by EminemBase » Jan 15th, '11, 01:53
Well, it doesn't feel right to say what does his 'music' mean to me because...
He has hundreds of songs, all with different aims and intentions. He writes about many things, sporadically jumps topics and in and out of persona's so...
You could say what does X song mean to me and I'd be able to give a better answer. Although, I suppose I could basically summarize his underlying themes as an artist and say his music - above everything; above the intent, above the structure and lyricism - is basically about free-speech.
He didn't intend it to be that, or, all that it has become (few do), but, it's morphed into that. It morphed into it after The Slim Shady LP and he had to start defending himself. And, as well all know, the true defense came in the form of reactionary art - The Marshall Mathers LP.
He also rarely gets ANY credit by the way, for what he's done for free-speech in art, and of course music specifically. I've never heard him once properly championed yet, Government officials were campaigning to ban The Marshall Mathers LP and he was fighting fire with fire, against everyone and everything, and he turned it into art and entertainment...
Not that fucking politicians should or could ever truly censor art to the degree they hope they could (due to their very limited brains) so, you could argue his music was never under any true threat but, it still took a lot of vigor, intelligence and creativity to handle it the way he did. And he very much inspired a generation to speak their mind, he inspired more open and brutal lyrics and therefore more realistic acts that would try to follow (and so on). And he deserves big credit for all this.
His music means; integrity, humour, self-awareness, tongue-in-cheek - all that and more. But, you could spend days divulging a single song of his. Certain songs longer than others of course and, for different reasons but. His music means many things, at different points: it depends on the song, the aim(s) and so on.
Last edited by
EminemBase on Jan 15th, '11, 01:57, edited 2 times in total.