Music Blogs

Reports of Eminem's demise have clearly been greatly exaggerated. Last we heard, Marshall Mathers was a 15st beefcake, popping tranquilizers and overdosing on PS3 controllers. Music seemed a forgotten fad. We should probably have taken such gossip with a pinch of salt, particularly after news of his new album, "Relapse", finally emerged at the end of 2008, closely followed by "Crack A Bottle", the first fresh material in five years, starring fellow rap heavyweights Dr Dre and 50 Cent.

The hip hop star is now expected to issue two albums in 2009, as he confirmed recently. "A lot of people were expecting 'Relapse' to drop last year", explained Eminem. "I was one of them. Then Dre and I went back in the studio in September for a few days, and that turned into six months. We were on such a roll; we wound up with a ton of new music produced by Dre. Putting out ‘Relapse 2' will let everyone get all of the best stuff."

Anticipation for Eminem's return has now reached palpable levels following his slick appearance at the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame event in Cleveland on Saturday night, where he inducted Run-DMC into the pantheon, wearing trademark black fedora and leather jacket. Two days later and today sees the release of the video to comeback single "We Made You", which begins with the infamous words: "Guess who? Did you miss me?"

Across the course of the next five minutes, Eminem bids to reclaim his rap crown backed by a rinky-dink keyboard line, carnival beats and a video trashing the likes of Jessica Simpson, Sarah Palin, Kim Karshadian, Amy Winehouse, Blake Fielder-Civil, Lindsay Lohan, John Mayer, K-Fed and Jessica Alba, with 50 Cent, Dre, Elvis and the cast of "Star Trek" also appearing as guest stars. It's an elaborate, kitchen sink production, which you can see here...