Eminem's Recovery: A Review

On the heels of his comeback album, Relapse (read review) the rapper known as Eminem announced a sequel, Relapse 2 scheduled for a few months later. However, after releasing a deluxe edition of Relapse, entitled Relapse: Refill (read review), within the same calendar year, he announced he was scrapping the planned Relapse 2 in favor of a new album Recovery.

Produced by a raft of beatsmiths, from Dr. Dre to Just Blaze to DJ Khalil (whose strong production work anchored The Clipse's last album Til The Casket Drops - read review), Recovery sports a more limber sonic backdrop than Relapse, which suffered from bouts of dull production despite it being a Dr. Dre album. If you thought his flow on Relapsewas tongue-twistingly limber, his flow on Recovery reaches new heights. His lyrical ability is scary, and one of the key draws here. His period of artistic decline notwithstanding, the album firmly re-establishes the rapper's standing in the rarefied air occupied by the likes of those such as Rakim, Big Pun, B.I.G., Big Daddy Kane, and perhaps a few others. And like those emcees, Eminem spends much of the time here establishing lyrical dominance. Won't Back Down might have been a chosen for a single as it features Pink on the hook, but the rapper unleashes a staggering volley of mostly obscene metaphors over the Just Blaze production that would make MTV rotation a tad difficult. And Cinderella Man is probably one of the flat-out catchiest tracks.

The manic intensity is reminiscent of that displayed on The Marshall Mathers LP, and indeed in this era of artists trying to recreate their earlier, hungrier works (see Jay-Z's American Gangster - read review or 50 Cent's Before I Self-Destruct - read review as recent examples), Recovery's closest point of comparison, in terms of flow, lyrical acuity, and rage is that album. It's graphic, but decidedly less so than Relapse, as the more graphic lyrics are broken up by flashes of insight and taunts aimed at other emcees, and those songs themselves are broken up by introspective records. The vitriol of the opening track, Cold Wind Blows, is nicely balanced by the self-analysis of Talking 2 Myself, for example. He's eschewed familiar formulae, such as his trademark silly lead singles and odes to his daugher for anthemic ballads, and bombastic battle raps. The preoccupations are somewhat familiar: the failed relationship that impel Shady's linguistic violence, drug abuse, and political correctness.

Indeed it's not less solipsistic than his previous work; it's probably more so. The failed relationship trope is a tad overused, especially as it undercuts his serious exploration of them on Love the Way You Lie featuring Rihanna, a definite single candidate. It's the subject of the haunting Space Bound which begins innocently enough before becoming a grim spectacle circa The Slim Shady LP's 97 Bonnie and Clyde in the third verse; and 25 to Life wherein it's used as a metaphor for his relationship with hip-hop; and it undergirds a raft of the other songs, such as Seduction.

The Lil Wayne collaboration No Love is one of the album's strongest tracks, though it is, like the previous Wayne collaborations, similarly odd. Lil Wayne apparently reached out to Eminem a year or two back to collaborate, and when there was no response, Wayne asserted in interviews that Eminem might be afraid to get on a track with him. Subsequently, Eminem's drug addiction became public, which suggests a reason for the non-response. However, starting with the first collaboration, the Drake-helmed Forever (appearing on both the More Than a Game soundtrack and Eminem's own Relapse: Refill), and continuing with Drop the World on Wayne's own Rebirth album, each Eminem verse, the subject of which are insults hurled at rappers who doubt him, seems aimed squarely at Wayne. Here, everything from the hook:

"It's a little too late, to say that you're sorry now/You kicked me when I was down, f--- what you say/Just don't hurt me, it don't hurt me/I don't need you no more/don't wanna see ya no more/you get no love/You showed me nothin but hate, you ran me into the ground/But what comes around goes around, and I don't need you"

to the outstanding syllabically dense verse seems as if it is designed to subliminally redress that situation, as if he is purposefully showing Wayne up. If he is trying, he is succeeding, and making excellent music in the process.
Every Eminem album is a reflection of the rapper's psyche, and if you lack interest in the man, Recovery may be a bit tedious. Mitigating that somewhat is the fact that the rapper is in seemingly such a good headspace, so upbeat, so passionate that you can't help but be roused by the records on Recovery. He's happy to be back, which indeed is the backdrop for much of this album from the chorus of amens that kick off Cinderella Man to the lead single Not Afraid, to the timbre of and focus in his voice, to the accessibility of many of the records - a quality Relapse's records largely lacked. A bit more of the mirth of earlier albums like The Marshall Mathers LP is on display, which is refreshing. Whereas Relapse was a lyrical exercise - Marshall Mathers flexing his considerable muscles - Recovery is a proper album, with range. Despite his repeated broadsides against Relapse, while lyrically dense, and a tad scattershot, is stronger than its previous two predecessors, though Recovery bests it handily. This is hands down some of his best work.