Despite the fact that the holidays are long over, Eminem gave his fans a belated present late Thursday night/early Friday morning when he dropped his latest album, titled Music To Be Murdered By, completely by surprise.
Eminem made the unexpected announcement on Friday morning at about 12:05 am EST via a tweet with the caption “It’s your funeral…#MusicToBeMurderedBy Out Now” and a link to various purchase options as well as the album cover, which features a bearded Mr. Mathers holding an axe in one hand and a gun to his head in the other in a not to the art from Alfred Hitchcock’s 1958 album of the same.
The 20-track album, largely produced by Dr. Dre, features collabs with Ed Sheeran, Anderson .Paak, Royce Da 5’9, Skylar Grey, Young M.A, the late Juice WRLD, and more.
The album seamlessly weaves traditional Eminem sounds and themes (yes, he responds to Machine Gun Kelly) along with newer sounds (largely due in part to his diverse ensemble of guest artists) while touching on hot-button societal, cultural, and political issues. In addition to the album, Eminem also released a video for the song “Darkness” off of the album. The video shows a shooting at a concert accompanied by audio and footage from the 2017 mass shooting in Las Vegas. At the end of the video, Em encourages viewers to register to vote with the closing text: “Make your voice heard and help change gun laws in America” and pointing viewers to register at Vote.gov.
In 2018, Eminem also released his album Kamikaze in a similar unexpected manner.
