But let’s back up.

After a typically theatrical/comedic opening, Relapse begins with the song’s protagonist on a pill-popping murder spree (3am). String bursts and keys lay a dramatic, foreboding tone that sets the stage as Em spits one of his most pedophillically hilarious lines ever in the second verse:

Sitting nude in my living room / it’s almost noon / I wonder what’s on the tube / maybe they’ll show some boobs / surfing every channel until I find Hannah Montana / then I reach for the Aloe & Lanolin / Bust all over the wall panel …and so on. He then moves on to Silence of the Lambs references and all other kinds of antics, tripping balls, freaking epileptic in the woods and so on. Somehow, what began as a gimmick has become a bona fide art form, and the airtight rhymes that carry on far beyond the initial payoff are a sign of what’s to come - an album where no stone is unturned, no combination of words has escaped forensic scrutiny.

Marshall goes on a Valium rant about his mom (My Mom), grinds jaws into the ground with a seriously f****d up incest blast (Insane) and slaps around Mariah and Nick Cannon over a Middle-Eastern-laced old-school Dre beat (Bagpipes From Baghdad), but really starts spreading his chameleon wings on Hello. It’s here that he drops a pop-lock flow that, just maybe, intentionally steps to Em derivitave Mickey Avalon’s style and backhands him in the face with it.

Skip right over the gruesome rape scene that is Tonya, and find yourself sucked immediately into the bass-heavy clap jam Same Song & Dance, tales of a murderous look back on love gone…wrong doesn’t quite cover it. We’re not dealing with any new thematic ground here, or throughout much of Relapse, but the lyrical design, flow and production value are far beyond anything we’ve heard thus far from Mr. Mathers.

In standard form, he takes aim at the celebrity sideshows of the day with vitriolic wit all over the map, particularly on first single We Made You. Sure, maybe nobody’s talking about Sarah Palin anymore, but bearing in mind that the guy’s been off the scene for five years, we should probably be thankful he’s not rhyming about Rumsfeld and Anna Nicole Smith. Although it is a little peculiar that there’s more than a couple references to late Superman star Christopher Reeve littered throughout Relapse.

On Paul, Em’s manager Paul Rosenberg turns in his stripes in a voicemail after hearing the album: “…and then the whole gay step-father incest rape shit? I don’t have your back on this one. I can’t even fucking handle it. I’m done.