VOODOO EXPERIENCE | WORSHIP THE MUSIC | OCT 30 / OCT 31 / NOV 1, 2009

From Elvis Presley to N.W.A to Marilyn Manson, many a rock and rap artist has flirted with and even flaunted controversy - but never with the uniform gusto and unapologetic panache of Eminem. On Eminem's 1999 major-label debut, The Slim Shady LP (#2 pop, #1 R&B), the Detroit-based white rapper spared nobody his verbal crosshairs, including not only his detractors but himself; Kim, his wife and the mother of his daughter; and his own mother (who later ended up filing a defamation of character lawsuit against him). The following year’s doubly venomous The Marshall Mathers LP (#1 pop, #1 R&B) raised/lowered the bar even more, drawing intense protest from gay, lesbian, religious, and women’s groups, even as it became the fastest-selling rap album of all time and topped many critics’ year-end best-of lists.

Eminem was born Marshall Bruce Mathers III just outside of Kansas City, Missouri. He never knew his father and was raised along with a younger half-brother by his mother, Debbie Mathers-Briggs, who moved the family to a predominately black neighborhood on the East side of Detroit when Mathers was 11. Although he was bullied and harassed by other kids on a regular basis, Mathers found a handful of friends who recognized his rhyming skills, and after failing ninth grade three years in a row, he dropped out of school and began competing in local freestyle throw-downs with his crew, the Dirty Dozen.

He released his first solo album, Infinite, on the local Web Entertainment label in 1996. It failed to garner much attention, but the followup, 1998’s The Slim Shady EP, so impressed N.W.A alum and rap icon Dr. Dre that he signed Eminem to his Interscope imprint, Aftermath. The EP was expanded into the Dre-coproduced The Slim Shady LP, which debuted on the pop chart at #3 in February 1999 and went on to sell 3 million copies and win Eminem a Grammy for Best Rap Album. Like the EP before it, the album showcased Eminem’s maniacal double ego Slim Shady - a homicidal comedian through whom Mathers enacted his most outrageous and perverse revenge fantasies. The catchy lead single “My Name Is” (#18 R&B) was a huge crossover success, climbing to #36 on the Hot 100 and eventually winning a Grammy for Best Rap Solo Performance. Meanwhile, moral watchdogs loudly protested darker fare on the album like “’97 Bonnie and Clyde,” in which Eminem sings lovingly to his baby daughter while enroute to dump her murdered mother in a body of water.

The combination of Eminem’s unique, behind-the-beat nasal flow (many critics and artists, both black and white, hailed him as one of the best MCs in the world), crossover appeal, and willingness to attack and offend anything in his way without prejudice quickly established the young rapper as a seemingly unstoppable phenomenon - a fact further proven when The Marshall Mathers LP debuted at the top of the chart in 2000 with close to 1.7 million copies sold its first week in stores.

The monster crossover hit came with “The Real Slim Shady” (#4 pop, #11 R&B, 2000), while the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLADD) led the protest charge, extremely alarmed over a recurring theme of hateful homophobia throughout the album. The debate peaked when openly gay rocker - and outspoken Eminem fan - Elton John performed with the rapper at the 2001 Grammy Awards ceremony (where Eminem won his second Best Rap Album but lost Album of the Year to Steely Dan). Together, Eminem and John performed the song “Stan,” a cautionary tale about a disturbed fan taking Eminem’s violent Slim Shady fantasies too seriously. The album version of “Stan” drew its disarmingly pretty chorus from the song “Thank You” by English singer/songwriter Dido, whose own career subsequently took off due to the exposure.

In the midst of all his critical and commercial success and the controversy stirred up over his lyrics, Eminem was besieged by lawsuits and run-ins with the law. In addition to his mother’s defamation suit, Mathers was also sued by his estranged wife (the girlfriend he “killed” in “’97 Bonnie & Clyde” and again in “Kim” from The Marshall Mathers LP). The couple later reconciled and his wife dropped the suit, but the pair eventually divorced in 2001. Meanwhile, Mathers pleaded guilty to charges of carrying a concealed weapon in a criminal case stemming from a June 2000 incident in which he allegedly assaulted a man outside of a nightclub for kissing his wife. He received two years’ probation.

from The Rolling Stone Encyclopedia of Rock & Roll (Simon & Schuster, 2001)

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