Eminem released his 10th studio album ‘Kamikaze’ on August 31, 2018, rather surprisingly to the entire world. There was no pre-promotion, publicity, advertising or trailers. The album took everyone by surprise and some people felt the release of the album a bit more than the ordinary Stan.
The new album ‘Kamikaze’ was aimed at assassinating all the haters that have been trying to drag Eminem to a war. On top of that, he obliterates the mumble rappers who seem to have dominated the industry in the past few years. Many tracks on the album, such as “The Ringer,” “Not Alike,” “Lucky You” and “Kamikaze” purely focuses on addressing the hate Em has been receiving for the past few years. A major theme of many of these songs is talking about the backlash and hate Em has been receiving for his 2017 project ‘Revival.’ The main complaint among these ‘critiques’ is that Eminem has slipped down on his rhymes, bars and lyricism.
‘Kamikaze’ album does not attempt to prove that Eminem is back on his usual macho lyricism and savviness. But rather, it focuses on talking back on the people who have been calling Em out. One of the best things this album did was start a cold-war with rapper Machine Gun Kelly, which provided some life to the else dull hip-hop industry. MGK responded to Eminem with “Rap Devil” and Eminem responded to MGK with “KILLSHOT.” “Rap Devil” went on to be one of the most successful tracks by MGK bringing him a new fan base and a newfound respect, whereas Eminem’s “KILLSHOT” broke a YouTube record for the most streamed track in under 24 hours of release.
Other honourable mentions on ‘Kamikaze’ album are Joe Budden, Tyler, The Creator, Lil-class of rappers and mumble rappers.
The Hate on ‘Kamikaze’ Album
Trying to reply to the hate on ‘Revival,’ Eminem allowed some of the critiques to jab at him through the new album. However, this time, Eminem did not bottle them up with him. He decided to make the ‘hate’ public so everyone knows the backlashes he has to face every day.
In an Instagram post, Eminem shared some of the most brutal comments made by popular media institutes and magazines about the new album.
The Hollywood Reporter
Titled under ‘Eminem’s Surprise Album ‘Kamikaze’ Is an Epic Fail,’ this news website goes on to call the album “the work of an ageing artist trying, and failing, to remain relevant by acting out.”
Pitchfork
Starting off with captioning “All across his 10th album, the more things change, the more Eminem stays the same,” the album review article goes on to summarize saying “yet another empty, intermittently tone-deaf onslaught.”
Rolling Stone
“Kamikaze is the latest and most disappointing entry to Eminem’s never-ending encore, a boot camp of knotty, joyless, lumbering ragers aimed largely at a rap game that’s passing him by.”
Billboard
Titled ‘Eminem’s ‘Kamikaze’ Tries to Stop the Rapper’s Artistic Decline by Blaming Everyone Except Himself,’ the article goes on to call Eminem a ‘fabled technician failing to cure his malignant disease that’s been eating away his career for a decade.’
Stereogum
This news website calls ‘Kamikaze’ “easily the best Eminem album in more than a decade. The bad news is that it still sucks.”
Noisey
This magazine calls the new Eminem album ‘a stale misfire.’ However, MGK did respond to the alleged misfire. Maybe, it hit where it needed to hit.
Vulture
Vulture implies that Eminem is taking his frustration on the poor performance of ‘Revival’ out on the industry. So they question who will Eminem blame if ‘Kamikaze’ failed too.
Eminem’s Response to the Hate on News Media
In the same Instagram post, Eminem speaks out his mind about all these critiques. He captions “#1 in 103 countries and 434,000 equivalent album units in the US in the first week.” Eminem then thanks all these hate comments that made the album go viral. Eminem proves that in stardom, there is no such thing as bad publicity.
‘Kamikaze’ Album Chart Performance Around the World
Amongst all this hate, it is good to see that Eminem is keeping his head up. It is unclear how any of this will affect the outcome of his next album. Time will tell if Eminem will reply to all the backlash on ‘Kamikaze’ or not.
Let us know what you think about this new album by Eminem. Was this your cup of tea? Drop your thoughts in the comments below.