of fakin’ knots with a stack of ones
Havin’ a lack of funds and resortin’ back to guns
Tired of bein’ stared at
Tired of wearin’ the same damn Nike Air hat
And then when we get to where hip hop lives, I picture the radio blaring this next to his bed, because it’s time to get up and go to work (with that same damn Nike Air hat) at some thankless job that pays little and has zero future.
And I’m tired of radio stations tellin’ fibs
Tired of JLB sayin’, “Where hip hop lives”
I loved “My Name Is” as a younger man, and I am in thrall to “If I Had” as a… uh, older dude these days. It’s that good.
And then “Guilty Conscience” is a funky hip hop ride, a dynamite collaboration between Eminem and Dr. Dre, genuinely hilarious, and quite dark (and will not play nicely for those with more delicate sensibilities) all at the same time.
Weirdly, almost remarkably, the songs entitled “Just Don’t Give a Fuck” and “Still Don’t Give a Fuck” are both outstanding while being their own things: the former slightly psychedelic while the latter is hardcore yet groovy hip hop.
Some stats & info about Eminem – The Slim Shady LP
- What kind of musical stylings does this album represent? Hip Hop, Rap, Hardcore Rap
- Rolling Stone’s greatest 500 albums ranking – #352
- All Music’s rating – 5 out of 5 stars
- When was The Slim Shady LP released? 1999
- My ranking, the one you’re reading right now – #108 out of 1,000
Eminem’s The Slim Shady LP on Spotify
A lyrical snippet from Eminem’s The Slim Shady LP that’s evocative of the album in some way, maybe
I lay awake and strap myself in the bed with a bulletproof vest on and shoot myself in the head.
What does the “best 1,000 albums ever” mean and why are you doing this?
Yeah, I know it’s audacious, a little crazy (okay, maybe a lot cray cray), bordering on criminal nerdery.
But here’s what it’s NOT: a definitive list of the Greatest Albums of All-Time. This is 100% my own personal super biased, incredibly subjective review of what my top 1,000 albums are, ranked in painstaking order over the course of doing research for nearly a year, Rob from High Fidelity style. Find out more about why I embarked on a best 1,000 albums ever project.