Some Career Advice for Eminem

I’ve got some career advice for the rapper who calls himself “Eminem.”

That advice is as follows — hang it up.

Now.

I’ve just walked into my hotel room from a night out on the town and managed to catch his latest musical “performance,” on NBC’s Saturday Night Live.  I assure you, this was completely by accident.  Not watching Eminem, mind you.  I’m talking about tuning into Saturday Night Live.

Before I could reach for the remote control, I learned that he was the “guest star” of the show that night.  “Coming up next:  Eminem!”  Naturally, I had to watch out of morbid curiosity.  I’d never watched him perform before.  I figured it was sort of like rubbernecking a bad car crash.  Well, it was kinda like that — only I would have been much more interested in the auto wreck, especially if there were injuries.

Here’s the deal.  Basically, the dude comes out and jumps around a stage for six minutes wearing a puffy winter coat and screams into a microphone.  That’s it.  No structure.  No emotion.  No soul.  Hell, I could barely understand a single word he was saying.

Yeah, some real fucking talent.

And another thing.  He’s white!

The first time I ever heard of his name a few years ago, I thought he was named after the popular Hershey candy, as in “M&M.” Sometime later, I saw his name in print and it was spelled out all weird, as in E-M-I-N-E-M.  I mean, what the fuck?  Can’t he make up his mind?  Does he want to be M&M or Eminem?

But for me, the real shocker happened a few years ago when Eminem won an Oscar.  Not a Grammy, which you can pretty much get at a garage sale.  A fucking Oscar.  That’s like giving a Nobel Prize to Andrew Dice Clay.  Poor Barbara Streisand, the presenter that night, had to stand there on the stage looking like a deer caught in the headlights, acting like she knew who he was.  Talk about an awkward moment in the television hall of fame.  I didn’t think it was humanly possible to feel sorry for Streisand, but she earned my pity in droves that evening.

But I digress.  Back to Eminem and his Saturday Night Live appearance.

I don’t know what this kid is thinking.  I gave it a listen.  I went in with an open mind.  But let me tell you something.  After seeing his show, no one’s gonna buy his shitty music.  What idiot in their right mind would pay to go see him live?  I mean, all of his “songs” — if you can call them that — sound exactly the same.  And there’s no point whatsoever.  He doesn’t play the guitar.  Or the piano.  Hell, he doesn’t even say hello to his audience.  What a total lack of respect!

So, I’ve got some career advice for Eminem.  Anyone who’s got his phone number should give him a ring and tell him to listen to me.  Aside from hanging it up, the dude should enroll in a vocational school — you know, learn a trade.  If this music thing doesn’t work out, and I sure as shit know it won’t, maybe he can get a job at Midas changing mufflers, or something like that.  You know, honest work for honest pay.  Trouble is, he’ll have some serious gaps on his resume.  What’s he going to say, that he was touring the world for eight years making tens of millions of dollars?  Who in the fuck is going to believe that story?

I will say one thing, though.  He’ll sure be able to impress his buddies, saying he was once on Saturday Night Live and got to meet Barbara Streisand in person.  I mean, who wouldn’t cream their pants after hearing that?

Right now, if you paid me a hundred million dollars for every Eminem song I could name, I’d leave this conversation flat broke.  That’s not a testament to my musical ignorance as much as it is his utter failure.  That’s right, he’s failed to reach out to people like me.  In fact, he’s doing a piss-poor job marketing his music to my generation.  More advice coming:  If I were him, I fire his agent in a heartbeat.  He’s not cutting it.  Nobody I know can name one of his songs either.  Do you call this a successful career?

Sincerely, I do want to modernize my taste in music.  I’m eager to hear new sounds and expose myself to fresh talent.  But as long as M&M keeps acting like a jackass and singing lyrics I can’t possibly understand or identify with, let me just say he’s not going to get any of my business.

I’m no fool.  I refuse to buy Eminem’s albums and 8-track tapes.  And, I urge you to demand the record stores quit carrying his music.  If we all unite together, we can win this fight and take back AM radio!