relapse 2 - the greatest album never made

[Chanya]

when relapse came out, i loved it, and although i currently prefer recovery over relapse i can't help but think about what relapse 2 would have sounded like, had it come out. it had such enormous potential and i was anticipating it so much! listen to the songs on relapse:refill and you'll know what i mean. that was a glimpse of the greatness we could have seen on relapse 2. it would have been better than relapse. it is truly the greatest album never made.

[Mr.DGAF]

While I'd love to hear it, I think he made the right choice. At the time, relapse 2 just wasn't the way to go. It didn't really feel like a proper way to re-introduce himself to the game. Now that time has passed, he could release an album like that, sure. But I think people were worried about the accent being his new permanent shtick. Now that we know its not, people go back and listen to relapse and enjoy it maybe a little more than they did at first. I'd love an albumm like relapse from Em right now. Especially considering that he's surely running the risk of becoming stale with every new album.

[Chanya]

that's a wonderful post, i basically agree with everything you said in it i too think recovery was the right way to go, but i'm not sorry he put out relapse first. recovery was like the dark knight after batman begins

[sindy]

i loved relapse and refill i wish he made relapse 2 instead of recovery.

[Fa-Q]

He should have released it on a mixtape...but Em never gives away material...I cant figure out if thats a facet of his perfectest-ism or if its the Label/Dr. Dre that says dont release mixttapes....

[jshashwat]

I don't understand what makes people believe that Refill did not contain the best stuff Relapse 2 had. Its so obvious the album was not that great and so they decided to release the bast 5 or 6 songs as Relapse: Refill. There is nothing good which is unreleased or else it would have been. So stop dreaming crap.

[Chanya]

and you know this because...?

this was eminem's statement on the relase of relapse:refill:

On its re-release, Eminem stated "I want to deliver more material for the fans this year like I originally planned. Hopefully these tracks on The Refill will tide the fans over until we put out Relapse 2 next year".


who's to say there wasn't more great stuff? eminem previously stated, when relapse was relased:

"We were on such a roll; we wound up with a ton of new music produced by Dre. Putting out Relapse 2 will let everyone get all of the best stuff.”"

but of course, you should know better?

[EminemBase]

I don't understand what makes people believe that Refill did not contain the best stuff Relapse 2 had. Its so obvious the album was not that great and so they decided to release the bast 5 or 6 songs as Relapse: Refill. There is nothing good which is unreleased or else it would have been. So stop dreaming crap.

Actually it's obvious that Refill just contained a blend of specific material to provide a balanced offering of some of the stuff not heard. It could of been left-overs from the first Relapse, or R2.

Either way, you have a single "Taking My Ball" (obvious), a Dre-assisted club track "Hell Breaks Loose", a tricky, wordy, spazzy track "Buffalo Bill", a casual punchline track "Drop the Bombs on Em" and a harder, dark but more laid back and natural murder track - "Music Box" and another potential single or personal track, "Elevator". It's obviously a balanced set.

So doesn't mean it's the best tracks.

It's a varied selection. But for me, the best stuff is always the most extreme, the stuff which is made for the execution and art, and not with a public agenda in mind (club etc.).

Why on earth would be put the best stuff (if you're saying Relapse was likely to be better than Relapse 2) out first? he's aware of the concept of saving the best to last and putting out the worst (in his mind) of the two albums out FIRST would be retarded. As you'd then have anticipation for a sequel and the sequel would be a let down, as it would be weaker than the original.

If you take The Marshall Mathers LP to be somewhat of a sequel to The Slim Shady LP, given its concept and encapsulation of a persona, and its subject-matter etc. - do you think The Marshall Mathers LP is weaker than The Slim Shady LP? is it not more extreme, more artistic, elevated and a total amplification of the prior in every sense? is to me.

He was in a focused, lyrical state and zone. So I would expect nothing less than the sequel to such a focused, extreme album to be bigger and better.

50 Cent even said right from the get-go that Relapse 1 is a treat but the second one is 'exciting'. He called Relapse a 'treat' (good, enjoyable) but the sequel 'exciting'. To switch between those words means it must of been an amplification, and more extreme.

Saying there is nothing good as it would of been released is unfounded, unlikely and complete rubbish. There's more likely a classic album that he's thrown in the trash.

Because something very bad happened when he got a mixed reaction to Relapse. He started to GIVE A FUCK what people thought. Despite saying that he was just going to do what HE liked now (when he came back out) and fuck what EVERYBODY thought. He contradicted himself.

Relapse 2 not being released is so obviously because he got a mixed reaction from the first one and so he probably assumed the second one would be even more hated and he could fuck up his career and credibility, as that would be three duds in a row (Encore, Relapse and R2).

Hence the reason he got a shitload of popular produces, sung hooks, flipped his style to match the current era (punchlines), started doing introspective content again and aimed for a more mainstream appeal. He's in his second run of his career and would probably hate himself if he fucked it up and probably wanted to show people he could still be a success.

That has nothing to do with how good / bad Relapse 2 was / is / could be as he stopped caring about JUST that and started caring about fans and perception more. Which is bad.

[Chanya]

I don't understand what makes people believe that Refill did not contain the best stuff Relapse 2 had. Its so obvious the album was not that great and so they decided to release the bast 5 or 6 songs as Relapse: Refill. There is nothing good which is unreleased or else it would have been. So stop dreaming crap.

Actually it's obvious that Refill just contained a blend of specific material to provide a balanced offering of some of the stuff not heard. It could of been left-overs from the first Relapse, or R2.

Either way, you have a single "Taking My Ball" (obvious), a Dre-assisted club track "Hell Breaks Loose", a tricky, wordy, spazzy track "Buffalo Bill", a casual punchline track "Drop the Bombs on Em" and a harder, dark but more laid back and natural murder track - "Music Box" and another potential single or personal track, "Elevator". It's obviously a balanced set.

So doesn't mean it's the best tracks.

It's a varied selection. But for me, the best stuff is always the most extreme, the stuff which is made for the execution and art, and not with a public agenda in mind (club etc.).

Why on earth would be put the best stuff (if you're saying Relapse was likely to be better than Relapse 2) out first? he's aware of the concept of saving the best to last and putting out the worst (in his mind) of the two albums out FIRST would be retarded. As you'd then have anticipation for a sequel and the sequel would be a let down, as it would be weaker than the original.

If you take The Marshall Mathers LP to be somewhat of a sequel to The Slim Shady LP, given its concept and encapsulation of a persona, and its subject-matter etc. - do you think The Marshall Mathers LP is weaker than The Slim Shady LP? is it not more extreme, more artistic, elevated and a total amplification of the prior in every sense? is to me.

He was in a focused, lyrical state and zone. So I would expect nothing less than the sequel to such a focused, extreme album to be bigger and better.

50 Cent even said right from the get-go that Relapse 1 is a treat but the second one is 'exciting'. He called Relapse a 'treat' (good, enjoyable) but the sequel 'exciting'. To switch between those words means it must of been an amplification, and more extreme.

Saying there is nothing good as it would of been released is unfounded, unlikely and complete rubbish. There's more likely a classic album that he's thrown in the trash.

Because something very bad happened when he got a mixed reaction to Relapse. He started to GIVE A FUCK what people thought. Despite saying that he was just going to do what HE liked now (when he came back out) and fuck what EVERYBODY thought. He contradicted himself.

Relapse 2 not being released is so obviously because he got a mixed reaction from the first one and so he probably assumed the second one would be even more hated and he could fuck up his career and credibility, as that would be three duds in a row (Encore, Relapse and R2).

Hence the reason he got a shitload of popular produces, sung hooks, flipped his style to match the current era (punchlines), started doing introspective content again and aimed for a more mainstream appeal. He's in his second run of his career and would probably hate himself if he fucked it up and probably wanted to show people he could still be a success.

That has nothing to do with how good / bad Relapse 2 was / is / could be as he stopped caring about JUST that and started caring about fans and perception more. Which is bad.

this was a very good post and i followed and agreed with you on every single point, especially him saving the best for last, refill being a balanced set and the best eminem songs obviously not being the hit singles and the club bangers, so it's safe to say he still had a lot of good songs in store when he put out refill. i do, however, disagree with your point that he scrapped relapse 2 and put out recovery instead because of public reaction to relapse. i feel fairly certain, based mainly on his own statements, that it was a combination of things that did it, mainly him getting inspired by working with other artists like lil wayne and other producers while waiting to release relapse 2, and him feeling that the material no longer reflected where he was at in his life, he had moved past that and the material felt dated before he had even released it. in light of that, not releasing it was obviously the right decision.

[Berry]

Because something very bad happened when he got a mixed reaction to Relapse. He started to GIVE A FUCK what people thought. Despite saying that he was just going to do what HE liked now (when he came back out) and fuck what EVERYBODY thought. He contradicted himself.

Relapse 2 not being released is so obviously because he got a mixed reaction from the first one and so he probably assumed the second one would be even more hated and he could fuck up his career and credibility, as that would be three duds in a row (Encore, Relapse and R2).

Hence the reason he got a shitload of popular produces, sung hooks, flipped his style to match the current era (punchlines), started doing introspective content again and aimed for a more mainstream appeal. He's in his second run of his career and would probably hate himself if he fucked it up and probably wanted to show people he could still be a success.

That has nothing to do with how good / bad Relapse 2 was / is / could be as he stopped caring about JUST that and started caring about fans and perception more. Which is bad.

So much truth.

Plus lyrically, Recovery is still pretty hardcore. In fact, I would say TES is more commercial.

[Chanya]

Because something very bad happened when he got a mixed reaction to Relapse. He started to GIVE A FUCK what people thought. Despite saying that he was just going to do what HE liked now (when he came back out) and fuck what EVERYBODY thought. He contradicted himself.

Relapse 2 not being released is so obviously because he got a mixed reaction from the first one and so he probably assumed the second one would be even more hated and he could fuck up his career and credibility, as that would be three duds in a row (Encore, Relapse and R2).

Hence the reason he got a shitload of popular produces, sung hooks, flipped his style to match the current era (punchlines), started doing introspective content again and aimed for a more mainstream appeal. He's in his second run of his career and would probably hate himself if he fucked it up and probably wanted to show people he could still be a success.

That has nothing to do with how good / bad Relapse 2 was / is / could be as he stopped caring about JUST that and started caring about fans and perception more. Which is bad.

So much truth.

Plus lyrically, Recovery is still pretty hardcore. In fact, I would say TES is more commercial.

i agree with that. in fact, there's so many brilliant (even seemingly hidden) rhymes on recovery that i'd call it his most lyrical album. the album is all about lyrics, while at the same time sounding (mostly) upbeat and fun. i love it.

[Fleka]

We will never know about Relapse 2. We can`t know if Refill are the best tracks from Relapse 2, or scraped tracks from Relapse. I hope, when he decided not to release Relapse 2, he made Refill with the best tracks from Relapse 2. But, since he scraped No Apologies and Stimulate (correct me if I`m wrong), his judgment of what to scrap is questionable. So, there could be a few classic tracks we will never hear. Relapse 2 mixtape is the answer.

[_Hawk_]

I agree with most of what Embase has said, other than the issue of Relapse-2 being more exciting. Certainly that word is more than ambiguous in this case; it could suggest Relapse 2 is delving into new, more exciting areas; that it is perhaps better' or maybe that it's different, and thus captivating. Take the latter example: it doesn't suggest the album is better.
Given that Eminem said he had enough material to make two relapse albums, the first was always put forward as a mix of the best tracks (in this case the best 'balanced' playlist, as you suggest). I agree that there will be tracks which fall into other categories which are better than the 'club' tracks or the singles, however I think we can only guess at how good these tracks really are. Of course someone like 50 would say the material was exciting, but at the same time that word doesn't give me a lot of comfort in feeling that the album was better. He could have said it was something special, but exciting suggests towards a project which is delving into new areas (as aforementioned) and with Relapse in mind, we could look into this as showing that Em has taken the accent too far, or made the subject matter too ridiculous and stupid. 50 had also commented on the subject matter of Relapse (e.g Insane) as being something that only Em could pull off. To many extents I agree with this, but you could clearly see form said interview that 50 thought it was a bit left-field from what Em had been rhyming about before (this case being that there were no metaphorical connections to events in Em's live for him to comment on artistically). And yes, one could look into Insane as a hit at Em's childhood, but the spoofy nature of the song discredits any credibility. The rhyming is pretty good, but the concept is not up to the standards of Stan/Kim etc. To cut a long story short; the use of the word 'exciting' is really just that: something unexpected which could be quite awesome.

And that's really what Relapse 2 is: something which could have been awesome, or something which could easily dissapoint. It depends on how far you look into it, what your view is of the first album, but also how you look into any of the hints about its introduction. IMHO, most of the hints weren't promising: compare Dre's reaction about the MMLP (pre-release) to 50's reactions, and it's completely different. Even Em didn't seem excited by the introduction of Relapse 2.

Just my 2P, but props to Embase for a brilliant post

[Devil'sAdvocate]

Because something very bad happened when he got a mixed reaction to Relapse. He started to GIVE A FUCK what people thought. Despite saying that he was just going to do what HE liked now (when he came back out) and fuck what EVERYBODY thought. He contradicted himself.

Relapse 2 not being released is so obviously because he got a mixed reaction from the first one and so he probably assumed the second one would be even more hated and he could fuck up his career and credibility, as that would be three duds in a row (Encore, Relapse and R2).

Hence the reason he got a shitload of popular produces, sung hooks, flipped his style to match the current era (punchlines), started doing introspective content again and aimed for a more mainstream appeal. He's in his second run of his career and would probably hate himself if he fucked it up and probably wanted to show people he could still be a success.

That has nothing to do with how good / bad Relapse 2 was / is / could be as he stopped caring about JUST that and started caring about fans and perception more. Which is bad.

So much truth.

Plus lyrically, Recovery is still pretty hardcore. In fact, I would say TES is more commercial.

i agree with that. in fact, there's so many brilliant (even seemingly hidden) rhymes on recovery that i'd call it his most lyrical album. the album is all about lyrics, while at the same time sounding (mostly) upbeat and fun. i love it.

Let us not get fucking carried away.

[Chanya]

???

you must have a poor brain for lyrics.