I miss the album phase.

[Man1x]

My parents kept me away from hip hop.
I don't know if I said it already here but back during summer of '03, Lose Yourself was on the radio. I really really liked it, so I told my mom. She told me "no, this isn't good music" and changed the station. I didn't even remember this until I heard Lose Yourself 3 years later, I was just like "I've heard this somewhere..." then I remembered. So I guess ever since I was an 8 year old it was inevitable I was going to be a hip hop fan.

It's just like that feeling, and you can't put a definition to it.

My parents didn't give a fuck.

Mine do... Whenever I have ear buds in now I'm told to take them out.

[Man1x]

My parents bought Eminem CDs for themselves because they liked him but they never let me listen to them until I got older because of Em's content. I was like 7 when MMLP came out so I guess that's understandable lol. I remember listening to Encore in the car with my parents sometimes when I was 11. I have a soft spot for that album 'cause I kinda grew up with it as my first Em album.

But the first Em song I heard was The Real Slim Shady. It played everywhere all the time.

Encore is to you as Recovery is to me. I really wish I was 15 around the time MMLP or TES dropped, thinking about it TES would have been the best era to knowingly live through and experience.

[Man1x]

My parents bought Eminem CDs for themselves because they liked him but they never let me listen to them until I got older because of Em's content. I was like 7 when MMLP came out so I guess that's understandable lol. I remember listening to Encore in the car with my parents sometimes when I was 11. I have a soft spot for that album 'cause I kinda grew up with it as my first Em album.

But the first Em song I heard was The Real Slim Shady. It played everywhere all the time.

Encore is to you as Recovery is to me. I really wish I was 15 around the time MMLP or TES dropped, thinking about it TES would have been the best era to knowingly live through and experience.

Someone you could ask about that would be Emadyville. Pretty sure he went to an Anger Management show around 2003-05. He got Em's hat from the show.

That lucky bastard.

Edit: Anyway, funny story. Jump Around is the only hip hop song that my father had on his CD player physically, not the only one he liked, but this was the only one where he found out the name of the song and made an attempt to purchase (still didn't know it was hip hop). He couldn't find a copy of the CD so he got the song burned on a disc and played it non-stop. However, my mother hated it two times more than my father and I liked it. She said it sounded it like they were kicking a horse to make the beat. Whenever it comes on now she covers her hears until my dad changes the radio.

[Fleka]

I got really into Em in 2000. MMLP/TES era was the best time of my life. When MMLP dropped TRSS was everywhere. All the people that looked at me strange when I would say that I listen to Eminem were loving that that song. And when TES dropped, everybody was a fan. 8 Mile era was the craziest.

[Man1x]

They used to, but that's cuz I was that kid Em describes in the first few bars of "Sing For The Moment".

To see him walking around with his headphones blaring
Alone in his own zone, cold and he don't care

This is me to this day. I space out a LOT, I guess it's another reason why people think I'm a druggy. Either I'll be thinking about life, I'll be thinking of rhymes, or I'll be listening to music. I can't pay attention to shit else except the music when I listen to it, I like to pay attention to everything about it.

Same here man, my teachers think I'm high all the time, but when they ask me I play it up as if I am because I just don't give a fuck. I had to be drug tested once because one teacher took my seriously when I responded to her question on if I was high with sarcasm.

I got really into Em in 2000. MMLP/TES era was the best time of my life. When MMLP dropped TRSS was everywhere. All the people that looked at me strange when I would say that I listen to Eminem were loving that that song. And when TES dropped, everybody was a fan. 8 Mile era was the craziest.

I could image. Just think what the Encore era would've been if The Game & 50 Cent didn't feud, Eminem didn't overdose on drugs, Encore was his best album to date and completely blew his others out of the water, Proof didn't die later on, and Dr. Dre put out Detox. That reign would have never ended.

[UofLCard]

I missed the eurphoric feeling I had on April 14th, 2010. My inner stan came out that afternoon.

Was that when Not Afraid dropped?

That was the day Recovery was announced.

[AbramIsaac]

I was in 5th grade when I started listening to Eminem.

It started in California, I was at my mom's. My half-brothers' half brothers were listening to the MMLP. TRSS was all over MTV, that shit played like every 20 minutes. It was ridiculous. After a while, it started making you nauseous to see the spit in those onion rings...

Anyway, I get back home, and my dad is listening to a mix of songs that his buddy got off of Napster (yeah, NAPSTER) and quite a few were Eminem. "Any Man", "Turn Me Loose", "Who Knew", and "Greg (freestyle)" all stick out to me now. "California Love" was on there too, but he had that on tape (!) back in like 96 when we were heading out to see my mom, so it wasn't the first time I had heard it.

After I started buying albums on my own, my dad was always having me burn shit off for him. I do remember him buying Devil's Night and the 8 Mile OST (complete with the sampler cd...oh, Stimulate for the first time) and letting me bump them for a week or two before asking for them back.

The Eminem Show really was the one that got girls and preppy kids to like Eminem. It also alienated a shitload of kids that only liked him because he used to be too raw for the general middle school public. You know, kids like PK. I kid, I kid...

[Hopsinshadie]

I feel like his next album will be his best. I just feel it.

I feel it too. Because I feel like he still has momentum from his last album. But I just don't know if he's going to come out with one for a long time, plus he will be 40.

[UofLCard]

But I just don't know if he's going to come out with one for a long time, plus he will be 40.

Why do you feel that...just because he hasn't announced one yet? When has he ever announced he was working on an album several months in advance?

[Trimss]

I feel like his next album will be his best. I just feel it.

I feel it too. Because I feel like he still has momentum from his last album. But I just don't know if he's going to come out with one for a long time, plus he will be 40.

Man, I'll be fucking more than satisfied if it's better than Recovery. With some amazing beats, and choruses by himself.

[Mathers]

I do to.

[JustEnjoytheMusic]

Literally. Same. Mother. Fucking. Thing. Except since I'm a bit nerdy looking people don't think I listen to rap. Then it's all "wow you listen to rap? wow!" or whatever, and then the perplexed looks I get when I talk about what I like because I've dug into the underground.

And that's me. I'm not quiet, just... well, not the kind of person people would expect to like hip hop.

Oh it was a girl?

There's your problem.

As for the "Album phase". BME: HTS was the first time I truly heard about the CD before it dropped... I became a fan after Encore came out, then the long hiatus and I kind of lost Eminem out of sight for a couple of years, so Relapse and Recovery I only heard of after they dropped. Once he announces a new solo album, I will feel that anticipation you mentioned for the first time.

[Amaranthine]

Oh it was a girl?

There's your problem.

[BumShiv]

I love everything. But mostly the interviews and the one freestyle he usually releases.

[ashley94]

same thing, i don't look like someone who's listening to rap at all, everyone is always shocked when i say i listen to hiphop, cuz girls don't really listen to hiphop in the netherlands...