Eminem: The Stories Behind Every Song

by David Stubbs

Emerging from a poor, stereotypically white-trash childhood in Detroit, this vengeful hip-hop devotee soon turned his anger into an art form and shot to global notoriety. Eminem has written two multi-platinum bestselling albums of surreally inventive, vicious, scattergun brilliance and become the world's premier rapper and and icon for disaffected teenagers everywhere. Along the way, though, he's been accused of homophobia, endorsing drug abuse, encouraging violence against women, and flirting with incarceration — a fate many see as inevitable for this psychologically flawed modern antihero. So where does Marshall Mathers end and Slim Shady begin? Who, in short, is Eminem? This fantastic biography is a celebration of the uniquely provocative and complex rapper who advises his young fans, "Don't do drugs, have unprotected sex, or be violent — leave that to me."

Genres: Nonfiction, Music

256 pages, Paperback

First published October 6, 2003

About the author

David Stubbs is a British journalist and author, covering music, film, TV and sport. He is known for his work on the Maker’s "Talk Talk Talk" column, converting it from a two-page gossip spread into a satirical and surreal take on the rock and pop world and those characters who stalked it, both the heroes and the hapless.

Among his creations were Pepe Le Punk, a Belgian music journalist (author of Hi, I’m Mr Grunge – An Unauthorised Autobiography Of Kurt Cobain); Derek Kent, MM staff writer since 1926, wit, raconteur and pervert, and Diary Of A Manic Street Preachers Fan (who admired the group for their “intense intensitude”); The Nod Corner, the fictional journals of the Fields Of The Nephilim drummer whose scheming bandmates continually got him into hot water with lead singer Carl McCoy, who would administer him the punishment of ten press-ups. The likes of Sinead O’ Connor, Morrissey, The Mission, Andrew Eldritch, Bono and Blur were also sent up on a regular basis.

However, his most famous and beloved creation was Mr Agreeable (formerly Mr Abusing), whose weekly column was a terse exercise in unmitigated, asterisk-strafed invective scattered at all and sundry, especially the sundry, in the rock world – the various c***s, streaks of piss, f***wits, arseholes and twotmongers who raised his blood pressure often by their mere existence. Although Stubbs left Melody Maker in 1998 to work for a cross range of titles including NME, Vox and Uncut, Mr Agreeable remains an occasionally active commentator, occasionally dropping in at The Quietus to vent his ire.

- excerpted from his website: http://www.mr-agreeable.net

Librarian note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.

David^^Stubbs

Reviews

[Rohin Dubey · Rating 2 out of 5]

This wasn't the story behind every song as much as a description of them. Expected more but for what's worth, it's worth 2 stars.

[Vishal Jaravta · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book is totally disappointment. One is buying EMINEM book, surely knows everything about the songs. Stan's all around the world follows him religiously and definitely knows this thing. I bought this book first because of the cover 😍 and then assuming there must be something which we don't know. After reading the half book, I was struggling to complete the book. I gave two stars for the legend only #EMINEM .

[Connor · Rating 5 out of 5]

“In the history of hip hop, rock or pop there never been anyone quite like Eminem”, wrote David Stubbs. Eminem has become the biggest name in the music industry. In Eminem: The Stories Behind Every Song David Stubbs brings Eminem’s past to life and shows how each song came to be. His past experiences are prevalent in each song that he has written. Stubbs chronologically goes through the career of Eminem. He starts from his early rap career in Detroit in the underground scene and works his way up to his most recent album “Recovery”.

Stubbs starts of each album section with a few pages to describe Eminem’s life leading up to that album. This allows the reader to get a glimpse as to what is going on in his life at the time. After the introduction of the album Stubbs breaks it down by each song. He elaborates on each song and what it refers to. Not only does he talk about the song itself, he also tells what occurred because of the song. Whether it was a number one on the billboard charts or a law suit, Stubbs tells it all.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book. I enjoyed it because Eminem is my favorite rapper and it was very interesting to learn even more about his life. Stubbs gave a lot of information to help the reader learn about the crazy past of Eminem. I also enjoyed this book because it gave meaning to each song. I prefer to listen to music that has meaning behind the song. This book has helped me enjoy his music even more because I can appreciate what he is rapping about.

As much as I loved this book one negative thing I would say about it is the variance of length. Stubbs will spend several pages on one song and then other times have a small paragraph about another. I felt that there could have been more written about some of the songs. I understand that some of the songs don’t have much behind them which makes it hard to write a lot about but for the most part the paragraph length was fair but for some it could have been better.

I would definitely recommend this book to someone who has an appreciation of rap music. Obviously I would recommend this book to someone who is a fan of Eminem. If a person doesn’t like Eminem then I would clearly not recommend it to them because it is all about Eminem. If you are a fan of Eminem you must read the book.

[Chelsea · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm not a huge Eminem fan, but apparently David Stubbs is. The author of this book basically fanboys explanations through every song from Em's early years through his Recovery CD. It had some interesting history on Em's early life and why certain CDs flubbed the way they did, but it was too rose-colored to really be anything special. Em had a lot of demons to work out, but being a misogynistic jerk is never ok...unless your Eminem, of course. But Stubbs does get one thing right, behind the mother-bashing, murder skits, there is a hurt human being...and an artist aching to be heard. He has a sort of Cinderella-story that is inspiring in and of itself. So, fans of the self-proclaimed Rap God may not find any of the info too surprising, and semi-fans like me might actually learn something from Slim Shady....everyone else..it was just meh.

[Lance · Rating 3 out of 5]

In the book, Eminem talks about what he went through in all of the songs. It first say about how he was in the group D12 and they soon broke up because they didn't agree with what Eminem thought. Some of them stayed close but most of them didn't talk at all. after it talks about that it talks about how his mom and grandma don't respect him. He then wrote a song about her and she sued him for it. he then starts talking about Kim and how she doesn't want his daughter Haley to leave him. His mom took custudy of her and so that's when he started to write about his daughter. People then started to not take him seriously and that made him mad so he started to rap about how his fans gave up on him and how he doesn't want them back. It ends with him talking about his movie (8 mile) <---- that's supost to be underlined. That talks about how he grew up in the hood and how he became a star rapper.

[Hunter Yurkovich · Rating 1 out of 5]

The way David writes this book is somewhat childish, and he uses words that make the purpose of the songs seem pointless. He used words like "super dope" in almost every chapter, and it gave me a headache. I needed patience to get through this book. I didn't enjoy it has much as I thought I would.

[Mona · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this book because I am a fan of Eminem. So, if you are not one of Eminem's fans (or even rap song's fans), don't read this. :D

[Hannah · Rating 5 out of 5]

Love it so much

[Bista Nirooj · Rating 4 out of 5]

Got chance to know Mr. Marshall Mathers more closely than early. No Doubt he is a Great Artist. Rap God as he is. :)

[Snowleopard · Rating 1 out of 5]

The recount of 8 mile is wrong. Wink is not who Jimmy is up against in the final rap battle of 8 mile; Papa doc's real name is Clarence.