How Eminem convinced Fat Joe not to retire: “He was almost depressed”
Fat Joe once wanted to retire from music. After almost three decades in the industry, the Bronx rapper was ready to call it quits. He was ready to leave behind a legacy that included Terror Squad and the Diggin’ in the Crates Crew, hit singles like ‘What’s Luv’ and ‘All the Way Up’, and high-flying solo albums Don Cartagena and All or Nothing. That was until Eminem stepped in.
Joe felt like he had contributed enough to hip-hop over the years, believing his work was done. His daughter was a teenager at the time, and he wanted to spend quality time with her, without wasting another minute on his music career. Only a small percentage of him was committed to rap music, but he’s not the type to retire and immediately return. Once he’s done, he’ll be done.
He admitted, “I’m almost out of here. I think I’m retiring. I think it’s time to give it up. I’ve got mad at all the other rappers who said that they’re retiring and they came back. I’m a strong advocate against that, so I’m really… I’ve been flirting with it. I’m like 85% gone. I’ve never felt like this in my life. My daughter’s turning 14, I really want to watch my daughter. I really want to take her to school every day.”
Despite being close to retirement, he was convinced to stay in the rap game by Slim Shady. According to Joe, Em heard about his career plans and decided to take action. He allegedly told Joe that he was disappointed about him leaving music behind and felt sad about his generation of rappers coming to an end.
For this, Joe feels like he changed the course of his life. “I owe Eminem so many favours,” he said. “Like, I have used my relationship with this guy to oblivion. You know he tried to talk me out of retirement? I was in my mother’s house, shirt off, topless. My phone rings, it’s a number I don’t know. Thank God I picked it up. It’s Eminem. He starts trying to convince me for an hour, ‘Don’t leave.’ He was almost depressed that I was leaving our era.”
The 55-year-old rapper, nicknamed Joey Crack, collaborated with Eminem on ‘Lord Above’ in 2019, with the Mary J Blige-assisted song appearing on Joe’s Family Ties album with Dre of the production duo, Cool and Dre. Em also appeared on a remix of the chart-topping ‘Lean Back’ in 2004 alongside Ma$e, Remy Ma, and Lil Jon.
Joe has talked about Eminem’s role in keeping him active on several occasions. During an Instagram Live with Big Sean, he acknowledged the number of times he brings up Em’s name. He described him as one of the greatest rappers of all time, calling it an honour to be recognised by someone of his skill set.
“Em called me last week — I don’t want to keep throwing his name around — but the man was trying to talk me out of retirement last week,” he said. “This is all I ever wanted my whole life, for one of the rap gods to call me and tell me, ‘Yo Joe, you nice. You need to get back in there.’”