Usually, when a public figure issues an “open letter,” it’s usually delivered in the form of a press release or an email directed to an outlet marked “okay to print.” But some folks just have a flair for the dramatic, which gives us Eminem’s latest public address, delivered in the form of an Instagram post explaining and defending his latest album, Music To Be Murdered By, typed up in a graceful-looking, old-timey font on a weathered background designed to resemble a piece of parchment and addressed to the “Gentle Listener” of his new project.
The letter reads as a justification of the album, seemingly in the wake of criticisms of its lyrical content, which includes jokes about the 2017 Manchester Arena bombing at an Ariana Grande concert and a lyrical re-enactment of the 2017 Las Vegas mass shooting at the Route 91 Harvest music festival. Em posits that “murder has become so commonplace that we are a society obsessed and fascinated by it” and insists that “this album was not made for the squeamish.” He also asserts that the “violent” content is designed to “shock the conscience,” which he says “may cause positive action.”
The rapper also snipes at his critics with his belief that people who write words for a living don’t understand figurative language and says that his bars are “only meant for the sharpest knives in the drawer.”
Read the letter above and listen to Music To Music To Be Murdered By here if you want to be murdered by music.
