Oct 10, 2021 Swear to god this topic resurfaces every 6 months. On the real though: Encore isn't THAT bad. It actually still SOUNDS like a vintage eminem album, and you can easily get into it because of that. There are two problems though: the bad songs, and the fact that Em was burned the f--- out. He did way too much during 2002-2004 and you can hear it. The album didn't even had to be a classic, it could've been the one that "just wasn't on the same level as the others". But Em chose to goof off.
Oct 10, 2021 this is exactly the Eminem that I liked the most. he doesn't have to prove to everyone that he is the best and can do a super fast rap. super fast rap and proving he's the best killed his career. But here you are wrong. Side B cannot be considered as the spiritual successor of Encore. Side B can be considered the spiritual successor of Kamikaze. Eminem started diss random people on Side B again, and so that side flop. Encore successor could be MMLP2 (which is actually Encore 2) and Side A (which is like a mix of TES and Encore, only worse than the original albums).
Oct 10, 2021 Encore is an average album with high highs and low lows. It's not a bad album by any means though. Even the critics back then didn't rate it too harshly.
Oct 10, 2021 Exactly this… his little bro accidentally got half the album leaked (all classic songs) and Eminem was pissed so he just freestyled half the album on some DRE beats. I’m shocked DRE allowed this to happen. Tragic really that this happened - I remember thinking when Encore leaked that it was a fake album to fight album leaks and they were on some genius level s---.. but no it was the album
Oct 10, 2021 I still think Relapse is his worst album. Not listenable. That’s just me though can’t stand the accents.. have no clue if songs were good or not because of that. And something about getting f----- in the a--- out behind the shed? f---ing “My Darling” is a brilliant track though. That’s some crazy s--- just brilliant.
Oct 11, 2021 Going Through Changes, Talkin 2 Myself, Seduction, No Love and Space Bound are better than 95% of the material he's released since. Not Afraid and Love The Way You Lie are also massive hits and decent songs imo. Then you have tracks like 25 To Life, Almost Famous, So Bad and Cold Wind Blows that are better than most of his more recent filler tracks. Recovery gets hate for the yelling and pop features which are definitely jarring but if we look at the album in isolation it's far better than it gets credit for. People talk about Revival being his "mature" album but it wasn't, its Recovery. Its the album we needed from him at that time and he found a nice balance in terms of his content which I think he has majorly struggled with since
Oct 11, 2021 Fully agree with this, and the album doesnt have THAT many popfeatures.. some may point to WBD and LTWYL cause of Pink and Rihanna.. two songs, big deal. Songs like 25 to life and Space Bound is not even an issue imo. Yelling is kinda same.. it’s mostly noticable on WBD and Almost Famous, and it fits well on almost famous.
Oct 11, 2021 "Recovery is pop" argument is based on nothing. Yelling is somewhat real, but it's far from being prominent in every song and it is a bit of overcompensation for the accents. The album is great start to finish and it's actually an album with least amount of skippable songs. h---, I even consider Won't Back Down a good song. Fight me.
Oct 11, 2021 I think we can all agree that although Encore didn't have the calibre to match the holy trinity, enough time has passed now for it to be Illmatic
Oct 12, 2021 I always liked Encore. It just was a let down considering it was following up his two greatest albums of all time. And honestly even if they did leak, he still should have kept We as Americans and Love You More on there. Only the die hard Eminem fans back then knew of those leaks like us...bust most average music fans didn't because I remember girls going nuts to Love You More when the Bonus CD came out lol. If they just got rid of Big Weenie and either My 1st Single or One Shot 2 Shot with those two tracks, the album still wouldn't have been classic, but better.
Oct 12, 2021 Somehow Encore has the most rhyme schemes that go on for more than 8 bars out of SSLP, MMLP, TES, Encore I always felt his rhyming was worse on Encore but he actually rhymes longer schemes than I noticed just not as dope lyrically.
Oct 12, 2021 I look at Encore in thirds. The first third (Curtains Up to Puke) is great. The middle (My 1st Single to a--- Like That) is, for the most part, awful. I love the beat for My 1st Single tho. The final section of the album (Spend Some Time to Encore) is great. If he omitted the middle section and included We As Americans, Ricky Ticky Toc and Love You More, and maybe Bully, this may very well be my favorite Em album. But that middle section is so laughably bad that it can't be.
