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Rob Harvilla: That loud droning noise you heard on Friday morning, Justin, was the sound of thousands of culture editors groaning in unison when they learned that Eminem had surprise-dropped a new album, Music to Be Murdered By, and yeah, you probably didn’t need me to tell you that, as I’m pretty sure you were groaning too. Music to Be Murdered By is indeed inspired by Alfred Hitchcock, a.k.a. “Uncle Alfred,” and in the interest of starting off with something positive, this 20-second video of Em stepping into a middle-finger-brandishing Hitchcockian silhouette is honestly very funny, and indeed much funnier than anything that transpires on the hour-plus-long album it’s promoting, and yeah, sorry, this turned into more of a negative thing.
Topics on this record include infidelity (pro), Eminem’s stepfather (anti), drug abuse (both pro and anti), strippers (pro physically but anti spiritually), and Eminem’s thoughts on his rapping ability (pro) as compared to anyone else’s (anti). In what has become a hallowed tradition, he complains about the poor reviews inspired by his previous surprise-dropped new album, summer 2018’s Kamikaze, and indeed my favorite reaction to this new album so far is this Twitter thread of Rolling Stone editors trying to figure out why Em is suddenly irate about a 33-year-old RS review of LL Cool J’s Bigger and Deffer that isn’t even online.
Em at least pretends, in his first few verses, that this is not immediately obvious, that he’s just rapping as himself nervous backstage before a show, his double entendres ranging from “F**k the Colt 45, I’ma need somethin’ stronger” to “Alcohol on my breath as I reach for the scope” to “I’m locked and loaded for rapid-fire spittin’ for all the concertgoers.” Then the shooting and screaming and TV-news-reporting starts, and “Darkness” reveals itself to be a gun-control morality play with, crucially, no moral
Justin Sayles: Rob, this culture editor is exhausted and borderline offended that Eminem evoked Hitchcock for his slasher-flick-grade musings. Nearly 20 years have passed since a younger (but not all that young) Slim Shady used the Columbine shooting as a punch line on “I’m Back.” Far be it from me to say that people, even the author of “Just Lose It,” can’t grow over the course of two decades, but it’s hard to take “Darkness” seriously as a PSA when he later raps, “I am the Santa Fe, Mandalay, and Orlando, and Colorado, and Columbine / All combined into one.” It also rings a bit hollow because of the timing: He released two albums in between the October 2017 Las Vegas shooting and Music to Be Murdered By. Why make this song now? Does he actually care? I’m doubtful. Positioning “Darkness” as an anti-gun-violence screed feels like a clumsy retcon, like if he recited the number for a domestic violence hotline on the outro of “Kim.”
I’d be tempted to say the video was an attempt to quell any potential controversy if he wasn’t actively courting it elsewhere on Music to Be Murdered By. Earlier in the album, on the Young M.A–assisted “Unaccommodating,” Eminem makes a reference to the 2017 Ariana Grande concert bombing in Manchester, which killed 23 people including the perpetrator. He’s rightfully catching backlash, but what’s one more backlash in a career full of them? Everything from the Sharon Tate murder to Richard Ramirez is still fair game for Em. (Just be thankful there are no “Christopher Reeves” references this time.)
So: Will this just be the Marshall Mathers experience for the rest of time? In three years, will a 50-year-old Eminem still be making JonBenét Ramsey jokes?
Harvilla: Yeah, the Santa Fe–Mandalay-Orlando-Colorado-Columbine line is when I cringed the hardest. It comes on “Yah Yah,” a deep-ish cut that otherwise represents the best Music to Be Murdered By has to offer, and in fact represents the platonic ideal of the Marshall Mathers experience for the rest of time, in that it’s just an aging but still supremely gifted rapper rapping his ass off with his (usually) supremely gifted pals. (Royce Da 5’9”, Black Thought, Q-Tip, and Denaun, in this case.) “Yah Yah” is grimy and abrasive and obnoxious and makes no concession to rap music in the 21st century, and I kind of love it right up to the point where Em starts reeling off gun-violence atrocities.
I would vastly prefer to regard Music to Be Murdered By as simply another pretty stupid but basically harmless late-Eminem excursion, the rapping often stupendous or at least hilariously dense and very fast, the conceits often very stupid to a degree that is almost impressive. (I do appreciate, as a native and current Ohioan, the string of Ohio-based puns unleashed on the Ed Sheeran–assisted stripper jam “Those Kinda Nights”—“We should be datin’ / She’s from Cleveland / But she’s a Bengal / This chick is catty”—but the fact remains that “Those Kinda Nights” is an Ed Sheeran–assisted stripper jam.) The world needs a safe space in which Joell Ortiz can make an A Fish Called Wanda reference, or at least Joell Ortiz does, and who am I to object? But the fact remains that Eminem has nothing to say about life in 2020 and gets less tolerable the more he insists that he does. At least he’s given up trying to troll Trump. (For now.)
My result from this text:Eminem is the best RAPPER in the world
Source :theringer website
About the game:
USA as a world power? In E-Sim it is possible!
In E-Sim we have a huge, living world, which is a mirror copy of the Earth. Well, maybe not completely mirrored, because the balance of power in this virtual world looks a bit different than in real life. In E-Sim, USA does not have to be a world superpower, It can be efficiently managed as a much smaller country that has entrepreneurial citizens that support it's foundation. Everything depends on the players themselves and how they decide to shape the political map of the game.
Work for the good of your country and see it rise to an empire.
Activities in this game are divided into several modules. First is the economy as a citizen in a country of your choice you must work to earn money, which you will get to spend for example, on food or purchase of weapons which are critical for your progress as a fighter. You will work in either private companies which are owned by players or government companies which are owned by the state. After progressing in the game you will finally get the opportunity to set up your own business and hire other players. If it prospers, we can even change it into a joint-stock company and enter the stock market and get even more money in this way.
In E-Sim, international wars are nothing out of the ordinary.
Become an influential politician.
The second module is a politics. Just like in real life politics in E-Sim are an extremely powerful tool that can be used for your own purposes. From time to time there are elections in the game in which you will not only vote, but also have the ability to run for the head of the party you're in. You can also apply for congress, where once elected you will be given the right to vote on laws proposed by your fellow congress members or your president and propose laws yourself. Voting on laws is important for your country as it can shape the lives of those around you. You can also try to become the head of a given party, and even take part in presidential elections and decide on the shape of the foreign policy of a given state (for example, who to declare war on). Career in politics is obviously not easy and in order to succeed in it, you have to have a good plan and compete for the votes of voters.
You can go bankrupt or become a rich man while playing the stock market.
The international war.
The last and probably the most important module is military. In E-Sim, countries are constantly fighting each other for control over territories which in return grant them access to more valuable raw materials. For this purpose, they form alliances, they fight international wars, but they also have to deal with, for example, uprisings in conquered countries or civil wars, which may explode on their territory. You can also take part in these clashes, although you are also given the opportunity to lead a life as a pacifist who focuses on other activities in the game (for example, running a successful newspaper or selling products).
At the auction you can sell or buy your dream inventory.
E-Sim is a unique browser game. It's creators ensured realistic representation of the mechanisms present in the real world and gave all power to the players who shape the image of the virtual Earth according to their own. So come and join them and help your country achieve its full potential.
Invest, produce and sell - be an entrepreneur in E-Sim.
Take part in numerous events for the E-Sim community.
