The World Will Relapse on May 19th

With Eminem's LOOOOOOOOOONG awaited fifth album release Relapse due in just a couple of weeks, a lot of buzz and controversy has been going on in the rap world. For starters, each one of his singles so far has spurred a lot of hate from the media towards himself, the genre, its fans, everything. But, what the hell else could be expected when you're talking about SLIM SHADY??? Its been a long time since we've heard anything new by Eminem, sure there was the occasional underground remix or featured single or whatever, but for the most part, Eminem fans like myself have been forced to listen to his while classic, but outdated older albums. I'm not complaining, songs like "Lose Yourself," "My Name Is," etc, will NEVER get old.

The title of his album is actually talking about Eminem himself, who during this mysterious disappearance from the public for several years, he was coping with an addiction to prescription pills. Recently, he has begun talking a lot about this addiction he had, and the troubles it brought. He claims the main reason he started using these pills in the first place was because he was trying to deal with the murder of a very dear friend of his Proof, a late member of the rap group D12. He then couldn't pull himself out of this cocktail of Vicodin, and other pills which would make him high. Pictures of him gaining serious weight started appearing on the Internet, which he claims were also a result of his habits. Addiction to drugs runs in his family he claims. He said he was finally able to now understand his mother, a person whom he'd been feuding with publicly for the better part of his career. It wasn't until his doctor told him that he was going to die if he kept this up, that he stopped.

In a recent interview with XXl magazine, Eminem told the world his story over the past five or so years, and how he is trying to get out of it. He said he hadn't recorded a song while being sober in as long as he could remember, until now. Rap wasn't cutting it for him anymore, he said it used to make him high, but it was no longer doing that, so he resorted to taking pills instead. Now though, he is back in the rap game strong as ever, and Relapse is just around the corner. But, some people think Relapse is a little too late. They say the days Eminem's controversy are long over, something which I disagree with. Sure yeah, the world was getting by without Eminem, but when he gets back, people will realize that rap was really hurting and they're glad to have him back.


Relapse's cover art, unique, not unlike what we're used to with Eminem.