Top 5: WORST Eminem Songs
I was a kid known for his love of Eminem in high school, but even I understand that every artist has his share of songs that aren’t good, and even some that just plain SUCK.
So here it is, the top 5 best of the worst, Eminem songs that I simply CANNOT STAND listening to.
Some basic ground rules, songs included are only songs that Eminem did on his 8 studio albums, also including his Bad Meets Evil collaboration with Royce Da 5'9.
5. Same Song and Dance
Relapse is likely considered by most Eminem fans as his worst album. Eminem has referenced how he didn’t feel so proud of this release either. A lot of the negative response dealt with how Eminem was trying to alter his vocals that just didn’t work the same way it did when he put out the Slim Shady LP.
The other major critique is the content of the songs on Relapse. There was still the over the top maniacal fantasies delivered in tall order, but much of the material didn’t generate the same reaction or really resonate with fans.
The perfect conceptualization of Eminem’s vocal troubles plus messy content is found in Same Song and Dance. There’s a few songs that you could argue could take its spot. Some may point to Insane, but since I liked the production value of Insane as compared to Same Song and Dance, the latter takes the #5 spot. Same Song and Dance had Eminem in his classic psychopathic murderer scenario but lacked any of his demonstrative emotion that Kim had on the original Marshall Mathers LP. It’s as if Eminem got tired of murdering women in his music.
Relapse was not a lost cause of an album, where songs like Beautiful, Drop the Bomb on Em, and 3 A.M. came out. Typical hip hop fans would point to Forever, which was weighted down by lackluster guest spots from Drake and Lil Wayne.
4. Love the Way You Lie (ft. Rihanna)
From murder to abuse, some would say Slim Shady was going soft in the transition from Relapse to Recovery. Love the Way You Lie contained the elements of an abusive relationship, but told more of a reality than the fantasies fans were used to. Since abusive relationships are a reality and Eminem so well depicts them in art form, Love the Way You Lie turns into a smash hit with its cheesy piano and acoustic guitar chords.
Love the Way You Lie was the second worst song on the Recovery album and if it never became a smash hit I would replace it’s #4 spot on the list with Untitled which was a bonus track and the worst track on the album.
Love the Way You Lie never felt like an Eminem song, and maybe there’s too much expectation. It could be likely Interscope had Eminem boxed in with Rihanna to create a radio smash and this was the watered down result. Eminem’s storytelling lyricism is what makes us cling to songs like Stan, add an authentic production and you have a classic, see Legacy. But Love the Way You Lie took the storytelling and lyricism, the top tier production value, and flatlined it.
3. Lighters (as Bad Meets Evil ft. Bruno Mars)
This song comes in close composition to Love the Way You Lie. Replace Rihanna with Bruno Mars and add in Royce Da 5'9 and you get this mess of yet another watered down radio smash. Lighters is definitely worse than Love the Way You Lie, this isn’t an either-or situation. Lighters went a step further on a production level and changed acoustic guitar with echoed clap, and with a synth you’d find in a Chris Brown song with a harder clap possibly mixed with snare and bass drum.
Lighters took off where Not Afraid left off in Eminem’s positivity tour of songs that conveyed positive changes in his life. I’m all for that lyricism and message, and while Not Afraid was okay, even then their was that hint of “this feels cliche”. Lighters expounded upon that cliche and really made that message lose its veracity.
There’s a hilarious irony that I find in Rihanna, Bruno Mars, and Royce Da 5'9 all being on this list. They’re all pretty damn good artists that have made some fairly good music. Bad Meets Evil was overall a good album, there’s just that ONE song. And in this case Lighters was an all-time dud.
2. No Love (ft. Lil Wayne)
I shudder when I think about this song. I wish it never happened. For casual hip hop fans, Lil Wayne and Eminem is a dream collaboration, yet this track has never had a lasting effect on the hip hop community. I wonder why, I say sarcastically and rhetorically.
I am perfectly competent in my judgment that Lil Wayne is not a rapper that puts out great or good music. It’s my opinion and I’m entitled to it. Much in the same way that Drake, Big Sean, or Nicki Minaj don’t deserve any praise from me either.
Some people would like to say I listen to “conscious rap” where the rappers write about and lyricize something that requires conscious thought. But does Eminem really symbolize that? I say definitely not. You could argue No Love is a song conscious about it’s material, ‘love’, the most common topic of musical content.
But Eminem doesn’t derive any inspiration from the uninspired production with the Haddaway sample. Lil Wayne bats first and his verse is easily skippable, there’s a half decent attempt at a hook, and then Eminem lazily arrives to finish off this disaster of a song.
It’s awful, but not plain unlistenable like the next song.
- Just Don’t Give a F*ck
Some people may give critical acclaim to this early Slim Shady song. They would say it would set a tone for the ego that fascinates us all to this day. But the only tone I hear is of the disastrously created beat led off by a screeching sound that never stops.
Just Don’t Give a F*ck has that nails on a chalkboard like quality, or some tires that never stop screeching. Eminem’s signature Slim Shady voice was a bit more nasally here, and the flow wasn’t perfected, which is understandable considering the time. But the song is easily the worst on the Slim Shady LP no doubt.
And by being the only song I want to shut off 5 seconds into listening, before Slim Shady’s voice even reaches the mic, Just Don’t Give a F*ck is my vote for worst Eminem song of all time.
