If you think at all like i do, you found Eminem's past 3 or 4 albums to be a bit "meh." In my mind I found them to contain one or two decent tracks but for the most part they were very forgettable. Then there was that awful B.E.T. freestyle thing that furthered my "meh" attitude about him. However, in Kamikaze, i believe that he has completely redeemed himself and I have a theory as to why that is. ![15262.jpg](https://cdn.steemitimages.com/DQmf4Q815m2UugfTvb1UzC6uo3FZu7oHbSY76HFxsvyX887/15262.jpg) From the very first song he has you hooked. "Ringer" has the deep bass that we really tend to enjoy about rap and he also switches to and from multiple styles of laying down bars. This shows that not only can he do the style that he was a massive part of developing but is also more than capable to of moving over to other styles - which I am not going to pretend to know the names of. ![eminem.jpg](https://cdn.steemitimages.com/DQmbAAou24PFt4iqBVjv8rPK56JqXsENofXP6SNmYc6PWMd/eminem.jpg) This album was completely unannounced and the people involved in its production did a very good job keeping that information from leaking. There wasn't even any sort of whisper talk on 4-chan about it as far as I know. It truly caught everyone off guard. It couoldn't have come at a better time because while no one was claiming he was washed up or anything, he was becoming less important in the rap game because of the lackluster performance of his last 3 albums. I suppose this is unfair because just like one of the lines in a recent song *my biggest flops are your greatest hits* Marshal is held to a completely different standard than pretty much everyone else in the game. If he ONLY sells 2 million copies, it is considered a failure whereas for pretty much anyone else, this would be an amazing accomplishment. Now on to my theory about why this album is good and the last 3 really weren't: Eminem hasn't been properly mad about anything in a while ![HIHS0jY.jpg](https://cdn.steemitimages.com/DQmXBhvCF4HNp25JaNos6vVDXMD9V9DFUUFQSzRBSuELJ2C/HIHS0jY.jpg) Think about it. If you know anything about this guy's past music you would know that much of his subject matter is his pent up rage about his past. He's past all that now, everyone loves him and kisses his butt all the time, he is rich as F**K and has people waiting on him hand and foot from now until the end of time. What is there to be mad about? Then 3 albums in a row he receives negative press about the quality of his work and a majority of pundits are "slaying" his albums on youtube and in magazines that anyone still reads. Plus there was the whole thing where MGK said what i consider to be an innocent comment about his daughter being "hot" and Eminem takes that sort of stuff really personally. Anyway, angry Em was back, and this is when he does his best work. A majority of the tracks on Kamikaze are response tracks, mostly to the critics as is personified in this epic track, and pretty great video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MfTbHITdhEI I don't really pay much attention to hip-hop, for the most part I don't like it. However, it is difficult to ignore something as good as Kamikaze, whether you are a fan of rap or not. # 9 / 10