Eminem- Recovery (*½)

Let’s get one thing straight: Marshall Mathers is a talented man.

When he burst onto the mainstream in 1999, there was scarcely a rapper alive that could match his energy, his vitriol. His rhymes stopped and started on a dime, dizzying listeners with his control and his blistering pace. While there was a fair share of criticism pointed at his violent and perhaps misogynistic lyrics, it was hard to argue that his aptitude for delivery was anything less than astonishing. Simply put, hearing your average Eminem track was like watching Kobe Bryant: The man clearly had skill in his domain, no matter what professional/personal antics dogged him.

And throughout his career, it’s been the one thing to save him from going belly up.

So armed with this tangible and mesmerizing talent, Eminem graces fans with the crossover ready Recovery, an album that pushes everything about his craft to its absolute limits. Coming on the heels of the bloated horrorcore of Relapse, Recovery finds Mathers still a master at his flow, but with an obsessive need to right the supposed wrongs of his past two releases. The result is a record that feels both musically and lyrically empty, void of the hungry earnestness, gritty soundscapes, and warped perspectives we’ve come to appreciate from Mathers.

Part of the problem lies in Eminem’s choice in producers. He foolishly employs personalities like Just Blaze to give him an unneeded 2010 hip-hop facelift. The move reeks of Mathers’ wish to be as massive as Lil Wayne, and displays a stark change from someone that used to battle the world on his own terms. While Dr. Dre’s presence on Relapse gave the disc a unified and often nightmarish atmosphere, Recovery feels schizophrenic at best, a pastiche of the worst the genre has to offer.

Whether it’s the cluttered auto tune traffic jam of “Talkin’ 2 Myself” or the plastic synthesizers on “No Love,” it’s clear that Recovery was crafted to move units rather than to explore new sonic territory. In fact, most of the album’s beats come across rigid and compressed, bent on blowing out your speakers rather than providing a steady groove. “Cold Wind Blows” opens up with Mather’s filtered vocals before the track’s Neanderthal-sized drums clobber everything within reach. Elsewhere, the saccharine strings and tinny thump of “Not Afraid” paints Eminem at his most desperate, not emotionally, but creatively.

In all, Recovery doesn’t flounder because the arrangements are too busy, it flounders because the songs are mechanized when they should feel organic. Ironically, the most balanced moment on the album is on the lazy horn infused stomp of “So Bad,” Dr. Dre’s lone production contribution. It works because it’s one of the few moments where the music has space to breathe, instead of feeling cramped and lifeless. Even the out of character Pink collaboration “Won’t Back Down” flexes some engaging muscle, complete with wildly fuzzy guitar and stutter-stop energy that makes Eminem appear urgent and relevant.

Still, when the curtain drops, even the best wizard can’t keep up the illusion.

While Mathers’ vocals sound more noticeably like himself than the bizzaro Jamaican counterpart fans heard on Relapse, Recovery’s real downfall is in its lyrics. If Eminem’s previous album sacrificed humor for the grim and graphic, Recovery mistakes emotive storytelling for the trite and tired. On “Going Through Changes,” Eminem attempts to detail how far his addictions made him slide (“Marshall what happened to you/You can't stop with these pills/And you've fallen off with your skills/And your own fans are laughin' at you…”), but it comes across as whiny considering he’s still the one of the most lucrative artists of all time.

Attempting confessional-style lyrics is never an easy proposition, but the problem is that they feel so calculated on Recovery. Even the most fair-weather fans will have to question the honesty behind them. If this was supposed to be Eminem’s “personal” album, one that stapled his heart on his sleeve, what are fans to make of “W.T.P.,” a track detailing Mathers’ trashy good times “mixin' Hennessey and Fanta/With Pepto and Mylanta…?” Party tracks like that not only undermine Eminem’s scope for the record, but they make listeners question his authenticity, much like his constant apologies for Encore and Relapse.

If he admits his records are disposable, why should anyone validate his art?

What it all comes down to is that Eminem has devolved into self-parody in the wake of his success. He now relies shock and forced emotions rather than writing provocative prose. It’s depressing considering how his first two albums were frightening portraits of how America’s excess created depraved monsters. Back in 1999, Marshall Mathers and Slim Shady were representative of what people could turn into given how our country operated, a frightening look at the Ghost of 2000’s Future.

Unfortunately, he’s stopped tackling the seedy underbelly of this country’s psyche, opting to make shallow music that’s easy to consume. Interestingly enough, Recovery’s brightest moment is when he tackles those who say his flow has gone soft on the soul inflected, heart beat flutter of “On Fire.” His precision delivery dips and dives over peaks and valleys as he raps, “Saliva’s like sulfuric acid in your hand/It’ll eat through anything metal/The ass of Iron Man…” Oddly enough, within the track’s open narcissism lies Mathers’ most honest realization: He’s a REALLY talented MC.

It’s too bad Recovery is the sound of him coasting on those talents.

Key Cuts: On Fire, Won’t Back Down, Almost Famous

Sounds Like: Rise Up (Cypress Hill), D12 World (D12), Encore (Eminem)

Click on the artwork to sample Recovery for yourself!