Songoftheday 5/31/23 - I've created a monster 'cause nobody wants to see Marshall no more, they want Shady I'm chopped liver...

 

 

"Without Me" - Eminem

from the album The Eminem Show (2002)

Billboard Hot 100 peak: #2 (five weeks)

Weeks in the Top-40: 16

 

Today's song comes from rapper Eminem, whose second album The Marshall Mathers LP (named after his real birth name) landed him his first big hit with the top ten single "The Real Slim Shady" in the summer of 2000, along with a follow-up, "Stan", which didn't make the pop top-40 but is revered as one of his best songs coined a new term for overzealous fans. 

In 2002, Eminem returned with his next record The Eminem Show, preceded by the lead single "Without Me". Written by the rapper with producer Jeff Bass and inserting a quick interpolation of the 80s single "Buffalo Gals" from Malcolm McLaren at the beginning that gave Trevor Horn and Anne Dudley writers credit, the song attempts to recreate the bratty wackiness from his breakthrough single and up everything five notches. This resulted in crass attacks on everyone from Prince to Elvis to alt-dance guru Moby to the fifth most famous member of NSYNC Chris Kirkpatrick, even throwing in Dick Cheney (and in effect George W Bush) for some flaming. It expanded on his "Eminem as Loki-like instigator" personality, though including a dig at his mother kind of pops the bubble for a bit. And with a chorus that has a melody like a elementary school playground taunt, and I can't feel for this being quite a step down from the devilishly clever "Slim Shady", full of grudges and resentment. But nevertheless his audience ate it up in droves, and surpassed the previous high mark he claimed on the last disc. The music video, full of childish jokes, was a fixture on MTV, and Eminem found his momentum continuing (including some inexplicable critical acclaim)...

"Without Me" became Eminem's second top ten crossover pop hit, spending over a month in the runner-up position of Billboard magazine's Hot 100 starting in June of 2002, while peaking at #13 on their R&B Singles chart and #5 on the Rap Songs list. On the radio, the song spent a week at #1 on both the Mainstream Top-40 and Rhythmic airplay charts, and #15 on the Alternative Rock Airplay list. Internationally, the single topped the charts in Australia, Austria, Belgium (#1 Wallonia/#2 Flanders), Croatia, Denmark, Germany, Ireland, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom, and made the top ten in Italy (#2), Spain (#2), Finland (#2), Hungary (#2), France (#3), Czech Republic (#5), and Greece (#6). The Eminem Show album, released in May of that year, took six weeks at #1 on the Billboard 200 sales tally, as well as on the R&B Albums list, going on to sell over eleven million copies. At the Grammy Awards in 2003, "Without Me" won for Best Short Form Music Video, and was nominated for Best Male Rap Solo Performance (losing to Nelly for "Hot In Herre") as well as Record Of The Year (which went home with Norah Jones for "Don't Know Why"). The Eminem Show album won the trophy for Best Rap Album, and was also up for Album of the Year, which Jones also won for her Come Away With Me. 

Both Eminem and the album will be back to the series.

(3/10)

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Here's Eminem performing the song at the MTV Movie Awards in 2002....

and lastly, in concert in his hometown of Detroit...

Up tomorrow: Grammy magnet rocker is catching some rays.