Using his biting wit and incredible wordplay this thirteen time Grammy Award winner broke away from his unhappy childhood.
His father deserted him before he could walk, and his drug-addict mom could not do much.He was bullied for several years in school, and he even landed in a coma for over a week.Â
But his love of the English language redeemed his life and catapulted him to become one of the biggest rap artists the music scene has witnessed.
Childhood
Marshall Bruce Mathers was born on October 17, 1972 in Missouri. He never knew his father, who abandoned the family when Eminem was still an infant. His father rebuffed all of his son’s many attempts to contact him during his childhood. Â
Her mother never managed to hold down a job, so they moved frequently and Eminem had to change schools twice or thrice in a year.
He failed ninth grade three times and eventually dropped out at the age of 17. Despite being a poor student, Eminem always had a deep affinity for language, devouring comic books and even studying the dictionary.
Career
Eminem found a way to express his passion for language, as well as to release his youthful anger through the musical genre of hip-hop. He entered rap battles where he was swallowed up most of the time.
He worked odd jobs to make ends meet while participating in rap battles and desperately attempting to land a record contract. In 1996, Eminem released his first independent rap album, ‘Infinite’ which sold less than a thousand copies.
Having nothing to lose at all, flat broke and not knowing where he would be living the next week, Marshall set out to rant about life in general. What came out of this was the Slim Shady EP; the early work for the later rapper Dr. Dre’s revised Slim Shady LP.
In 1999, Eminem released ‘The Slim Shady LP’. The heavily hyped record became an instant success and went on to sell over three million copies.
Eminem released his second studio album, ‘The Marshall Mathers LP’, in 2000. The album showed off Eminem’s poetic talents as well as his emotional and artistic range. His songs vary from manically funny (“The Real Slim Shady”) to heartbreakingly poignant (“Stan”) to explosively violent (“Kim”) to disarmingly self-critical (“The Way I Am”). The Marshall Mathers LP sold over 19 million copies worldwide.
In 2002, Eminem released a new solo album, ‘The Eminem Show’, another popular and critically acclaimed album highlighted by the tracks “Without Me,” “Cleaning Out my Closet” and “Sing for the Moment.” His next album, 2004’s Encore, was less successful.
For the next several years, Eminem was largely consumed by personal problems. He divorced his wife in 2000 but continued to maintain an off-and-on relationship until remarrying in 2006. They divorced again several months later and began an ugly and highly public custody dispute over their daughter.
He slipped further into alcoholism and addiction to sleeping pills and prescription painkillers. In 2007, he overdosed and nearly died.
In 2010, Eminem released another album, Recovery, a highly autobiographical attempt to come to terms with his struggles with addiction and experience with rehabilitation.
Acting Stint
Eminem made his official Hollywood acting debut with the semi-autobiographical film 8 Mile, released in November 2002.
Controversy
Through his song lyrics, Eminem publicly accused his mother of being addicted to prescription drugs as well as subjecting him to emotional and physical abuse. However, his mother vehemently denied all such accusations, and in 1999 filed a $10 million defamation lawsuit against her son. They settled the case for $25,000.
In 2000, his wife Kim attempted suicide by slashing her wrists. Kim sued Eminem for defamation after he depicted her violent death in his song “Kim”.
In 2001, Eminem was sentenced to one year probation on weapons charges that stemmed from an argument with an employee of Psychopathic Records, assessing him a fine around $2,000.
Awards
He was ranked number nine on MTV’s list of The Greatest MCs of All Time.
Ironically, “The Real Slim Shady”, one of the songs from his second Grammy-winning album, The Marshall Mathers LP, slammed the Grammy Awards in its second verse, and stated the opinion that negative feelings about his material would keep him from ever winning one.
Eminem received the Global Icon award at the 2013 MTV EMA in Amsterdam.