_Hawk_ wrote:If the songs didn't leak, Em may well be dead.
Obviously this is a reach, but if the album was successful Em would have further degenerated into a false idea that he could do nothing wrong. Queue further drug use, a following album which would truly be worse than Encore, and a completely drugged up Eminem having to deal with one of the worst turnarounds in rap music history, and the loss of his best friend.
I think Encore was a blessing in disguise in the way it was released. It showed that Em was not untouchable.
I don't think Encore having a lukewarm reception really impacted him like it wasn't successful... I know he doesn't fully equate sales to success but he seems to use it as some kind of measure of whether he's working or not... and Encore was successful commercially...
Most critics at the time saw it as a 'good album' too...
Obviously he probably knew it wasn't up to scratch and that he was feeling bored and empty, and probably lived in bitter denial for a while "that shit'll be Illmatic"... because yeah, going from the absolute peak to your lowest, in one flash... that's got to sting quite a lot.
But I think that sunk in later maybe, whilst already in the swing of addiction anyway. Just added to it, but I think even if critics called it excellent... he still would have been an addict, as he was having writers' block and he knew it, he was still feeling bored and uninspired.