Eminem- Untouchable Track Reaction
(By: Thomas Rodriguez)

Eminem: world famous, award winning, vulgar, and overall iconic rap superstar. Popularized by his late 90s and early 2000’s career, in which he released a trio of incredibly successful and acclaimed albums, Eminem has now been considered to be in a bit of a lull point of his career. While not terrible by any stretch of the imagination, Eminem’s recent output hasn’t quite reached that acclaim so common in his glory days (at least to many Eminem fans). However, despite his disappointing releases of Relapse (2009) and Recovery (2010), and solid release of The Marshall Mathers LP 2 (2013), many music lovers are still excited, have been awaiting Eminem’s grand exit out of the “meh” category of rap. Hype for his upcoming album, Revival, has been building and building, and then the album’s first single, the Beyoncé-featuring “Walk on Water”, was released. The spoken word song was met with…..lukewarm reception. However, people soon realized this was most likely just an extended intro, and awaited the next single to be released by Eminem. This next track, titled “Untouchable”, was released December 8th. How did it fare?

Eh, it was passable. But why in God’s name did Mathers release this as a single?

Right off the bat, the song is just….off-putting to put it lightly. The beat, comprised of crunchy rock inspired guitars that are way too loud and drumming that’s just flat out messy, automatically doesn’t sound pleasant to the ear. It’s different from the usual instrumental you’ll find in mainstream rap, but it’s not good. Eminem doesn’t sound like a professional rapper on this beat, just a lunatic (but not in a good way). The all-over-the-place feeling doesn’t just end in the instrumental; Eminem’s flow is just flat out baffling. This is a problem that’s been plaguing him for his past few singles, and while some of those were seemingly freestyles, this is just poorlh written. Eminem’s bars, which have a (seemingly) great underlying message of recognizing stupidity of racial stereotyping, pile on top of each other in strange, unpleasant ways. He sounds like he’s reciting a fifth grader’s rough draft of what an Eminem song should sound like. I won’t even bother mentioning the hook, because many have known that Eminem has often struggled with his hooks. This one in particular is a dumpster fire. The future of Revival, at least at this point in the song, looks to be quite grim.

While the first half of the song was really quite bad, the song picks up considerably at the halfway point. Instead of trying to be in your face, the second half is much more subdued, with nothing but a skeletal trap beat serving as a backdrop to Eminem’s lyrics. When they’re on tempo, as they are here, the song is actually passable! Granted, his flow and delivery are as subtle as the beat and could be energized a little; but his performance still works overall. His message of racial equality in America is covered again, and this version is a much more serious coverage of police brutality, crime, and protests. He still allows himself some punchlines (capped in America like Steve Rogers is arguably the funniest and most serious Avengers line ever written), and his coverage of racial tensions has a certain amount of believability and importance. After all, Mathers did grow up in the seediest part of Detroit. But at the end of the day, the second half of “Untouchable” is not amazing, just solid. The beat isn’t too flashy, nor is the performance, and it just doesn’t save the horror that is the first three minutes of the song.

 

Overall opinion: eMEHnem/10

 

Did you like this song? Any comments or criticism? Comment down below and let me know! I’d love to hear what you think!