Late last night, Eminem surprised fans with the unannounced release of Kamikaze, the rapper’s 10th studio album. The new release comes on the heels of an uneven year for the revered though controversial rapper in 2017, during which he went viral with his Donald Trump-bashing BET Awards cypher and received a near-universal critical panning for his ninth album, Revival. The album art shows a fighter jet with a “FU-2” tag that borrows its aesthetics from The Beastie Boys‘ Licensed To Ill cover.
Tried not 2 overthink this 1… enjoy. 🖕#KAMIKAZE Out Now – https://t.co/ANw73KbwMt pic.twitter.com/qfQoTYBTUy
— Marshall Mathers (@Eminem) August 31, 2018
On the new album, Eminem wastes no time going in on his detractors, the President, the music media, the watered-down new guard in the hip-hop world, and even his own BET freestyle which garnered him so much attention from the media. The jabs hit their mark with varying degrees of success. At its best, Kamikaze ironically embodies the trap flow that’s taken over mainstream hip-hop airwaves in recent years, writing off artists like Lil Pump, Lil Xan, Lil Yachty, Migos and more as a way to assert that he could fit their mold—and pretty damn skillfully, too—but that he won’t compromise his characteristically pointed approach to do so.
The attitude of the album is best summed up by one of the “skit” tracks, a voicemail to him from manager Paul Rosenberg:
Are you really going just to deride everybody who, you don’t like what they have to say about you or the stuff you’re working on? I don’t know if that’s really a great idea, it’s like what’s next, ‘Kamikaze 2,’ the album where you reply to everybody who didn’t like the album that you made replying to everybody that didn’t like the previous album? It’s a slippery slope, I don’t know if it’s really a good idea.
While the album has its artfully vitriolic high points, it also has plenty of the dime-a-dozen, extra-angry, latter-day Eminem that has continued to bring him hits into the 2010’s but remains devoid of the mischievous swagger that made him a universally-acclaimed superstar in the early 2000’s.
Preferences aside, Kamikaze illustrates that Eminem is still one of the most masterful lyricists in the game, and boasts one of hip-hop’s sharpest, most engaging flows. He may not have the fresh-faced exuberance he did as a young MC, but he’s still undoubtedly got the skills, and that’s about as much as anyone can ask from the 45-year-old on his 10th album. Give it a listen below via Spotify:
Eminem – Kamikaze – Full Album
For more information, head to Eminem’s website.
