When Eminem signed his initial three-album deal with Dr. Dre’s Aftermath imprint, rumors swirled that once his contract was up, he would eye retirement, in fear over-extending his welcome. However nobody knew that Eminem would become the biggest thing since sliced white bread, making renegotiations inevitable, and early retirement not an option. 2002′s The Eminem Show meant to close the curtain on Marshall Mathers’ reality television lifestyle, but the fans demanded more, hence, Encore. 

      The album begins with the beautifully dark “Evil Deeds”, where Eminem resurrects his crowd-pleasing double-time rhyme flows, delivering twice the dosage of his usual multi-syllabic lyrical onslaughts. On this incredible opener, Em rambles on with his typical pessimistic outlook on things, but does so in such amazing cadence that he still continues to impress. Brilliantly beating his critics to the punch, he suggests: “There goes poor Marshall again / whining about his millions and his mansion and his sorrow he’s always drowning in / and the dad that he never had, and how his childhood was so bad / and how his mom was a dope addict and how he and his ex-wife go at it / Man I’d hate to have it as bad as that Mr. Mathers / Claims he had it, I can’t imagine it / That little rich poor white bastard needs to take some of that cash out of the bank and take a bath in it / Man if I only had half of it / Man, if you only knew the half of it”. Can anyone fuck with this guy? 

     Maybe not lyrically, but Eminem has certainly made his enemies over the past few years. Known for ending careers with his battles (Limp Bizkit, I.C.P.), Em lays to rest two more beefs from the past year, as incidents with The Source and Murder Inc are addressed on both “Yellow Brick Road” and “Toy Soldiers”. Em can almost thank Benzino and Ja Rule for sparking shit with him, as these present two of the most interesting topics covered on the record. “Yellow Brick Road” takes Em back to his true-life “8 Mile” era, where he recounts his high school identity crisis, which resulted in the infamous “Foolish Pride” tape The Source pegged him racist for. This continues into “Like Toy Soliders”, perhaps the album’s greatest accomplishment, where the last real wigga alive literally marches to the beat of his own drum, addressing the origins of his recent beefs. The true accomplishment of the song is that Em realizes the consequences of rap beefs (i.e. 2Pac & B.I.G.) and instead calls for peace: “Don’t get it twisted, it’s not a plea that I’m coppin / I’m just willing to be the bigger man if y’all can quit poppin / off at the jaws well than I can, cause frankly I’m sick of talkin / I’m not gonna let someone’s coffin rest on my conscience”. Well said.  

      Regardless, Em still instigates beefs new, old, dead, and imaginary on many of the albums other tracks. Bush catches a bad one on the murky “Mosh”, while Kim gets both sides of the coin on each “Puke” and “Crazy In Love”. Both Kim tracks inspire Mathers to “sing-rap” his lyrics, unfortunately with less-than-outstanding results, despite dope production on both. Speaking of beating a dead horse, Em proudly dances on the grave of Christopher Reeve claiming “I killed superman, I killed super / Man how I ironic, that I’d be that bad guy, Kryptonite green chronic” on the eerie Dr. Dre produced “Rain Man”. Here we finally welcome the return of “funny Eminem”, a character more or less absent on “The Eminem Show”. Again on “Ass Like That”, Em dementedly examines the child-molestation/porn fixations of each R. Kelly, Pee Wee Herman, and Michael Jackson, all while doing so in as Triumph The Insult Comic Dog. Em hints Triumph gets away with things that he can’t, suggesting “I can say that and you’ll laugh because there’s a puppet on my hand”. Social commentary or bouncing pee-pees? Dwoing, dwoing, dwoing.

     But Encore is not all good. Some of Em’s humor works, some does not. The redundant “Just Lose It” rehashes his last three albums’ lead singles, acting as the worst of the bunch (argh, argh, argh, argh), especially considering he is at the point where he doesn’t have to do this type of thing anymore. Meanwhile, his failed attempt at the alternative, “My First Single” is (purposely) ruined by an awful, forced hook, compete with toilet bowl sound effects (not exactly something you want to bump at high volume in the ride). Things turn for the worst on “Big Weenie”, a crash and burn freestyle session plagued by another questionable hook. Among the barrage of posse cuts included on the LP, the best of the bunch is the closer “Encore”, where Em, 50, and Dre get everyone excited about the on-again-off-again “Detox” album. Second to this is “Never Enough”, where Em and 50 help set the album off with a little help from Nate Dogg. Yet the token D12 track “One Shot 2 Shot” drags on entirely too long (“How Come” might have fit in better on this LP), while “Spend Some Time” does the same.  

       With sounds, ideas, and attitudes all over the place, the schizophrenia of Encore makes it largely hit and miss. Despite the fact this LP starts off strong, the main issue with it is that Em has set such a high standard for himself that it’s hard for him to find new subjects to tackle, inevitably leading to redundancy. Sure Kim and Hallie are a large part of his life, but listeners have more or less heard it before. By no means has Em transformed himself into “the average rapper” with this LP, as he remains in top form lyrically, yet many of his million dollar rhymes are plagued with hundred dollar hooks and old concepts. Regardless, he’s made his mark, and even if this isn’t his best work to date, this critic will still check for his next “encore” with open arms.