When Eminem admitted to “stealing” Black music
Eminem is certainly the biggest white rapper in history, and he has a fair shout at being considered the biggest ever rapper full stop. But given hip-hop’s Black roots, he has frequently faced accusations of cultural appropriation throughout his career.
Never one to shy away from confrontation, Em faced up to these accusations directly in one of his songs a few years back. He and Cee-Lo Green made a track, ‘The King and I,’ for Baz Luhrmann’s Elvis movie, and he used it to make a plain admission.
“I stole black music, yeah true,” he spits in one of the verses. “Perhaps used it (For what?) as a tool to combat school / Kids came back on some bathroom shit / Now I call a hater a bidet (Why?) / ’Cause they mad that they can’t do shit (Haha).”
It may seem startling for Eminem to so readily admit to stealing Black music, but, while he has always freely recognised his unique talent as a rapper, he has never denied the practice’s specific relationship to Black culture. He’s always known that his success is built upon the legacy of the Black artists that came before him.
In ‘The King and I,’ Eminem directly compares himself to Elvis, who also faced accusations that he was stealing Black music for himself. “Now I’m about to explain to you all the parallels / Between Elvis and me, myself / It seem obvious: one, he’s pale as me / Second, we both been hailed as kings / He used to rock the Jailhouse, and I used to rock The Shelter / We sell like Velveeta Shells & Cheese (Woo!) (Let’s go!).”
Elvis’ relationship to race and the nature of his wider politics remain a source of debate to this day, but, to his credit, he did publicly acknowledge Black musicians with pioneering the rock ’n’ roll music that had made him a superstar.
Speaking to Jet magazine in 1957, Elvis said, “A lot of people seem to think I started this business. But rock ’n’ roll was here a long time before I came along. Nobody can sing that kind of music like coloured people. Let’s face it: I can’t sing like Fats Domino can. I know that.”
Eminem has similarly spoken publicly about his reverence for the Black musicians that pioneered hip-hop, describing himself as a “guest” within their tradition. Writing for XXL magazine in 2022, Em reflected on the heat he got during the early stages of his career, when his whiteness was deemed to be problematic.
“Coming up, I had to deal with that a lot,” he wrote. “I wanted to be respectful because what I do is Black music. I knew I was coming into it as a guest in the house… I understood, at the same time, everybody’s perception of a white guy coming into hip-hop and all of a sudden things start happening for him.”