The Eminem Show
Track 8 - Without Me
[2 trailer park girls go round the outside/ round the outside, round the outside]
Marshall watched from his seat as the nominees flashed across the large monitors on the left, right, and center of the stage.
[Guess whos back, back again/ Shadys back, tell a friend/ Guess who's back, guess who's back, guess who's back/ Guess who's back...]
It was good to have the public eye trained on him again. His latest video played in front of the audience, and Marshall kept his smile to himself, hidden beneath the layers of Eminem and within the core of Marshall Mathers.
[I've created a monster, cuz nobody wants to
see Marshall no more they want Shady I'm chopped liver
well if you want Shady, this is what I'll give ya
a little bit of weed mixed with some hard liquor
some vodka that'll jumpstart my heart quicker then a
shock when I get shocked at the hospital by the Dr. when I'm not cooperating
when I'm rocking the table while he's operating ]
He loved his fans. He loved his music.
But sometimes he hated it all. Wished he’d never made it, never was discovered, and could just be Marshall Mathers and only that.
He knew it was a stupid wish, and that he didn’t really mean it, because he had hated life before his fame—hated it more than he hated his life now.
Why couldn’t he find happiness? Wasn’t there some middle-ground to be found?
[you waited this long now stop debating cuz I'm back, I'm on the rag and ovulating
I know that you got a job Ms. Cheney but your husbands heart problem's complicating
So the FCC wont let me be or let me be me so let me see]
His life seemed like a myriad of extremes. Happiness eluded him, despite the millions he made and the fans that plundered music stores for anything with his name on it. It seemed impossible to settle between everything and nothing for something.
Either he was too violent, or becoming a pussy.
Either he was Eminem, or he was nobody.
Everything was becoming an enormous pretense, just some ruse under the guise of alter-ego Eminem. He felt the walls crashing in upon him, felt the pressure of the need to live up to the reputation Eminem had built, but knowing that Marshall Mathers was not the man everyone assumed he was.
[they tried to shut me down on MTV but it feels so empty without me
So come on and dip, bum on your lips fuck that, cum on your lips and some on your tits and get ready cuz this shit's about to get heavy
I just settled all my lawsuits Fuck YOU DEBBIE!]
Everyone complained when he was in the spotlight.
But then they’d turn around and taunt about Eminem not having the guts to stick around. That he didn’t have staying power. And then there were the fans who expected him to continually crank out album after album, hit song after hit song without pause or hesitance. That’s all he was, hesitance.
Hesitating to resolve things with Kim.
Hesitating in his career.
Hesitating in pursuing his dreams.
Hesitating losing it all.
Hesitating determining his future; deciding it, living it, and destroying it.
Hesitation, thy name is mine.
[Now this looks like a job for me so everybody just follow me
cuz we need a little controversy, cuz it feels so empty without me ]
It was natural that he would win the award, and as he stood up and took in the applause of celebrities who weren’t there for anyone but themselves, he took the stage and podium with charisma.
[Little hellions kids feeling rebellious
embarrassed, their parents still listen to Elvis
they start feeling the prisoners helpless, 'til someone comes along on a mission and yells "bitch"
A visionary, vision is scary, could start a revolution, pollutin the air waves a rebel
so let me just revel an ask, the fact that I got everyone kissing my ass]
“Let’s see. I’d like to thank… You know what, fuck it. I thank my fans and the people who produced the album.”
[and it's a disaster such a catastrophe for you to see so damn much of my ass you ask for me?
Well I'm back (batman sound) fix your bent antennae tune it in and then I'm gonna
enter in and up under your skin like a splinter
The center of attention back for the winter
I'm interesting, the best thing since wrestling
Infesting in your kids ears and nesting
Testing "Attention Please" feel the tension soon as someone mentions me
here's my 10 cents my 2 cents is free
A nuisance, who sent, you sent for me? ]
The award he’d come to win had been won, and he didn’t bother to take his seat as he stepped down from the stage. He kept walking until he came to the security guards at the exit doors.
“Let me out.”
They looked at each other, shrugged, and opened the doors only to quickly shut them as soon as Marshall had left.
[A tisk-it a task-it, I'll go tit for tat with anybody who's talking this shit that shit.
Chris Kirkpatrick you can get your ass kicked
worse than them little Limp Bizkit bastards, and Moby
you can get stomped by Obie, you 36 year old bald headed fag blow me
You don't know me, you're too old let go its over, nobody listens to techno
Now lets go, give me the signal I'll be there with a whole list full of new insults
I've been dope, suspenseful with a pencil ever since Prince turned himself into a symbol]
Who was he if he wasn’t Eminem?
Without Eminem.
Without that nickname he’d made, what was left among the ruin?
He wasn’t so sure Marshall Mathers was still there.
If he hadn’t been lost amongst the fame and trying life of a superstar.
[But sometimes the shit just seems, everybody only wants to discussme
So this must mean I'm disgusting, but its just me I'm just obscene
Though I'm not the first king of controversy
I am the worst thing since Elvis Presley, to do Black Music so selfishly
and use it to get myself wealthy (Hey)
there's a concept that works
20 million other white rappers emerge
but no matter how many fish in the sea it'd be so empty without me]
It felt good, he thought, as he jumped into the back of his limousine.
Felt good to leave them behind. Escape into the blackness of the night, in the safety of the pitch-black windows. The cool air pricked his skin, lulled him into an abyss of nothing.
He closed his eyes.
Without Eminem, he would be wondering whether he’d ever had the talent to have made it.
If it was bad luck or bad timing that he hadn’t been discovered.
He’d struggle through providing his daughter; he’d fight and argue with Kim, clinging to a marriage that didn’t work.
Eminem may have made him a better man, but it made him wiser to the mistakes and the errors of his life.
He was all the more aware of where things were going, and that he could never go back to how things used to be.
That he didn’t want them to.
Marshall Mathers was Eminem.
Eminem was Marshall Mathers.
They were one.
He settled against the leather seats, welcoming the realization.
[Hum dei dei la la Hum dei dei la la... la la la]
Chapter 9
Author: zines@aol.com
These stories are for entertainment purposes only. They are completely fictitious, and the authors mean no harm to EMINEM, his family, friends, or anyone else that may have been depicted as a 'real life' character. No money was made on the fiction here, either directly or indirectly, i.e. paid advertising. In other words - it's just a bunch of shit we wrote for fun. Please don't take it seriously.