Tynan's Anger

Hip-hop enthusiasts black and white knew that Eminem was getting a ridiculously unfair and hyprocritical rap for the PC obsessed, and picked out "Stan" by necessity as a sign that Eminem's was more mature than his surface-level obscenity indicated. A decade later, the song holds up better than most anything else Eminem had produced to this point, and it may be because of the compassion that was easy to be cynical about in 2000. Here we see Eminem coming to terms with his fame, where the obsession with his image was taken to sick extremes, even if it was based on real emotions. The most chilling image on the track to me is not Stan taking his Eminem idolatry too far, or interluding chorus by Dido, which deservedly became a hit on its own. Instead it's the image of Eminem, sitting on his steps, realizing after the fact what he has just wrought. At the end of the day, if you don't keep the art interesting, nothing based on pure shock value will keep you fresh, something Eminem learned the hard way in the decade's second half. At this point in Eminem's career, he was used to being a brash young white rapper. "Stan" was the only time Eminem allowed himself some perspective.

Labels: 2000s, eminem, lists, pop music, songs of the decade, stan