Summer 1998: The birth of the Slim Shaady – White Men Can Rap: Eminem comes out with “My Name is”. In 1997 Eminem had a one -year -old daughter and not much. Determined to wrestle the music business, he took up the “Slim Shady” EP and moved from Detroit to Los Angeles. There Dr. Dre his demo, who was lying around in the office of Interscope boss Jimmy Iovine. “I was about to go crazy, had a lot to do with drugs and other fucked shit because I was so depressed,” Eminem said later.
“EM hardly dared to go into the door”
“When Dre called, he saved my life.” “On our first day,” said Dre, “we worked for five or six hours and had four songs in the box at the end.” “My name is” was one of them. “EM hardly dared to go into the door, a very shy boy,” says Richard “Segal” Huredia, who was sitting at the mixer.
“But as soon as he stood in front of the microphone, this energy came out and all the different voices – we had never heard that before. At some point we all groove with us. ”“ My name is ”presented Eminem’s bad alter ego slim shady, a grass -smoking, traveling drunkard that threatens to tear down the tits. Lines such as “I just found out my mom does more dope than do” gave an idea of subsequent insults and alienation between Eminem and his mother Debbie Mathers-Briggs.
“I got the” by Labi Siffre
And behind the scenes, EM was accused of the first time: the memorable keyboard reef of the piece reminded a little too much of “I got the” by Labi Siffre, which then enforced that EM changed a passage of the text.
“My name is” did not make it higher than 36 in the Billboard charts and was yet an unforgettable start for Eminem. He soon couldn’t do anything with the song and refused to sing him live: “He hung out of my neck after only three months. “” At some point the song got too big for him and he started to rebel, “says Eminem’s manager Paul Rosenberg.
That did not stop him from writing a sequel-“The Real Slim Shady” from the “Marshall Mathers” LP-and also to use the track as an inspiration for “The Way I am”, another Mathers classic. “, My name is’ was the biggest hit on his first album, and he had the feeling that he could never deliver anything that goes into the ears in this way – and is so credible,” says Rosenberg. And Eminem did not quite wrongly had this prophecy.