Public opinion on Eminem has seemed to turn once more, with people recognising that he is one of the true hip hop greats. Although he’s an easy target to ridicule, Slim Shady is a master on the mic and inspired a whole generation of artists.
It’s been over two decades since Eminem first made his way into the public consciousness after being scooped up by Interscope, and Dr Dre took him under his wing. He enjoyed a meteoric rise, and within a handful of years, Mathers was the biggest name in the rap game who had transcended the genre.
At the moment, there probably isn’t a hotter rapper than Jack Harlow, and he’s unashamed to speak about the influence of Eminem on his career. In fact, he recently described his work as “forever immortal” and said he believes “we’re a couple years away from everyone reviving that shit as a culture and being like, ‘Look at this shit.”
He added: “Everyone’s gonna pay their rightful respects again. No matter how the production ages to people, he put so much into his words that it immortalised him, even though that shit aged as ‘circus music’ to [some] people.”
Chance the Rapper is another artist who worships at the altar of the Detroit native and classifies him as one of his heroes. For rap fans of a certain age, Eminem’s early records were a staple of their musical education and worked akin to a gateway drug.
For Chance, The Marshall Mathers LP made him see music in 4K for the first time, and he remains forever grateful. He explained to Complex: “The Marshall Mathers LP. That was just where he was like the darkest and the hottest.”
He added: “I guess like albums are so crucial and I want to say Infinite was crucial, but specifically, The Marshall Mathers LP is when I was like ‘, Aww, yeah. That’s a lot of people’s point where they were like, ‘This is my favourite rapper, Eminem is my favourite rapper.'”
In the same interview, Chance also spoke about his favourite moment in Eminem’s career, and it’s an extremely poignant memory for the Rapper which remains vivid.
Chance explained: “He’s done like hella funny shit—the Mariah Carey shit was mad funny, and his random beefs. The Elton John shit was cool. I don’t know if this counts but the moment I saw a commercial for 8 Mile, like ‘What?!’ The Eminem movie version? Let’s go.”
Stream The Marshall Mathers LP below.