i came in third

Eminem just announced yesterday that the title to his upcoming album will be "Relapse". I have to be honest when I first heard of Eminem I was appalled. Awful lyrics, horrible messages, berating women, drug use, and sex with anyone who'll drop their pants for you. (Kind of reminds me of when I used to listen to Too Short on the bus to out of town basketball games) Since my first experience with him, however, my views have changed somewhat. I still can't say that I agree with all of his lyrics by any means but I can say that I do respect him a lot more now. Not that we've hung out or done time together or anything but just saying that a couple of his songs have really hit to the heart of matters. (that and I am a lot less judgmental of profanity than i was taught growing up) The only other thing that i wanted to throw out there today (today being Friday, not Thursday when i should have posted this), is the evolution of the rap star. I believe that i can fairly say that I have grown up in the hip hop era. I have seen the rap stars change from people like Tone Loc, LL Cool J (when he was FIRST cool), Snoop Doggy Dog (not to be confused with Snoop Dog), Biggie Smalls, Puff Daddy (the first time he was Puff Daddy pre-Diddy) and many many others that I could name. Now we could go on all day about the relevance to these specific artists but lets save that debate for later. By Eevolution I just mean that when rap first became popular it was taboo mostly. The rappers said and did things that the main stream public thought was repulsive. Since that time, however, both the rap society and main stream public have shifted to a more middle ground. The public have been more open to the rappers constant profanity, diamond crusted teeth, and constant drug use/references. And rappers, have embraced toning some things down a little in order to cash in on movies and merchandise that was previously unavailable to them because of their 'fringe' of society status. Drop a comment and let me know what you thoughts are.....