Songoftheday 9/13/21 - Hi kids do you like violence? Wanna see me stick Nine inch Nails through each one of my eyelids?

 

 

"My Name Is" - Eminem

from the album The Slim Shady LP (1999)

Billboard Hot 100 peak: #36 (two weeks)

Weeks in the Top-40: 4

 

Today's song comes from Marshall Mathers, who records under the nickname Eminem. The rapper grew up mostly in the Detroit area, where he had a tumultuous time with both his mother and the locals, getting bullied and abused regularly by both. Latching on to hip-hop music in his early teens, Eminem took his moniker after dropping out of school. Eventually, he was signed to the small indie label WEB Entertainment, where he released his debut album Infinite in 1996, which got no positive attention. However, his second release on WEB,  The Slim Shady EP, did get Eminem noticed by Jimmy Iovine of Interscope Records, and in turn seminal rap icon Dr. Dre of N.W.A.. Signing on with the label, and using a couple of the tracks from the EP, the rapper released his major-label debut The Slim Shady LP at the beginning of 1999. It was preceded by the single release of "Just Don't Give A F***", a redone track from the EP that Interscope released as the teaser single for the new album. The track made the R&B Singles chart in Billboard magazine, and "bubbled under" their pop Hot 100 at #114 at the close of 1998. That was followed by Mathers' first true single from the album, "My Name Is". Meant to be just as much an introduction record as Boyz II Men's "Motownphilly", albeit a twisted perverted one, the track brings the character of "Slim Shady" to the American conscience - starting off name checking Nine Inch Nails, Pamela Lee Anderson, Usher, and the Spice Girls as he describes himself as a drugged grown up abused kid who lashes out at the world in that nasty nasal tone that somehow connected with fans. This is all on a sample of gay jazz/R&B musician Labi Siffre's 1975 track "I Got The...", which was only cleared when the rapper removed anti-gay lyrics from the record. Embraced by both rock and urban radio, and with a flashy music video on MTV that had the rapper dress up as Bill Clinton and Marilyn Manson, Eminem found himself with his first hit single...

 

 

"My Name Is" became Eminem's first top-40 pop hit in March of 1999. The song rose to #18 on Billboard's R&B chart, and even got enough rock radio airplay to appear on their Altenative format list at #37. Internationally, the single did even better, reaching the top ten in the UK (#2), Iceland (#3), Ireland (#4), New Zealand (#4), and Norway (#8), and made the top-40 in Australia (#13), Denmark (#13), Sweden (#16), the Netherlands (#17), Austria (#24), Switzerland (#29), Belgium (#33F), Germany (#37), and Canada (#38). The Slim Shady LP, released in February of that year, spend over two years on the Billboard 200 sales tally, two weeks of that at #2, going on to sell over four million copies. At the Grammy Awards in 2000, "My Name Is" won the award for Best Rap Solo Performance, while the Slim Shady LP won for Best Rap Album. 

The next single from the record, "Guilty Conscience", paired Eminem up with producer/mentor Dr. Dre as opposite ends of the moral spectrum in someone's mind in three disturbing vignettes, The track, hampered on the radio by its lyrical content, still was a minor R&B hit (#56), and peaked at #5 in the UK. The song was also nominated in 2000 for a Grammy for Best Duo/Group Rap Performance, which went to the Roots and Erykah Badu for "You Got Me". Eminem will be back to the series many, many times.

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Here's Eminem performing (to a mostly white audience) at MTV's Spring Break in 1999...

Next up, live in concert in Sweden the same year...

And lastly, at the MTV Video Music Awards with Dr. Dre doing "My Name Is" and "Guilty Conscience"...

Up tomorrow: A Notorious widow goes on through the evening.