The Interview

DECEMBER 1998 (6)

It's December 7th. My Name Is has been blowing up. It's on the Billboard Hot 100 and it hasn't even been out for a full week yet. Every radio station is playing my shit and now I'm being booked for hella interviews.

Since the success of my single, I've been in talks with Dr. Dre about creating my own label so I can sign my group D12. He said it would depend how well The Slim Shady LP does. But by the way my first single is doing, I'm sure it'll do well enough for me to get my own label.

Right now, I'm on some radio station that apparently is really mainstream and shit. The interviewer is a bald, dark-skinned man. He's wearing a black t-shirt and white jeans with a gold chain around his neck.

His expression softens as the cameras start rolling and we go live on air.

"We got the man responsible for the hit single My Name Is. What's up Slim Shady? Can we talk about the new album coming out?"

"Yo what's up dawg.. My album is pretty much just an invitation to my world. Or Slim Shady's world. Just takin' dark shit from the world and making jokes about it y'know?"

"I see. So would you say with the fame you're getting now, it'll be hard to top the expectations you've made for yourself with this single?"

"Nah, nah I think it just opens up some new opportunities for me. Like My Name Is was just a little freestyle turned into song. And my next single is 100% purely written. It's a concept song with Dre."

"How has everything been with Dre? Working with him must be hard. That's a lot of pressure to be put on a newcomer to the mainstream culture. Dre has been around for a while and to be new working with him is overwhelming huh?"

"I mean, yea. The first day with him was just me tryna not to make a fool outta myself. But now me and Dre got a clique y'know? And it's easy working with him now y'know what I'm saying?"

"Yea, yea. So Em let's talk about the main thing that's been going around recently. We've been hearing from a couple of sources that an upcoming pop singer Alana Grey has a few bars aimed at you in her single Needing You."

"I had that shit yesterday man. I fully listened to it and I don't know if I'd say it's about me. But she doesn't want to aim a bar at me. I'm a battle rapper and she's a pop star so..."

"I understand that but you know she has a few bars too. Her style fuses Hip-Hop and Pop together really good. Do you think even there was a word for word trade, she'd be good against you?"

"Yo dawg, it's not even like that. Even if she did diss me, it's all good. All love from my side. I hung out with her. She's really cool and deserves all the success she's gotten in past two weeks."

"Well that closes up the speculation from your side. Let's see what Alana Grey says after she sees this interview." The interviewer said jokingly. He switched the topic but what he said earlier rubbed me off the wrong way.

It was like he was trying to spin off the situation into something it wasn't meant to be. A lot of beefs have started over petty stuff like misunderstanding. Biggie and Pac. LL and 'Bis. Me and ICP. That shit was petty and if I can avoid it, I will.

"So in the single you talk about your mom doing dope. It's a pretty controversial line and already, there are around 20 articles going over those lyrics. Has your mom said anything about that?"