... That snap you back into reality. Mine seems to be death or tragedy. Last week I found out that someone I knew once, well someone I dated (if that's even what we could call it) from High School died. He's the second person that I had a "relationship" with and the third person in my graduating class and someone that I knew that died. The thing that sucked is the two people that I was in relationships with, are two people I never really knew after High School. One I was such a pain in the butt to after I broke up with him. I refused to speak to him. So when he died, like this one, I didn't feel I deserved, or had a right to be upset. Somehow though, I found peace with it. I went to his funeral, said my apologies and lived my life.
The biggest thing i have learned is that you can't go on making the same mistakes that you made. I know there are people that I do not talk to, for whatever reasons those might be, but I know that each day I try to make the best of the relationships I do have.
Ugh, what brought this on-today is that guy's funeral... I don't know if I should be sad and cry or what. All I do know is that I am affected by this, and it is definitely sad.
Well to the guy i once knew, Rest in Peace- I hope that the life you have now is better than the life you had here.
And a little bit of a prayer to all of those who have gone before, here is a little thank you for reminding me of the person I need to continue to grow to be, via Eminem.
Saturday, July 31, 2010
Friday, July 30, 2010
HE'S BACK!!!
So this blog has been loooong overdue..
I know that he has many enemies in the world inside and outside of music. He is at times abrasive, rude, misogynistic, ugly, catastrophic, damaging and hurtful. But when I listen to him, I hear someone just fighting to stay alive, someone who is trying to give a voice to all those who have been so lost at times. And one of those voices turns out to be his own. He might not be liked by many, but he is loved by many and I am one of them. I don’t understand it, since his music at times goes against everything I believe in my fiber, but I think too often we hide behind what we are unwilling to say, and if there is anything that I have learned out of his music, it is that you have to stop hiding.
With that, this particular blog is about one that goes by many names, but today I am just going to call him Marshall Bruce Mathers III. Where do I start…? I fell in love with Marshall Bruce Mathers III aka, Eminem, aka Slim Shady. When his first track “My name is” dropped on TRL in 1999. I think for me I was in a music rut. Tupac had died, and this hip hop loving fan was lost, needing something fresh among the bubble gum Pop music that was breaking out. Don’t get me twisted, I was a middle school Backstreet and *Nsync fan! But during this time in my life, my parents were going through an awful divorce and I sort of just needed something to relate to.
“My name is” aired on TRL and I lost it. Who was this crazy, white boy attempting to turn the rap game on its heels? I mean “My name is,” was catchy if anything.
But it definitely wasn’t a one hit wonder. The album showed much strength, and carried the popularity he received much farther than I even think he imagined. His lines were/are just mind-blowing. This rapper for Detroit showed me something about myself that I didn’t know I needed or wanted. The Slim Shady LP definitely filled a void that I wasn’t sure needed filling. I was a little broken. 12 years old, and having my life literally turned upside down. My mom kicked my dad out of the house the morning of my 12th birthday. It was 1am, my dad came into my room and told me that he wished I had a very happy birthday and that he would see me later that day. I wasn’t sure what was going on, I mean, who gets woken up like that by their parents. This was already after months of my dad having sleepovers with my cousin and I in our family room in the basement of our house. It was crazy. So after sort of laying in bed trying to figure out what was going on, I crawled out onto the landing of my second floor room and peered over my balcony to see that my father was being escorted out of the house by a police officer, ON MY BIRTHDAY! I don’t know what it was about Slim Shady that woke me up. Maybe it was the way he sounded, maybe it was what he said. Maybe it was the fact that there was a shift in how I felt about my mother, that he seemed to tap into in his music with his. I’m not sure, all I know was that I heard it and was hooked. I think the main thing came out with his line “99% of my life I was lied to.” Felt like at that particular moment in my life, I had been lied to. You have this version of the life that you think is yours. You are pretty much naïve to the world around you. And then in one moment the life that you thought you had gets sort of ripped away. I guess what really happened, is that Eminem didn’t sugar coat the world around him. If he was angry at the life he had, the mother he had, the broken relationships, well he seemed to just let you have it. Looking back on it, I guess he taught me not to hold anything back. It’s funny, you never realize how much something can have an impact on your life and his music definitely had an impact on mine. At any rate, I followed this rising star.
I think I might have mentioned that I was abducted? If not, well there you go. I have probably mentioned this in another blog, and if I haven’t here it is. I spent a semester “healing” from all of the drama of my life, that stemmed from being abducted, and it was in this that I started writing my blogs. I may or may not “talk” about the real reason why I created this blog, but when I am ready you’ll get more.
Needless to say, Em was my comfort, like a teddy bear. My best friends (one guy and one girl) also shared my love of Em so it was nice. The Slim Shady LP was the beginning, then came The Marshall Mathers LP, with “B*** Please II” and “The Way I Am”- OMG! It was after this album that I got to see the genius at work live. Jess, my best friend in High School and still one of my really good friends now and I went to the Up and Smoke Tour! Such an amazing concert!! It was Dr. Dre, Xzibit, Snoop Dog, Ice Cube, some others that I can’t remember and Em. Oh, it was the first and last concert that I have gotten a chance to see him in So sad. Anyways, the day that The Eminem Show came out was the day before the Santa Clara DA picked me up and returned me to my dad. So I spent a day with 2 cops, not really talking much, crying the whole time and listening to The Eminem Show on repeat. From "White America" to "Cleanin’ out my closet" Em just spoke to the pain that I was going through in that moment. And I liked the way he gave it to then President Bush and the ugly politics we were seeing post 9/11 ;)
Then came Encore, which I thought was good. I mean “Mockingbird”
was great, people complain about Em’s lyrics and then criticize him being a good father etc, but I hear this song and others that he has written specifically for his daughter and I am floored. Then Em dropped off the planet, dealing with the loss of his best friend Proof, drugs, rehab, his relationships etc. Relapse came out and I was like HE’S BACK!!! But the thing about both of these albums, is that there are only a handful of songs that I can truly love. With the other albums, I am going through the whole disc from start to finish, skits included. These two albums I’m bouncing back and forth; which brings me to the reason I am writing this particular blog, on this particular subject.
Eminem slowly started to make his way back into the rap game, doing colabos on songs like Forever with Drake and Weezey. But in 2010 he dropped the much anticipated album RECOVERY which I thought was supposed to be part 2 of Relapse. Anyways, Recovery shows the depth of Eminem in a way I didn’t think was possible. So often Eminem is critiquing other people, but in this album, it’s him who he turns his rants on. It is the most raw I have ever seen him be, at least I think so. He gives himself a hard time about Encore and Relapse and I couldn’t figure it out. I liked those albums, I didn’t love them, but I liked them. So one day after I bought the album, I decided to listen to all of his studio released albums in chron. order (and no I do not have Infinite). When I got to Encore and Relapse I realized that he was right, those two albums were jokes. There might have been one or two good songs on them, but they weren’t his best. Recovery to me fits in very well right after The Eminem Show, it’s as if he didn’t even have Encore and Relapse after I heard Recovery, every song is a good one. And it seems as if the fans agree, he’s held the #1 spot on the Billboard charts for 5 weeks now, and I hope he isn’t uprooted..
I’ll leave you with some of my favorite songs, including a few off of his new one. And one day very soon I’ll tease out one of those songs on Recovery and tell you how I feel about it. But here is what I will say, Em has seen me through my ups and downs. And this Recovery album is perfect with where I am now in my life, because I have finally made it through all of the shit! So as much as Recovery was a healing process for him, it had/has the same effect on me. I am excited to see what else he can bring and to all of those people who need to hear it let me tell you- HE IS THE GREATEST RIGHT NOW! Weezey has his following, but it’s not quite up to Em’s stature. I love T.I. and I’ll give cred to Jay and Drake, but Em has my heart!
Check out Recovery and tell me what you think..
So here are the videos and some of the songs that I LOVE by Eminem:
Okay so those are some of my favs, I could go on for ever!!
I know that he has many enemies in the world inside and outside of music. He is at times abrasive, rude, misogynistic, ugly, catastrophic, damaging and hurtful. But when I listen to him, I hear someone just fighting to stay alive, someone who is trying to give a voice to all those who have been so lost at times. And one of those voices turns out to be his own. He might not be liked by many, but he is loved by many and I am one of them. I don’t understand it, since his music at times goes against everything I believe in my fiber, but I think too often we hide behind what we are unwilling to say, and if there is anything that I have learned out of his music, it is that you have to stop hiding.
With that, this particular blog is about one that goes by many names, but today I am just going to call him Marshall Bruce Mathers III. Where do I start…? I fell in love with Marshall Bruce Mathers III aka, Eminem, aka Slim Shady. When his first track “My name is” dropped on TRL in 1999. I think for me I was in a music rut. Tupac had died, and this hip hop loving fan was lost, needing something fresh among the bubble gum Pop music that was breaking out. Don’t get me twisted, I was a middle school Backstreet and *Nsync fan! But during this time in my life, my parents were going through an awful divorce and I sort of just needed something to relate to.
“My name is” aired on TRL and I lost it. Who was this crazy, white boy attempting to turn the rap game on its heels? I mean “My name is,” was catchy if anything.
But it definitely wasn’t a one hit wonder. The album showed much strength, and carried the popularity he received much farther than I even think he imagined. His lines were/are just mind-blowing. This rapper for Detroit showed me something about myself that I didn’t know I needed or wanted. The Slim Shady LP definitely filled a void that I wasn’t sure needed filling. I was a little broken. 12 years old, and having my life literally turned upside down. My mom kicked my dad out of the house the morning of my 12th birthday. It was 1am, my dad came into my room and told me that he wished I had a very happy birthday and that he would see me later that day. I wasn’t sure what was going on, I mean, who gets woken up like that by their parents. This was already after months of my dad having sleepovers with my cousin and I in our family room in the basement of our house. It was crazy. So after sort of laying in bed trying to figure out what was going on, I crawled out onto the landing of my second floor room and peered over my balcony to see that my father was being escorted out of the house by a police officer, ON MY BIRTHDAY! I don’t know what it was about Slim Shady that woke me up. Maybe it was the way he sounded, maybe it was what he said. Maybe it was the fact that there was a shift in how I felt about my mother, that he seemed to tap into in his music with his. I’m not sure, all I know was that I heard it and was hooked. I think the main thing came out with his line “99% of my life I was lied to.” Felt like at that particular moment in my life, I had been lied to. You have this version of the life that you think is yours. You are pretty much naïve to the world around you. And then in one moment the life that you thought you had gets sort of ripped away. I guess what really happened, is that Eminem didn’t sugar coat the world around him. If he was angry at the life he had, the mother he had, the broken relationships, well he seemed to just let you have it. Looking back on it, I guess he taught me not to hold anything back. It’s funny, you never realize how much something can have an impact on your life and his music definitely had an impact on mine. At any rate, I followed this rising star.
I think I might have mentioned that I was abducted? If not, well there you go. I have probably mentioned this in another blog, and if I haven’t here it is. I spent a semester “healing” from all of the drama of my life, that stemmed from being abducted, and it was in this that I started writing my blogs. I may or may not “talk” about the real reason why I created this blog, but when I am ready you’ll get more.
Needless to say, Em was my comfort, like a teddy bear. My best friends (one guy and one girl) also shared my love of Em so it was nice. The Slim Shady LP was the beginning, then came The Marshall Mathers LP, with “B*** Please II” and “The Way I Am”- OMG! It was after this album that I got to see the genius at work live. Jess, my best friend in High School and still one of my really good friends now and I went to the Up and Smoke Tour! Such an amazing concert!! It was Dr. Dre, Xzibit, Snoop Dog, Ice Cube, some others that I can’t remember and Em. Oh, it was the first and last concert that I have gotten a chance to see him in So sad. Anyways, the day that The Eminem Show came out was the day before the Santa Clara DA picked me up and returned me to my dad. So I spent a day with 2 cops, not really talking much, crying the whole time and listening to The Eminem Show on repeat. From "White America" to "Cleanin’ out my closet" Em just spoke to the pain that I was going through in that moment. And I liked the way he gave it to then President Bush and the ugly politics we were seeing post 9/11 ;)
Then came Encore, which I thought was good. I mean “Mockingbird”
was great, people complain about Em’s lyrics and then criticize him being a good father etc, but I hear this song and others that he has written specifically for his daughter and I am floored. Then Em dropped off the planet, dealing with the loss of his best friend Proof, drugs, rehab, his relationships etc. Relapse came out and I was like HE’S BACK!!! But the thing about both of these albums, is that there are only a handful of songs that I can truly love. With the other albums, I am going through the whole disc from start to finish, skits included. These two albums I’m bouncing back and forth; which brings me to the reason I am writing this particular blog, on this particular subject.
Eminem slowly started to make his way back into the rap game, doing colabos on songs like Forever with Drake and Weezey. But in 2010 he dropped the much anticipated album RECOVERY which I thought was supposed to be part 2 of Relapse. Anyways, Recovery shows the depth of Eminem in a way I didn’t think was possible. So often Eminem is critiquing other people, but in this album, it’s him who he turns his rants on. It is the most raw I have ever seen him be, at least I think so. He gives himself a hard time about Encore and Relapse and I couldn’t figure it out. I liked those albums, I didn’t love them, but I liked them. So one day after I bought the album, I decided to listen to all of his studio released albums in chron. order (and no I do not have Infinite). When I got to Encore and Relapse I realized that he was right, those two albums were jokes. There might have been one or two good songs on them, but they weren’t his best. Recovery to me fits in very well right after The Eminem Show, it’s as if he didn’t even have Encore and Relapse after I heard Recovery, every song is a good one. And it seems as if the fans agree, he’s held the #1 spot on the Billboard charts for 5 weeks now, and I hope he isn’t uprooted..
I’ll leave you with some of my favorite songs, including a few off of his new one. And one day very soon I’ll tease out one of those songs on Recovery and tell you how I feel about it. But here is what I will say, Em has seen me through my ups and downs. And this Recovery album is perfect with where I am now in my life, because I have finally made it through all of the shit! So as much as Recovery was a healing process for him, it had/has the same effect on me. I am excited to see what else he can bring and to all of those people who need to hear it let me tell you- HE IS THE GREATEST RIGHT NOW! Weezey has his following, but it’s not quite up to Em’s stature. I love T.I. and I’ll give cred to Jay and Drake, but Em has my heart!
Check out Recovery and tell me what you think..
So here are the videos and some of the songs that I LOVE by Eminem:
Okay so those are some of my favs, I could go on for ever!!
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