Trivia / The Marshall Mathers LP

• Colbert Bump: Pleasant English singer/songwriter Dido went global after Em sampled a part of her song "Thank You" for "Stan".
• Creator Breakdown: "Kim", written while Em's marriage to Kim was falling apart, is a hateful, disturbing song where the narrator sadistically and maniacally rants to, pleads with, and ultimately kills, his terrified wife (the controversial Black Comedy track "'97 Bonnie and Clyde", which was released earlier, is actually the "sequel" to "Kim"). A live performance of the song caused Kim herself to attempt suicide. Interestingly, they both tried to reconcile years after the song was released.
• Executive Meddling: The album was 100% complete before Eminem was forced to add one more track, per request by the Interscope Records execs. They wanted a Spiritual Successor to the zany pop anthem "My Name Is" for the lead in radio single. As we all know, the result was "The Real Slim Shady". The song's intent is quite obvious, since it doesn't sound like anything else on the entire album. Interestingly enough, Eminem went through a mountain of writer's block to reach that point, and he let out his surmounting frustration with the vitriolic (though excellent) "The Way I Am". According to Em, his displeasure with being typecast by the higher ups fueled a brief feud between him and Interscope, which nearly got him kicked off the label. Of course, this corporate conflict ended up resulting in two great songs off an highly acclaimed and commercially successful album, so this could be a case of Tropes Are Not Bad.
• Playing Against Type: In the video for "Stan", the titular Loony Fan is played by Devon Sawa, who was best known as a teen heartthrob in 90s films. It was around this time he was specifically looking to break that typecasting by taking on "weird" roles, along with Final Destination and Idle Hands.
• Throw It In!: Eminem observed that much of his favorite material on the album evolved from "fucking around" in the studio; "Marshall Mathers" developed from the rapper watching Jeff Bass casually strumming a guitar, while "Criminal" was based on a piano riff Eminem overheard Bass playing in studio next door. "Kill You" was written when Eminem heard the track playing in the background while talking to Dr. Dre on the phone and developed an interest in using it for a song. He then wrote the lyrics at home and met up with Dr. Dre and the two recorded the song together.
• What Could Have Been:
  • "Kim" was intended as a love song, and its dark tone was due to Em wanting to avoid overt sentimentality.
  • The album was considered complete before "The Way I Am" or "Real Slim Shady"; however, the higher-ups didn't feel it had much in the way of single-worthy material.
  • According to Em himself, while recording the third verse of "Stan", he had problems with the audio engineer that ruined a take that he stated was "way better" than the one we all heard.
  • Although Dido gave her permission for Em to sample the first verse of her song "Thank You" for "Stan", she was initially reluctant to appear in the music video; worrying about the scene that required her to be tied up. But she was eventually convinced to do the video, and got on quite well with everyone on set too.
• Working Title: Eminem almost considered naming the album Amsterdam after a trip to the city shortly after the release of The Slim Shady LP, in which he and his friends engaged in heavy drug use. To celebrate the album's 20th anniversary, Jonathan Mannion shared the picture that he thought would be the album cover.
• Writer Revolt: A big reason why "The Way I Am" was made. Marshall was pressured by his record company to make a pop rap song similar to "My Name Is" and he puts out a much angrier and emotionally driven song about the stress he has been enduring. Despite this, he made "The Real Slim Shady" anyways.

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