{"id":42069,"date":"2010-08-12T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2010-08-12T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/reviews\/recovery\/"},"modified":"2010-08-12T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2010-08-12T00:00:00","slug":"recovery","status":"publish","type":"review","link":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/reviews\/recovery\/","title":{"rendered":"Recovery"},"content":{"rendered":"

It\u2019s only August, but I\u2019m calling the verdict that this is my top album of the year. I\u2019ve engaged in several arguments about this disc as of late: Recovery <\/i>as compared to the rest of Eminem\u2019s oeuvre; how it compares to other such statements of artistic maturity, such as Jay-Z\u2019s The Blueprint 3 <\/i>(2009). But while Jay-Z has been on top of his game for basically the entirety of his career, Eminem has had some lapses. His previous two albums, Relapse <\/i>and Encore, <\/i>were lacking in some essential spark \u2013 or, as Em himself says on \u201cTalkin\u2019 2 Myself,\u201d one of the album\u2019s many incisively honest tracks: \u201cEncore I was on drugs \/ Relapse I was flushing \u2018em out\u2026I\u2019ve got something to prove to fans \/ I feel like I let \u2018em down.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0 <\/o:p><\/p>\n

Recovery <\/i>is definitely not another Marshall Mathers LP <\/i>or The Eminem Show<\/i>; it won\u2019t incite riots, and it spends far less time going after celebrities for shock factor. Instead, this album highlights a far different Eminem, one who\u2019s penitent, conflicted, still a little messed-up, and all the more fascinating and relatable for it. Fans may balk at what seems like a tamer Marshall Mathers \u2013 he\u2019s threatening to murder far less people than previous albums \u2013 but there\u2019s absolutely still defiance broiling in these cuts. <\/o:p><\/p>\n

Even in single-friendly fare such as \u201cLove The Way You Lie\u201d (feat. Rihanna), there\u2019s no shortage of high-stakes wordplay and brutal rhythms as he chronicles an abusive relationship, and the contrast between Eminem\u2019s rough, rapid-fire delivery and Rihanna\u2019s smoothly seductive chorus is intoxicating. Meanwhile, \u201cWon\u2019t Back Down\u201d features a similar assist from Pink on the hook, adding some feminine energy to the pounding drum beats and howling organ. <\/o:p><\/p>\n

But it\u2019s the one-two punch of \u201cNot Afraid\u201d and \u201cNo Love\u201d that cement the excellence of this album for me, only interrupted by \u201cSeduction,\u201d which technically comes between those two tracks but ends up diverting the flow. \u201cNot Afraid\u201d is a killer anthem for anyone who counted Eminem out when he faltered these past couple of years, earnest in a way that\u2019s totally endearing (sample line of greatness: \u201cSo I solemnly swear to treat this roof like my daughter and raise it\u201d). But \u201cNo Love\u201d is absolutely the gem on Recovery, <\/i>and not just because I\u2019ve always had a deep, abiding love of Haddaway\u2019s \u201cWhat Is Love,\u201d which is sampled to awesome effect here. The combination of Lil Wayne\u2019s slow Southern drawl on the first verse, churning beats, Haddaway\u2019s delightfully cheesy synths turned ominous, and Eminem\u2019s incredible delivery is too potent to resist. This cut is blasting with energy and fury, and the incomparably quick pace of Eminem\u2019s verses is jaw-dropping. <\/o:p><\/p>\n

And there\u2019s still some fun stuff here to keep it from being too heavy: \u201cW.T.P.\u201d (which stands for White Trash Party) is vintage Eminem in its lighthearted, wisecracking tone, while \u201cGoing Through Changes\u201d features a tasty hook borrowed from Black Sabbath. <\/o:p><\/p>\n

What draws me in so much with this album is the fact that Em\u2019s not afraid at all to be vulnerable, to reckon with his own shortcomings and mistakes. On \u201cTalkin 2 Myself,\u201d he even says that he almost cut tracks calling out Lil Wayne and Kanye West (\u201cIt\u2019s like I was jealous of him \u2018cause of the attention he was gettin\u2019 \/ I felt horrible about myself \/ He was spittin\u2019 and I wasn\u2019t\u201d) but realized that at that point, in a haze of pain pills and writer\u2019s block, he couldn\u2019t have countered their success. It takes a mature, self-assured artist to deliver those lines, to come to terms with his own past megalomania and lay his soul out for the listeners that have stuck with him. \u201c25 To Life\u201d is one of the best examples of this, in which Eminem likens his career in rap to a drawn-out, addictive, insatiable marriage. At first listen, it seems like it\u2019s about his ex-wife Kim, frequent source of his vitriol, but the fact that it\u2019s about his conflicted outlook towards his career in the music world makes it all the more resonant. <\/o:p><\/p>\n

Recovery <\/i>is meaningful as an artistic statement, wholly enjoyable as an album, and an excellent example of Eminem\u2019s personal and musical growth over the years. This is not the pissed-off, bleach-blond guy calling out Moby and boy bands in the early 2000\u2019s; this is a real man, a real artist, and one of the best releases of his career and of 2010.<\/o:p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":48,"featured_media":30407,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[],"artist":[6341],"rating":[5646],"class_list":["post-42069","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-eminem","rating-rating-a"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/42069","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/48"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=42069"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/42069\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/30407"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=42069"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=42069"},{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=42069"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=42069"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}