Artist Case study
The artist I have chosen to write about is Eminem. Marshall
Bruce Mathers III (born October 17, 1972) better known by his stage name Eminem and by his alter ego Slim Shady, is an American
rapper, record producer, songwriter and actor. Eminem’s popularity brought his
group, D12, to mainstream recognition. As well as being a member of the Detroit
rap group D12, Eminem is also one half of the Detroit hip hop duo Bad Meets
Evil, with Royce da 5’9″. Eminem is one of the best-selling artists in the
world and is the best selling artist of the 2000s. He has been listed and
ranked as one of the greatest artists of all time by many magazines including
the Rolling Stone magazine which has ranked him 82nd on its list of The 100
Greatest Artists of All Time. The same
magazine has declared him The King of Hip Hop.
Including his work with D12 and Bad Meets Evil, Eminem has achieved ten
number-one albums on the Billboard200. He has sold more than 42 million tracks
and 41 million albums in the United States, and nearly 90 million albums
worldwide.
Eminem quickly gained popularity in 1999 with his
major-label debut album, The Slim Shady LP. That first album, The Marshall
Mathers LP and his third major album, The Eminem Show, all won Grammy Awards,
making Eminem the first artist to win Best Rap Album for three consecutive LPs.
The Marshall Mathers LP is also considered one of Eminem’s best and most
successful albums. Eminem then went on hiatus after touring in 2005. He released
his first album since 2004′s Encore, titled Relapse, on May 15, 2009. In 2010,
Eminem released his seventh studio album Recovery, which was an international
success. Recovery was also named the best selling album worldwide of 2010
joining The Eminem Show, which was the best seller of 2002. Eminem won Grammy
Awards for both Relapse and Recovery, giving him a total of 13 Grammys in his
career.
Eminem has opened other ventures since the beginning of his
success. He founded his own record label, Shady Records with his manager Paul
Rosenberg. He also has his own radio channel, Shade 45. Eminem began an acting
career in 2002, when he starred in the hip hop drama film 8 Mile in which he
won the Academy Award for Best Original Song, becoming the first rap artist ever
to win the award.
Eminem is one of the biggest selling artists of the 2000′s
decade and has sold more than 86.5 million albums worldwide to date. The reason
why he is so well-known is because his brand is promoted very well on lots of
different media platforms.
Space Bound” is a song by American rapper Eminem from his
seventh studio album, “Recovery”. The song is released as the fourth single
from his album “Recovery”. The function of this video is to act as a youtube
viral. This music video is made for entertainment and to attract the audience
to watch more of his videos as they are placed on the side bar next to the
video. By adding more videos at the side link this will get his fans to be sent
to his youtube channel and subscribe. Furthermore fans will then try and locate
his facebook fan pages and twitter. This will make Eminem more well known by
teenagers and youths because they use online socialising more. Youtube provides
an embed code so that fans can embed the viral into their own blogs, websites
and facebook pages.
Eminem is shown to be a “split-person” personality. In many
of the shots of the video there is a split-screen. One half of the screen shows
Eminem as calm, quiet and in love with his girlfriend Sasha Grey. The other
half of the screen shows Eminem to be violent, frustrated and paranoid.
Eventually he commits suicide by shooting himself in the jaw, this is filmed in
slow motion supposedly to generate shock as blood is visibly sprayed across the
shot. Because of the profanity and the suicidal scene the audience for this
music video would be adults and eminem fans. The mode of address is the
profanity and graphic suicidal scene as
eminem fans expect nothing less than this of eminem.
The music video caused attention by news reporters and fans
for its high shock value which includes Eminem’s suicidal scene and the use of
a gun for it.The video was harshly criticized by anti-violence campaigners in
the United Kingdom. Anti-violence group, Mothers Against Violence, told the British
Daily Mirror, “It’s all about the money with these videos. Eminem isn’t
thinking about the families affected.The music video was both praised by fans
and was noted for being rather graphic in nature. The controversy around the
video promotes the video because many people will watch it to see if it really
is controversia
8 Mile is a 2002 American hip-hop drama film written by
Scott Silver, directed by Curtis Hanson, and
starring Eminem, Mekhi Phifer, Brittany Murphy, and Kim
Basinger. The film is an account of a young white rapper named Jimmy “B-Rabbit”
Smith Jr. (Eminem) living in inner city Detroit, Michigan set in 1995, and his
attempt to launch a rap career in an industry dominated by blacks.
The story of Jimmy Smith is similar to the life experiences
of Eminem which attracts Eminem fans. Fans are able to identify with Eminem
because in this movie he is depicted in a different light. His character is
completely different to his alter ego “slim shady”. Eminem is not presented as
misogynist or violent. The film is highly patriotic because through hard work Eminem’s character finally
succeeds. It is thoroughly gratifying because fans are able to see Eminem’s
character succeed in life.
