Eminem

"Guess who's back? / Back again?" Shady's back, but based on the bulk of the tracks on his comeback effort Relapse, it seems like he never really went away. He still hates his mother, but now we know she used to feed him Vicodin for breakfast ("My Mom"). He still loves to diss fellow celebrities, this time around its ex-jumpoff Mariah Carey and her new hubby Nick Cannon ("Bagpipes from Baghdad") and he still enjoys fulfilling his psycho-sexual fantasies on wax ("Same Song and Dance"). As can be expected, the radio singles like "We Made You" are hardly good. However over the Dr. Dre supplied creeper-funk of "Hello," it's evident that Em will always be able to spit, "I'm just busting my own chops / While I'm busting a rap / Resuscitated and rejuved / so fuck it I'm back." If Mr. Mathers had decided to stick with more of these and ones like the self-produced catharsis of "Beautiful" and less of the corny accents this disc wouldn't have fallen just short of being the kick in the ass that the rap game needs right now. Nonetheless, the Stans will come crawling out the woodwork to cop this one.