I woke up this morning intending to finish up our Film Festival videos and doing some actual work. But upon seeing that Eminem had dropped a new single, I felt like I should at least mention it.

Generally speaking, I am an Em fan. I love his verses on Jay-Z’s Renegade, Biggie’s Dead Wrong, Obie Trice’s We All Die Someday, and many, many others. He is one of the greatest mixtape artists of all time. His 2000 release, The Marshall Mathers LP is a Hip Hop classic. He was never afraid to say what he felt and he expressed those feelings with such anger, sincerity and beauty. He had all the tools to become a great MC.

Unfortunately, Em always held himself back by catering to the MTV-addicted teenagers that, on the strength of My Name Is, essentially made his career. Embracing pop-culture references, gay jokes and random fart noises he became a rap parody. And by mocking himself and his craft, Eminem never reached that legendary status he so desperately craved. Granted, he became uber-successful and made millions. But to authentic Hip Hop heads, he fell short of the promise he flashed throughout his career.

I, for one, was eagerly anticipating his latest album. I was hoping for a record less like previous singles and more like his mixtape work—less play, more passion. But sadly, I was wrong.

We Made You is yet another joke from a comedian past his prime. It’s just not funny anymore. It’s tired and played out. Clowning pop stars, name dropping and that ridiculous accent, we’ve heard it all before—ten years ago. If we want to hear a song about Sarah Palin, we’ll listen to a mindless country song about the women of “Real America.”

Hopefully, this track is just an aberration and not representative of Relapse as a whole. Maybe it’s just one last song for the demographic that “made him.” But it just feels like a self-fulfilling prophecy. They made him into this caricature and now that’s all he is.

You can check out the song for yourself at the bottom of the post or watch the video here. And please tell if I’m crazy. But, it feels like Eminem is the biggest waste of talent in Hip Hop today and it breaks my fucking heart.

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