May 13, 2020 • 45 mins
Slim Shady enjoys a well-deserved reputation as one of the all time greatest rappers, but in 2015 Machine Gun Kelly made a play for his “Blonde MC from the Midwest” crown — and hit on his teenage daughter in the process. Subliminal lyric disses sparked a nuclear response from Em, resulting in a war of words in songs and interviews that has continued sporadically ever since.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Rivals is a production of I Heart Radio. Hey everyone,
this is Rivals, the show about music beefs and feuds
and long simming resentments. I'm Steve and I'm Jordan's you know, Jordan.
(00:22):
One of the things I really love about this show
is that not only do we get to talk about
great artists and great bands, we get to talk about
wonderful people, you know, people with with with good hearts
and in great minds. And unfortunately we're not gonna be
doing that in this episode. No, No, today is not
one of those days. This is not a field good day.
I feel like I'm going to have to maybe take
a shower after this episode. I'm I'm feeling already sleazy.
(00:46):
Uh after all the research that we did into this
and and listening to the volleys that went back and
forth between these two artists, this is not going to
be the episode I played for my mother, Let's just
put it that way. No. But on the upside, we
will get the basically battle rap with each other, So
that's that's something to look forward to. That's true. I
(01:07):
feel like we've been building towards a battle rap over
these episodes. There's been tension building, and you know, sometimes
just to have a good battle wrap it. Uh, it
could be cathartic. This is the season people will finally
have that moment. So in this episode we're gonna be
talking about the rivalry between Eminem and Machine Gun Kelly. Uh.
(01:31):
This is not one of the great rap feuds of
all time. I I feel like in a way, you
could maybe even argue that this is the sign that
rap feuds are are played out. Maybe you talk about
the nineties, you had all these great beefs between rappers.
Of course, he had Biggie and Tupac, had jay Z
and Nas all down the line, and when you get
to the end of the line, you have Eminem and
(01:53):
Machine Gun Kelly. Right, does it feel that way to you?
It seems like he's picking a fight. Machine Gun Kelly
is picking a fight for publicity in my opinion, But
also it seems like Eminem's this guy who doesn't know
when to not fight back, to not feed the trolls,
to really not give into this because it, as we'll
get into, he reignited a feud from like six years
(02:13):
earlier for seemingly no reason. So yes, this is one
of the more pointless feuds. I think we'll get into
but there's something fascinating in just how random it all seems. Yeah,
I mean, it's not just the gap of time. It's
the fact that one person is Eminem arguably one of
the I mean not arguably, he is one of the
most famous rappers of all time, and the other guy's
(02:34):
Machine Gun Kelly, who is machine Gun Kelly. Enough said there,
you know, this is not one of the great sort
of balanced matchups. This is not a culture clash of
the ages. This is no and yeah, this is not
too great artists going into the rapp ring too, you know,
measure their skills against one another. This is a very
(02:55):
famous guy, and well it also Ran. Yeah, I think
it's safe to call him shine Gun Kelly and also Ran.
But because of their opposing characteristics, as you said, Eminem's
almost pamp will be in need to have conflict, and
then machine Gun Kelly, who is just a troll basically
and and wants attention, it results in this perfect storm
(03:17):
or I don't really want to use the word perfect
to describe anything in this rivalry. Let's just call it
a imperfect perfect ball of slea's and grossness, tornado of bile,
tornado of bile and it's resulting what we're gonna talk
about today. So without further ado, let's dive into this mess. Alright, Well,
(03:41):
first you gotta start with Eminem. I mean, what can
you say, one of the greatest mcs of his generation
are probably any other generation, and it's still fair to
say that, right. I mean, I feel like Eminem like
the bloom is off the rose with him a little bit,
you know, especially now we look at some of the
things he said in the early two thousand's. It's politically
incorrect to to put it mildly, but I mean, I
feel like you still have to give him props for
(04:03):
his skills, right, I mean, I there's still records of
his that I enjoy, oh absolutely, I mean, from his
narratives to even just like his his putdowns and asides.
He's incredibly skilled at both. He's rapid, he's fluid. He's
got really, in my opinion, unparalleled mix of commercial success
and critical acclaim. It's one on Oscar, for God's sakes,
(04:23):
which is still nuts to me. I think that loving
or hate him, you can't really argue with his with
his success, and he also has the myth behind him
because you know we're talking about his bio here, but
we all know he's from Detroit. For those of you
who haven't seen Eight Mile, I was gonna say, did
he actually grow up near eight Mile Road? Is that
for real? It's for real? Yeah? I know in my head,
I kind of blend the movie plot with his actual biography,
(04:46):
but I think that part's real. So tell us more
about his background. When he started rapping in high school,
and he started joining freestyle battles as a team, and
it was predominantly a an African American community, but he
was accepted just by his raw talent alone, and he
was recruited to join several hip hop collectives, groups like
the New Jack's, Soul Intent and most notably D twelve
(05:06):
and UM. And that was kind of how he first
started cutting his teeth. And he released his first album
called Infinite, and it didn't really do a lot. It
had some underground recognition but didn't blow up in any stretch. Um.
But then he endured a series of personal setbacks. He
split up with his girlfriend Kim, with whom he had
his beloved daughter, Haley Um. He moved in with his
(05:29):
mother and fell into a spiral of substance abuse and depression.
I think he attempted suicide at this point. Uh. And
it was during this dark period, this sort of dark
night of the soul, that he developed his famous alter ego,
Slim Shady, which has basically been described of his sort
of like dark It basically an outlet for his rage
(05:49):
and anger and violent imagery became Slim's hallmark and this
informed his verses on his next his next work, the
Slim Shady EP, and that him a lot of attention
that earned him contracts from Interscope Records and Jimmy Ivan
put him in touch with Dr Dre hip Hop legend obviously,
who would become his mentor, and the result was the
(06:10):
Slim Shady LP in first global smash with My Name
is Huge, Huge, absolutely just a monster record, both sales
wise and just in the cultural conversation. People didn't know
what to make of this guy, I mean, just the rage,
the venom. Yeah, it's like, you know, it's hard in
(06:33):
a way, you feel like you're overstating, like how big
Eminem was at this time, you know, especially for people
that weren't alive at the time or maybe too young
to remember it. But you're right it was this cultural
earthquake at a time where it's that weird time like
before the Internet and social media really took over, and
where MTV and the radio had outsized influence on like
(06:56):
what people heard. And I remember when m A first
came around. I was in college and I was still
watching a lot of MTV at that point, and I
feel like, Hi, my name is you know, like his
first big single was literally on TV every fifteen minutes.
You know, If it wasn't every fifteen minutes, it was
every twenty minutes. I mean, it just seemed like he
was set up to be a star from the first
(07:18):
time you heard about him, Like they were treating him
like he was already the biggest thing on the planet,
and he pretty much became that. Yeah, I mean the
Marshall Mathews LP followed in two thousands, and between those
two albums, just I think they both were diamonds. They
definitely both were number one for a number of weeks
they I think, um, Marshall Mathews LP he sold two
million copies in its first two weeks alone. And just
(07:40):
to put that in perspective, it's a month into a
month after his latest album, Music to Be murdered by
has been out and he's only sold a hundred thousands,
so I mean, just incredible sales. But as you said,
the cultural conversation around him was just it was everywhere.
I mean, he's not only taking shots at huge stars
of the day, Britney Spears, Christina Aguilera, Will Smith and
(08:01):
sang Clown Posse. I think in Sync was in there.
He's just disinc everybody. But just the violent visions and
total tounge of his outrage on these albums was just shockings,
absolutely shocking too to everyone. I mean, he reconciled with
with him at this point and he raps about killing her.
He has a song about his mother called kill You.
(08:22):
Just things that that he really had an uncanny knack
for offending everybody, um but his talent, so to let
him get away with it in some ways. Well, we
also have to mention the song Stand, which is maybe
the most culturally lasting song from that record, just in
terms of the lexicon. I don't know if he invented
stan as a name for an obsessive fan, but it
(08:45):
was certainly popularized by that song and now people to
say Stand all the time, you know, twenty years after
that song came out, and what's interesting to me about
Eminem is that along with just how enormous he was,
and again it was I don't know if in my
lifetime that I can recall well many pop stars being
that popular for like a two or three year stretch,
(09:07):
but certainly rappers. I feel like that mass media machine
was still churning, so he was really huge. And normally,
especially in hip hop, you expect some sort of decline
to come into play by the time of like your
fourth or fifth album, and it seemed like it was
going to do that with Eminem around the time of Relapse,
(09:28):
which came out two thousand nine, that was like his
first record in five years, and then he just has
this incredible kind of revival in two thousand ten, puts
out Recovery. It's a huge hit, and it sets him
up for this decade in the two thousand tents where
he's not as big as he was maybe in the
early odds, but he's still like a pretty popular rapper,
(09:51):
and he's maintained this position in the culture where other
people that have come along that you would think might
have replaced him, they've failed, like he's still hung around
even as He's moved into his like late forties now,
which I believe sets the stage for Machine Gun Kelly
one of the would be challengers to Eminem's crown. Um
(10:13):
and uh hasn't really worked out that way for him,
has it? Uh? No, not yet? I mean, in fact,
at this point, it seems like he's best known for
feuding with em and m which is probably not how
he really wanted that whole thing to go. Well, I
gotta say, like, Okay, going into this episode, I had
never heard a Machine Gun Kelly song, or at least
(10:33):
that I was aware of. I realized that there was
one song that he did that I was was familiar with,
which is the song bad Things. It was a duet
with comedo Caballo, which came out I think a couple
of years ago. And I know it because that song
essentially lifted the melody from a song called out of
(10:54):
My Head by the nineties alt rock band Fastball of
the Way. However, gen x er, Yeah, of the Way,
And although I always thought out of my Head was
the better song, it was like the second or third
single from that album. Um, this nice little Oregon pop
soul record. What was that record? All the money can
(11:14):
buy something like that, all the paying money can buy. Yes,
shout out to Fastball. Uh. So I knew Machine Gun
Kelly from that. Otherwise I just knew him from his
acting work, like he placed Tommy Lee in the Motley
Crue biopic The Dirt Terrible Movie by the Way, which
you can watch on Netflix. Um. And he was also
in the Cameron Crow show about Rhodis, which I believe
(11:39):
was called Rhodis. He does a monologue about Mike McCready
in that show that I remember. So I mostly knew
him as dating Amber Rose. That was my main uh
after after with Khalifa. My knowledge of Machine Gun Kelly's
catalog is is pretty minimal. Like did you delve deep?
Like do you know more? And I do about him? Uh?
(12:02):
Probably not. Um. He was born in Cleveland, rapper he
I did learn that he became the first rapper to
win Amateur Night at Harlem's Apollo Theater, which blew my mind.
I I checked several sources on that, and that is
in fact true. Um, and that kind of and he
(12:23):
was a teenager he was like seen something like that.
So he's another Midwest rapper, you know. I don't think
he's talked a lot about this, but I assume that
he he certainly grew up listening to Eminem. I mean,
there's no way he didn't grow up like he would
have been ten years old or so when those records hit,
like the big first couple of records. So I'm sure
(12:44):
that was not only an influence on him, but it
might have been like a gateway drug for him and
to get into hip hop. I mean, has he ever
talked about that? Um? I think in the in the tweet,
that's what I started this whole thing off. He talks
about Eminem being a king, so he has, uh, in
interviews and on social media before their whole feud started,
talked about how he he is. You know, he's idle uh.
(13:08):
And I think that's probably why he wanted to take
him down. He idolized him so much. And this is,
you know, amateur psychologist, but uh, he wanted that position
for himself, I think. But uh, but yeah, we should
dive into the actual feud, which started in May. There
was a viral photo of Eminem's now sixteen year old
(13:29):
daughter Haley that went viral and uh, and you know
it's one of those posts that were always said I
want to feel old. Checkout Eminem's daughter Haley now and
um and it was making the rounds and Machine Gun
Kelly apparently saw it and wrote that Eminem's daughter is
hot as fun and she was sixteen and he was
(13:51):
in his um mid twenties, I believe. Um, yeah, yeah,
that was uh, you know, we were talking about this earlier,
about just like the wonderful people that we're gonna be
talking about in this episode, and uh yeah that that's
uh talking about the normally you feel like, Okay, Eminem,
he's often in the wrong maybe with his with his
(14:11):
rivalries and like his smack talking with other people. But
I feel like, yeah, if someone tells your daughter that
she's hot as fuck, yeah, it would be wrong. And again,
like you know, and this was around the time that
he was trying to get his career going too, right.
I mean, he had a record I think that came
out around two thousand and twelve. Um, yeah, yeah, this
(14:32):
is very very Machine Gun Kelly's career. So yeah, so
so so he's kind of reaching out to the King's
daughter here, and you know, and we alluded to this earlier,
but you know, Eminem, you would think that by two
thousand twelve, that he would have been off the stage,
and that this young up and coming guy from Cleveland,
you know, who has some skills as a rapper. I mean,
(14:55):
as you said, he won the amateur night at the
Apollo Theater. And you think, Okay, Eminem's going he's he's
going to exit the white rapper lane, and uh, I'm
gonna go in there. You know, if you're thinking that
machine gun Kelly, that's his That's probably what he was
thinking at the time. And uh, I personally don't think
there was a deeper thought behind this tweet. I don't
think there was any kind of of deeper, deeper feeling
(15:17):
behind this. I think it was just a pure impulse. Uh.
And you know, I mean, obviously, referring to anybody's teenage
daughter in these terms in a public farm isn't the
best thing you could be doing. In fact, I would
argue it's a not good thing that you're doing. But
this is Eminem we're talking about, who you know, has
been known for writing rap verses about killing people and
(15:37):
having sex with those skulls, for significantly less in referring
to his daughter and these very uh ungallant terms. So
don't he's poking the bear. He's poking the bear here,
and it's a bear bear that he idolizes. So I
don't really understand what he thought was gonna happen. Well,
I think I think in his mind he probably thought, well, Okay,
Eminem is gonna fade. I'm coming up and we'll have
(15:58):
like a little back and forth and it will help
me because I'm the young guy, and Eminem will go down.
But what's weird about this is that he doesn't go down. Yeah,
his Pavlovian need to respond to any sort of slight
he doesn't respond to this. And I wonder if maybe
he didn't even notice it. You know, maybe he had
like really good blockers on his Twitter, you know, like
(16:20):
a really good filter that like the Machine Gun Kelly
tweets don't go through because um, there's like really no
response to this at all, and it doesn't really continue
it for until like three years later. Well, yeah, machine
Gun Kelly goes on Hot ninety seven and he talks
about how he believes that Eminem had him banned from
(16:42):
Shade fort presumably due to this tweet, and um, and
Shade forty five is is eminem serious radio station? By
the way, and he's convinced that he's been banned from
it because of this. And apparently that's what really pissed
Eminem off the most was that this kid thought that
he would be he would get to Eminem to the
(17:03):
degree where he would he would have him blacklisted. I
guess that's the thing that really offended him most. Yeah,
this another interesting wrinkle here, because you know, Eminem ended
up doing an interview um several years later after all
this happened. By the way, this this this, this rivalry
moves at a snail's pace. By the way, this is
like the you know, the gun with the wind of
musical of rap rivalry and very slow build. But anyway,
(17:28):
Eminem didn't interview was Sway many years later, and he
said that it wasn't the fact that machine gun Kelly
said his daughter was hot as fuck that made him mad.
It was the fact that you, like you just said
that that machine gun Kelly was shooting his mouth off
and saying that Eminem was like trying to somehow hurt
his career. And Eminem was like, I don't care about
(17:51):
your career. Why would I care about your career. I'm
I'm Eminem in your Machine Gun Kelly, like, there's really
nothing to stop with your career. You think it was
actually think about you at all. Yes, he's given him
the Don Draper too, you know in the other of it,
you know, it's like I don't think of you at all,
which I think is a pretty plausible explanation. Again, he
(18:11):
seems weirdly cool with the Hailey stuff. It's like, I
think you were justified and getting piste off about that.
But you know, if this is the thing you're mad
about that, I guess that's fine, all right hand, We'll
be right back with more rivals. Even after Machine Gun,
(18:35):
Kelly says this stuff about and I'm trying to hurt
my career and I'm still not saying anything. Skip ahead
another three years. Okay, So we've gone six years now
since the initial volley, and we finally get to a
disc track, the first disc track of this rivalry, and
(18:55):
this is where things start to pick up a little bit.
So like in March of Machine Gun, Kelly appears on
a song by Tech nine called No Reason, and he
appears to reference the eminem A single Rap God, from
which is a pretty crappy song. By the way, do
you know rap God. Yes, uh not one of the
better ones. No, No, I think that's from like the
(19:17):
Marshall Mathers, which if you're making sequels to albums, that's
not a bad sign. That's a bad sign. I mean.
And also he did the Monster, which I thought was
a sequel to Love the Way You Lie with Rihanna,
which I think it was a much better song. Yeah,
it's like, you know, like like it's like meat Loaf
did sequels to his albums, and it's like you're following
(19:39):
in meat loafs foot stuff and actually meat Loaf in
Defensive meat Loaf the Baron of Hell saga, it demanded
a sequel, but like the Marshall Mathers saga, I don't
think really needed a sequel. It just seems like a
cash in. I would like to say, would if you
if you do a memoir, I would like your memoir
to be titled in Defensive meat Loaf. Well, and I'm
also defending Jim Steinman shout out to Jim Stein. Then
(20:00):
I just watched The Class Jim Simon, if you're listening
to this episode, so this is the lyric where machine
Gun Kelly takes a shot at Eminem. He says, I
popped cherries and pop stars. You popsicles. It's not hard,
popped in and out of the top charts, out the
cop car to remind y'all, you just wrap. You're not God,
and I don't care who got bars. I think Jordan
(20:22):
I wanted to be honest with me. I need I
need to be honest with me here. Um, how stupid
do I sound reciting Machine Gun Kelly lyrics on a
scale of one to ten, ten being extremely stupid. Um,
I don't think you would have one amateur night against
machine Gun Kelly at the Apollo. Let me put it
that way. Okay, I my flow is not very good,
(20:43):
but I'm gonna the emotion was the size the material there? Yeah,
the material was not that great. But anyway, Um, so, Eminem,
here's this. He hears machine gun Kelly saying you popsicles
is not hard, And this is finally the thing, the
popsicle line. This is finally the thing that sets Eminem off. Uh,
(21:04):
He's finally gonna respond to machine Gun Kelly. Six years
after the initial transgression by machine Gun Kelly, happens in August,
and it's from a song called not Alike. It's a
collaboration with Royce to five nine. Is it five inch
five ft nine inch? I think I'm not sure. I
think it was Royce the five nine. But okay, Royce
(21:26):
the five nine, Andy, Royce the five nine. In this song,
he says, but next time, you don't got to use
tech nine if you want to come at me with
a submachine gun. And I'm talking to you, but you
already know who the funk you are, Kelly, I don't
use sublimbs. Is it sublish? Is it okay? So it's
sort of like a little abbreviate. Yeah, is that like
(21:48):
a common thing. I've never heard someone say sublims. I've
never done that. But I sound like the most middle
aged white dude of all time talking about this right now.
I apologize, but I gotta come correct and say I
got a question to Blooms anyway, So Blooms and sure
as fuck don't sneak this. But keep commenting on my
daughter Haley referencing. That's whole mess. I keep on telling
(22:12):
motherfucker's bitches. In case you forgot, We're gonna need that
little explicit sticker on this episode. By the way, I
think we've already said some pretty big swears. I don't know.
Hopefully your kids are not listening to this episode anyway.
The only thing we have in common is I'm a
dick and you suck. Oh man, I don't feel good.
(22:36):
I don't feel good saying that last part that No,
I definitely, yeah, I feel terrible about that. What's funny
about this is like, Okay, this is a Tech nine
track and apparently technic I didn't know that he was
talking about Eminem. So then like he like totally like
through machine Gun Kelly under the bus. Isn't that what happened?
Oh yeah? He Uh. Instagram's a tech screen shot between
(23:00):
him and the producer saying, oh my god, I had
no idea he was talking about m which kind of
has a little bit of it. It smacks of, you know,
he Goth protest too much a little bit, but pretty
pretty funny. So yeah, like machine Gun Kelly, he's just
totally on an island at this point. Yeah, like Eminem,
he's finally got an Eminem's attention, and not only did Eminem,
(23:20):
everybody's just left him. Yeah, exactly, And because they all
know it's like, wait, why am I with Machine Gun
Kelly when I could piss off Eminem. That's not good
for me. You know, that's just smart thinking on Tech
nine's part. So machine Gun Kelly, instead of crawling back
under the rock where he may maybe he should have stayed,
(23:44):
he comes back. He goes nuclear at Eminem. Yeah, and
and this is like his magnam opus. Can we call
it that? This is yeah, I would say so. I
I have a hard time imagining that he's going to
top this, but hey, I'd love to be proven wrong.
I mean, this is it's certainly like the I think
(24:04):
the most famous song of this rivalry, Like this is
the first song that I remember hearing about um, like
when these two were squabbling. So it was you know,
this was the song. And I'm referring to Wrap Devil
by the Way, which came out in September. I feel
like this was the first song to sort of transcend,
maybe like the rap circles where people were you know,
(24:24):
mildly interested in this important came out like maybe a
week and a half after after not alike, because the turnaround,
right was really quick. Now this is when the huge
starts picking up exactly because we've you know, as we've said,
it took forever to get this for this to get going.
You know, I think I said gun with the wind earlier.
It's sort of like a Lord of the Rings movie, maybe,
(24:44):
you know, to use a more topical reference. You know,
it's like, Okay, we're finally getting to the battle, like
we've we've been in the shire for like an hour
and a half, you know, like, but we're finally getting
too good stuff. And so Wrap Devil comes out, you know,
a week and a half after Eminem's volley, and uh,
I gotta say that there are some lines in the
(25:05):
song that I think are pretty good. Like okay, so
at the beginning, he says, I, yeah, yeah, yeah, someone
needs to like record me reciting these lyrics and like
put like a rapiat under it, you know, and just
like like the worst hip hop song of all time.
Um I somebody grabbed him some clippers. His fucking beard
(25:28):
is weird. Now I think that's an app I think
that's an app criticism. You know, by this time, you know, Eminem,
he uh he emerged with this beard that um you know,
it made him It looked like one of those that
have a beard. But then there's like if you can
wash it off with water. It was kind of like that, right.
(25:52):
You know. Look, he's a guy in his forties, so
he has like the forty ish guy bod at this
point to so it's it's hanging out a little bit,
and he has the beard and he kind of looks
like a guy. It looks like you should be in
Three Doors Down or Shine Down or like one of
those bands, you know, like just like like the one
(26:13):
of the like we're just guys being dudes type bands.
That's what he looks like at this He makes fun
of these sweatpants too, or a sweatsuit. I think it's
a song he makes fun of his sweatsuit in the
song too Yeah, which again apt criticism. You know, we've
been taking a lot of shots at machine Gun Kelly.
But there's in Wrap Double he really does step up. Okay,
there's another line here. He says, took you six years
(26:35):
in a surprise album just to come up with a
diss apt criticism. Well done, fucking do we All you
do is read the dictionary and stay inside. I don't.
I don't think it's a bad thing to read the
dictionary and try to improve your vocabulary. I mean, you
know that's a that there's a positive attributes, especially as
(26:56):
one ages into middle age. Exactly, I'm I'm gonna the
ducks some points for that one. So yeah, he makes
fun of the sweatsuits, as you said, and he makes
fun of Eminem's corny hats, you know, he makes some
of his heights. He calls him Oscar the Grouch and
then makes fun of him for being an Oscar winner,
(27:17):
which again, it's like, how many people are Oscar winners?
You know. I don't know if that's something you should
make fun of someone about, but anyway, it threatens to
call ems his ex wife, presumably to do all sorts
of things that you wouldn't want someone like Machine Gun
Kelly to do to your ex wife. Um, what's your
(27:38):
favorite line from the song? Because you have a line
that you that you love from this man. I mean
my favorite is that is all you do is read
the dictionary and stay inside. I just think that's that's
pretty choice in this well, because we were talking about
this before and owner outline, you said you love the
line last time you saw eight mile was at home
on a treadknot, which is a good line. Again. Okay,
(28:00):
so I was kind of mad at Machine Gun Kelly
for the dictionary line, and also for making fun of
the oscar. Yeah, because I think you're out of your
depth there. But yeah, the treadmill line and the line
about the beard, I think he's right on. So this
is like where he's kind of hitting his peak, I
think with with wrap double oh. Absolutely. And the best
part is he shares the song with a sort of
(28:23):
manifesto posted on Twitter machine gun Kelly does. He says,
I'm standing up not just for myself but my generation.
And he's now he's addressing eminem right. I mean this,
he's criticizing somebody's you know, love of the Dictionary for
his generation. Um well again, I mean but I think
it goes back to what we were talking about at
the beginning, where on his part, and this might have
(28:45):
been subliminal on some level that he felt like, well,
it's my generation's turn to have the spotlight. It's my
turn basically to be the reigning you know, white guy,
surly uh attitude, you know, grumpy guy at the top
of the rap heep, get out of the way, grandpa,
(29:06):
and Grandpa won't leave because he's just way better than him.
And and that's his frustration with that, and it becomes
this sort of generational battle. Eminem's official response to this
comes very soon after September. It's like mid September. I
guess it's about a week and a half again after
Wrap Devil comes out, so we're really moving at a
(29:28):
quick pace here, and he puts out the song kill
Shot and man, this song is awful. To god, this
is a I gotta say, I think, like Wrap Devil
is like my favorite song out of this whole run,
even though I think Eminem would win this battle overall,
because I mean, kill Shot sucks, even even if like
(29:49):
Eminem is in the right for going back at machine
gun Kelly, like this is uh, this is line. He says,
here's the autograph of your daughter. I wrote it on
a starter Cap stands on. Listen, man dead isn't mad,
But how are you going to name yourself after a
damn gun and have a man bun? I mean, if
you're gonna make that of a man's beard and sweatsuit,
(30:11):
a man bun, comment is probably gonna come your way,
I guess. But he's punch Seminem punching down. He's punching down,
and he's also rhyming damn gun and man Bun, I mean,
come on, man, And also he's dragging a bunch of
innocent women into this. He's talking about Rihannazalea Halsey, who
(30:33):
I guess um machine Gun Galley had some kind of
relationship with. Um. Yeah, it's punching down all around, but
he does have a really good sort of death blow
in it. He says, I'd rather be eighty year old
me than twenty year old you, which, yeah, that's game,
set match right there. I think even if he is
(30:55):
talking about man Bun's, you know, it's still better to
be Eminem. At this point, we're going to take a
quick break and get a word from our sponsor before
we get two more rivals. After kill shot, this whole
(31:18):
revelry is starting to lose some steam, and I feel like, uh,
in the way that Machine Gun Kelly responded to this,
he was letting, I think some of the hurt come
out uh that. Uh, you know, I think you really
just wanted acknowledgement from Eminem and maybe for them to
throw some volleys back and forth good naturedly and ultimately
(31:40):
be friends, whereas Eminem is just annoyed by this guy
and wants nothing to do with him, you know you're
right when when he put that message out on Twitter,
when he put Rapped Devil out, he said, I'm doing
the same thing you did back in the day, and
and reading it in context, it seems like he's saying, like,
you know, I'm I'm just responding the way you would have,
but kind of looking back out on it. From the
(32:01):
stuff that he says later, it almost seems like he
is looking for his approvi. He sa, and I'm doing Look,
I'm Aren't you proud of me for on some level
for coming out either way you would have back in
the day. Don't you see something in me? Don't you
see me as a young you in any kind of way,
because he does say in an interview in the Breakfast
Club Um after kill Shot comes out, he basically says, yeah,
(32:22):
you know, I have another song, another distract ready to go.
But kill Shot was so weak that we're just I'm
just gonna holster that I'm gonna put that away for
later because I don't want to do that to him
because he's so pathetic, and he says, I really just
wanted to talk to him, to have a conversation to
hash it out as two guys and Eminem never responded,
so he said, you know, you know what he blew it.
He blew it. I'm I'm I'm done with him, uh,
(32:45):
which is is sad. As he said, it's almost like
he did want some kind of recognition from his hero
and it never it never came. He got the disk
track and nothing else. And there was also that weird
thing about like Machine Gun Kelly's entourage beating up a
guy was on the Netflix show Ozar like It's like
it was like Gabriel g rod Rodriguez, who's an actor,
(33:09):
He's on that that show Ozark, and apparently he like
videotaped himself calling Machine Gun Kelly a pussy and then
he said it he said it wasn't right for machine
Gun Kelly to go for Eminem's family, which I mean,
it is is a fair criticism. And then I guess
machine Gun kelly security team jumped him in the parking
(33:30):
lot of a Hampton Inn in Atlantic, which you know,
of all the terrible things that have happened in the
parking lot of a Hampton Inn in Atlanta, that at
least makes the top one d Yeah, it at least
makes the top one hundred. Uh So, you know, we're
really seeing a real de evolution at this point. And finally,
(33:51):
in in January, Eminem puts out the song accommodating the
track on his surprise album, Music to be Murdered By?
I have you listened to Music to be Murdered By?
By the way, did you put that record on it all?
I put it on right when it came out. I
I skimmed it. I didn't get too deep into it.
I gave myself a treat by not listening to it.
I'm like, I'm gonna treat myself by not listening to
(34:13):
this record. Um self, care care, so Eminem, He takes
another shot at machine gun Kelly. I don't know why.
At this point, he's saying, I won't topple. I'm not
giving it to anyone who want to come and get it.
I'm not gonna stop. But when they asked me, is
the war finished with mg K? Of course it is.
(34:36):
I cleansed them of his mortal sins. I'm God, and
the Lord forgives even the Lord, even the devil worshippers.
I'm moving on, But you know your scruples are gone
when you're born with Lucifer's horns so he says he's
done with it, but then he says, oh, by the way,
machine Gun Kelly, you're the devil, so I'm done with you.
But in closing, you're you're literally satan. Also, it's not
(35:01):
really a criticism. I mean, if Machine Gun Kelly have
the song Rap Devil, which he identifies himself as the
wrap Devil, so on a way, that's just kind of
like restating, do you think so you think it's just
sort of like tying a bow right on it and saying, yeah,
I guess I don't know. I mean, I don't really
care at this point. Well, that's the thing about fuse
(35:21):
that continue whether we want them to or not, and
this feud has kept going is that the world didn't
have enough problems already. You know, we can't have a
moment's peace anywhere we go. But the best part is
Machine Gun Kelly here's unaccommodating and he's not happy, and
he tweets about it, saying, mad a f I just
stepped out of a loud room to hear this bullshit,
(35:43):
which maybe a new low and hip hop trash talk
when you think about it, like I'm so mad, I'm
gonna leave the room, I mean right now. Well then okay,
So then he drops this song in March called Bullets
with Names. Have you have you heard this song? I
have it has some That song takes me to a
bad place, Stephen, I have to say it really does. Okay,
(36:06):
So all right, because I guess I'm the one who
has to read all the Machine Gun Kelly lyrics, so
I will go through this one as well. He says, Look,
I got a bullet with somebody's name on it. I
get up on him, killed me a goat g o
a t as in Greatest of of All Time. So
my jacket got stains on it, wiping my nose like
(36:28):
I got some cocaine on it. YadA, YadA, YadA YadA.
So he just he just decides again Machine Gun Kelly
to perpetuate this meaningless feud, which you know is pretty
weird because as far as like Valedictory distracts, go unaccommodating
was pretty zen, especially for Eminem. I mean, he's citing
(36:50):
forgiveness and moving on like those are definitely new words
in the m palette. I feel like the m of
Old would have had at least, like, you know, one
on complimentary reference to machine gun Kelly's or something in there.
But so we should have just let it lie. Yeah,
but you know, we can't ever let things lie on
this show. People have to feud or else we wouldn't
have anything to talk about. So let's try to find
(37:12):
meaning in this meaningless feud. If you were going to
make a pro machine gun Kelly case, I mean, wait,
what would it be? I mean, is it is it
essentially that he was just like this kid that wanted
attention and Eminem overreacted. I mean, is that his case? Basically?
I don't know, man, I mean talking about someone's daughter. Uh,
(37:34):
you're seating, You're seating. You're seeing the high ground to Eminem,
which which can be very hard to do. Um. That's
something that's interesting is that there are a lot of
sort of online Twitter conspiracy theorists who think that this
whole thing was staged, and there's actually some kind of
compelling evidence too. I guess that um Rap Devil was
uploaded to soundclouds six months before it was released, but
(37:54):
then it was immediately put to private. So there are
a lot of people who think this whole thing is
just a giant act to try to boost Machine Gun
Kelly's career. They're on the same uh label Interscope, and
I think that at least two of the of the
dis tracts Not Alike and Rap Devil have the same
producer I forget his name, but so there there's some
(38:17):
evidence to support that, which is interesting compelling. I don't
know if it's true or not, but um, but okay,
arguing for Machine Gun Kelley man, yeah, I you I
got nothing. Yeah, I mean, I think the case is
that he's just like this kid that was trying to
(38:38):
get attention. And even if it's staged, which even makes
talking about this a bigger waste of time, but even
if it is staged, I think it does point to
the fact that that he had nothing to lose really
by doing this. That I mean, unless you want to
count his dignity. You know, he had his dignity to lose,
(38:59):
but I don't know if he had dignity, probably not.
So it was, you know, taking a shot at eminem um.
There's really no downside for him because either way if
if it if it works, it helps his career. If
it doesn't work, well, he already doesn't have a great
career to begin with. I don't know about. I mean,
is it is it worse to be known for just
taking shots at a much more famous and successful and
(39:22):
talented person, you know, I mean like that almost feels worse,
Like like, is it worse to not be famous or
known as some famous persons funky? You know, I'd almost
prefer nominemity. Well in a way, you know, Machin Gun
and Kelly I think benefited from Eminem getting worse as
the two Thousand Tents war on because I think one
reason why Rap Devil works, I think relatively speaking, like
(39:47):
I'm not saying Wrap Devil was a great disc track
or or a great song or anything, but in the
realm of this exceedingly stupid rivalry between these very one guy,
Eminem is very talented, but he's like maybe not the
best guy. But um, I think one reason why that
works because Eminem actually did become someone that you could
(40:08):
make fun of, like fairly easily. Like there were a
lot of things about him that were pretty mockable. Uh,
you know, starting with the beard that's weird, and you know,
his his corny hats, and and and and and the
list goes on forever, Like all the sort of corniness
that I think Eminem inevitably sort of devolved into as
he got older. But the gap between these two guys,
(40:31):
it never was going to close enough for Machine Gun
Kelly to bridge the gap. You know, even if like
Eminem became someone that was easier to make fun of, um,
he was, as you said, always going to be way
more successful, way more famous, and and and more talented.
So I guess coming into the conclusion of this, this
(40:55):
is the part of the episode where we like to
sort of step back and say, what have we learned,
what can we take from this story to improve ourselves,
and what can we say to perhaps spark reconciliation between
these two opposing forces, you know, who have been battling,
in this case battling throughout the two thousand tens and
into the early twenties. But I'm really tempted to say
(41:17):
that these guys should not be friends, and maybe no
one should be friends with either one of them. Well,
I think maybe a broader theme in this whole real
or staged rap battle is, uh, what does what does
a rap feud mean? In now? Are they kind of
a played out, spent thing they've been as something that
(41:39):
started as a very real. Um, competition between two artistic,
talented people devolved into a way to basically just sell albums. Yeah,
I mean I think that for something like this to work,
you definitely need two people that are on a similar plane. Um.
And if you don't have that, and you have this
situation where it's either it feels trumped up or it's
(42:03):
just flat outstaged. You know, as the conspiracy theorists say, Um,
all the noise in the world isn't going to make
it compelling enough as a battle for people to really
kind of invest themselves in it as we do with
the great rivalries. So in a way, this is sort
of like a meta rivalry to comment it's a commentary
(42:25):
on like how rivalries maybe have changed over the course
of the last several decades in pop music history. Um.
I also feel like the lesson here for anyone, and
it applies to pop stars and it applies to us
normal people. Don't feed the trolls. If you have a troll,
(42:48):
don't feed the trolls. And really, Eminem went a long
time without feeding the trolls. You know, he blew a
lot of stuff off, either knowingly or just because he
was in a different stratosphere for Machine Gun Kelly, and
he even noticed what was happening. But in a way,
when he opened his mouth, he made himself look stupid,
you know. He he kind of seemed cooler when he
wasn't responding to this stuff, and then when he responded
(43:10):
to it, um he seemed kind of fish. And he
addressed that too in interviews. He would say, he would say,
you know, I'm in this weird position where if I
don't say anything, that's gonna look like he won. But
if I say something, that's giving him all sorts of validation,
not to mention attention and making him way more famous.
So he was in a difficult position, specifically him. I mean,
he's not if we can just avoid trolls because nobody cares,
(43:32):
but being Eminem and having somebody takes shots at you,
even if it is somebody who's comparatively a flee like
Machine Gun Kelly, it does his psyche. I don't think
we'll allow it in this way. Eminem is all of
us because we all say, don't feed the trolls, but
then we all kind of have our weak spots and
we give in. And it's like, even as he was
(43:53):
doing it, he knew it, like, shouldn't be doing this.
I'm making a mistake, but I'm still gonna take a
out his man bun. I'm still gonna do it. And
he did it, and it was a mistake. So we'll
live and learn. We can learn, so so maybe we
can learn from that. This is what we'll take from
this episode. You know, don't feed the trolls. If there's
(44:15):
an annoying person in your life, ignore them, don't make
fun of their ponytail on top of their head. Move on,
and we'll all be happy. We won't be like M
and M and the machine Gun Kelly, which is really
I think the point of all of our existences. Everybody,
just where your man buns and your weird beards with pride.
(44:36):
It's all good, it's all love. I think inadvertently we've
we've arrived at the message of reconciliation in peace that
I didn't think we're going to get to in this episode.
But you know, I think that's it. Weird beards and
man buns join joint hands, hair strands. Alright, Jordan, Well,
(44:57):
I'm gonna go take a shower now, as I said,
and I'm going to forget that I recited all these
machine Gun Kelly lyrics and in a public for I'm
gonna go chop up some beats and put it over
them all man, Well until next week, all right? Looking
forward to it. Rivals is a production of I Heart Radio.
(45:22):
The executive producers are shaun Ty Toone and Noel Brown.
The supervising producers are Taylor Chi Coogn and Tristan McNeil.
I'm Jordan run Talk. I'm Stephen Hyden. If you like
what you heard, please subscribe and leave us a review.
For more podcasts for My heart Radio, visit the I
heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or ever you listen to
your favorite shows
Rivals is a production of I Heart Radio. Hey everyone,
this is Rivals, the show about music beefs and feuds
and long simming resentments. I'm Steve and I'm Jordan's you know, Jordan.
(00:22):
One of the things I really love about this show
is that not only do we get to talk about
great artists and great bands, we get to talk about
wonderful people, you know, people with with with good hearts
and in great minds. And unfortunately we're not gonna be
doing that in this episode. No, No, today is not
one of those days. This is not a field good day.
I feel like I'm going to have to maybe take
a shower after this episode. I'm I'm feeling already sleazy.
(00:46):
Uh after all the research that we did into this
and and listening to the volleys that went back and
forth between these two artists, this is not going to
be the episode I played for my mother, Let's just
put it that way. No. But on the upside, we
will get the basically battle rap with each other, So
that's that's something to look forward to. That's true. I
(01:07):
feel like we've been building towards a battle rap over
these episodes. There's been tension building, and you know, sometimes
just to have a good battle wrap it. Uh, it
could be cathartic. This is the season people will finally
have that moment. So in this episode we're gonna be
talking about the rivalry between Eminem and Machine Gun Kelly. Uh.
(01:31):
This is not one of the great rap feuds of
all time. I I feel like in a way, you
could maybe even argue that this is the sign that
rap feuds are are played out. Maybe you talk about
the nineties, you had all these great beefs between rappers.
Of course, he had Biggie and Tupac, had jay Z
and Nas all down the line, and when you get
to the end of the line, you have Eminem and
(01:53):
Machine Gun Kelly. Right, does it feel that way to you?
It seems like he's picking a fight. Machine Gun Kelly
is picking a fight for publicity in my opinion, But
also it seems like Eminem's this guy who doesn't know
when to not fight back, to not feed the trolls,
to really not give into this because it, as we'll
get into, he reignited a feud from like six years
(02:13):
earlier for seemingly no reason. So yes, this is one
of the more pointless feuds. I think we'll get into
but there's something fascinating in just how random it all seems. Yeah,
I mean, it's not just the gap of time. It's
the fact that one person is Eminem arguably one of
the I mean not arguably, he is one of the
most famous rappers of all time, and the other guy's
(02:34):
Machine Gun Kelly, who is machine Gun Kelly. Enough said there,
you know, this is not one of the great sort
of balanced matchups. This is not a culture clash of
the ages. This is no and yeah, this is not
too great artists going into the rapp ring too, you know,
measure their skills against one another. This is a very
(02:55):
famous guy, and well it also Ran. Yeah, I think
it's safe to call him shine Gun Kelly and also Ran.
But because of their opposing characteristics, as you said, Eminem's
almost pamp will be in need to have conflict, and
then machine Gun Kelly, who is just a troll basically
and and wants attention, it results in this perfect storm
(03:17):
or I don't really want to use the word perfect
to describe anything in this rivalry. Let's just call it
a imperfect perfect ball of slea's and grossness, tornado of bile,
tornado of bile and it's resulting what we're gonna talk
about today. So without further ado, let's dive into this mess. Alright, Well,
(03:41):
first you gotta start with Eminem. I mean, what can
you say, one of the greatest mcs of his generation
are probably any other generation, and it's still fair to
say that, right. I mean, I feel like Eminem like
the bloom is off the rose with him a little bit,
you know, especially now we look at some of the
things he said in the early two thousand's. It's politically
incorrect to to put it mildly, but I mean, I
feel like you still have to give him props for
(04:03):
his skills, right, I mean, I there's still records of
his that I enjoy, oh absolutely, I mean, from his
narratives to even just like his his putdowns and asides.
He's incredibly skilled at both. He's rapid, he's fluid. He's
got really, in my opinion, unparalleled mix of commercial success
and critical acclaim. It's one on Oscar, for God's sakes,
(04:23):
which is still nuts to me. I think that loving
or hate him, you can't really argue with his with
his success, and he also has the myth behind him
because you know we're talking about his bio here, but
we all know he's from Detroit. For those of you
who haven't seen Eight Mile, I was gonna say, did
he actually grow up near eight Mile Road? Is that
for real? It's for real? Yeah? I know in my head,
I kind of blend the movie plot with his actual biography,
(04:46):
but I think that part's real. So tell us more
about his background. When he started rapping in high school,
and he started joining freestyle battles as a team, and
it was predominantly a an African American community, but he
was accepted just by his raw talent alone, and he
was recruited to join several hip hop collectives, groups like
the New Jack's, Soul Intent and most notably D twelve
(05:06):
and UM. And that was kind of how he first
started cutting his teeth. And he released his first album
called Infinite, and it didn't really do a lot. It
had some underground recognition but didn't blow up in any stretch. Um.
But then he endured a series of personal setbacks. He
split up with his girlfriend Kim, with whom he had
his beloved daughter, Haley Um. He moved in with his
(05:29):
mother and fell into a spiral of substance abuse and depression.
I think he attempted suicide at this point. Uh. And
it was during this dark period, this sort of dark
night of the soul, that he developed his famous alter ego,
Slim Shady, which has basically been described of his sort
of like dark It basically an outlet for his rage
(05:49):
and anger and violent imagery became Slim's hallmark and this
informed his verses on his next his next work, the
Slim Shady EP, and that him a lot of attention
that earned him contracts from Interscope Records and Jimmy Ivan
put him in touch with Dr Dre hip Hop legend obviously,
who would become his mentor, and the result was the
(06:10):
Slim Shady LP in first global smash with My Name
is Huge, Huge, absolutely just a monster record, both sales
wise and just in the cultural conversation. People didn't know
what to make of this guy, I mean, just the rage,
the venom. Yeah, it's like, you know, it's hard in
(06:33):
a way, you feel like you're overstating, like how big
Eminem was at this time, you know, especially for people
that weren't alive at the time or maybe too young
to remember it. But you're right it was this cultural
earthquake at a time where it's that weird time like
before the Internet and social media really took over, and
where MTV and the radio had outsized influence on like
(06:56):
what people heard. And I remember when m A first
came around. I was in college and I was still
watching a lot of MTV at that point, and I
feel like, Hi, my name is you know, like his
first big single was literally on TV every fifteen minutes.
You know, If it wasn't every fifteen minutes, it was
every twenty minutes. I mean, it just seemed like he
was set up to be a star from the first
(07:18):
time you heard about him, Like they were treating him
like he was already the biggest thing on the planet,
and he pretty much became that. Yeah, I mean the
Marshall Mathews LP followed in two thousands, and between those
two albums, just I think they both were diamonds. They
definitely both were number one for a number of weeks
they I think, um, Marshall Mathews LP he sold two
million copies in its first two weeks alone. And just
(07:40):
to put that in perspective, it's a month into a
month after his latest album, Music to Be murdered by
has been out and he's only sold a hundred thousands,
so I mean, just incredible sales. But as you said,
the cultural conversation around him was just it was everywhere.
I mean, he's not only taking shots at huge stars
of the day, Britney Spears, Christina Aguilera, Will Smith and
(08:01):
sang Clown Posse. I think in Sync was in there.
He's just disinc everybody. But just the violent visions and
total tounge of his outrage on these albums was just shockings,
absolutely shocking too to everyone. I mean, he reconciled with
with him at this point and he raps about killing her.
He has a song about his mother called kill You.
(08:22):
Just things that that he really had an uncanny knack
for offending everybody, um but his talent, so to let
him get away with it in some ways. Well, we
also have to mention the song Stand, which is maybe
the most culturally lasting song from that record, just in
terms of the lexicon. I don't know if he invented
stan as a name for an obsessive fan, but it
(08:45):
was certainly popularized by that song and now people to
say Stand all the time, you know, twenty years after
that song came out, and what's interesting to me about
Eminem is that along with just how enormous he was,
and again it was I don't know if in my
lifetime that I can recall well many pop stars being
that popular for like a two or three year stretch,
(09:07):
but certainly rappers. I feel like that mass media machine
was still churning, so he was really huge. And normally,
especially in hip hop, you expect some sort of decline
to come into play by the time of like your
fourth or fifth album, and it seemed like it was
going to do that with Eminem around the time of Relapse,
(09:28):
which came out two thousand nine, that was like his
first record in five years, and then he just has
this incredible kind of revival in two thousand ten, puts
out Recovery. It's a huge hit, and it sets him
up for this decade in the two thousand tents where
he's not as big as he was maybe in the
early odds, but he's still like a pretty popular rapper,
(09:51):
and he's maintained this position in the culture where other
people that have come along that you would think might
have replaced him, they've failed, like he's still hung around
even as He's moved into his like late forties now,
which I believe sets the stage for Machine Gun Kelly
one of the would be challengers to Eminem's crown. Um
(10:13):
and uh hasn't really worked out that way for him,
has it? Uh? No, not yet? I mean, in fact,
at this point, it seems like he's best known for
feuding with em and m which is probably not how
he really wanted that whole thing to go. Well, I
gotta say, like, Okay, going into this episode, I had
never heard a Machine Gun Kelly song, or at least
(10:33):
that I was aware of. I realized that there was
one song that he did that I was was familiar with,
which is the song bad Things. It was a duet
with comedo Caballo, which came out I think a couple
of years ago. And I know it because that song
essentially lifted the melody from a song called out of
(10:54):
My Head by the nineties alt rock band Fastball of
the Way. However, gen x er, Yeah, of the Way,
And although I always thought out of my Head was
the better song, it was like the second or third
single from that album. Um, this nice little Oregon pop
soul record. What was that record? All the money can
(11:14):
buy something like that, all the paying money can buy. Yes,
shout out to Fastball. Uh. So I knew Machine Gun
Kelly from that. Otherwise I just knew him from his
acting work, like he placed Tommy Lee in the Motley
Crue biopic The Dirt Terrible Movie by the Way, which
you can watch on Netflix. Um. And he was also
in the Cameron Crow show about Rhodis, which I believe
(11:39):
was called Rhodis. He does a monologue about Mike McCready
in that show that I remember. So I mostly knew
him as dating Amber Rose. That was my main uh
after after with Khalifa. My knowledge of Machine Gun Kelly's
catalog is is pretty minimal. Like did you delve deep?
Like do you know more? And I do about him? Uh?
(12:02):
Probably not. Um. He was born in Cleveland, rapper he
I did learn that he became the first rapper to
win Amateur Night at Harlem's Apollo Theater, which blew my mind.
I I checked several sources on that, and that is
in fact true. Um, and that kind of and he
(12:23):
was a teenager he was like seen something like that.
So he's another Midwest rapper, you know. I don't think
he's talked a lot about this, but I assume that
he he certainly grew up listening to Eminem. I mean,
there's no way he didn't grow up like he would
have been ten years old or so when those records hit,
like the big first couple of records. So I'm sure
(12:44):
that was not only an influence on him, but it
might have been like a gateway drug for him and
to get into hip hop. I mean, has he ever
talked about that? Um? I think in the in the tweet,
that's what I started this whole thing off. He talks
about Eminem being a king, so he has, uh, in
interviews and on social media before their whole feud started,
talked about how he he is. You know, he's idle uh.
(13:08):
And I think that's probably why he wanted to take
him down. He idolized him so much. And this is,
you know, amateur psychologist, but uh, he wanted that position
for himself, I think. But uh, but yeah, we should
dive into the actual feud, which started in May. There
was a viral photo of Eminem's now sixteen year old
(13:29):
daughter Haley that went viral and uh, and you know
it's one of those posts that were always said I
want to feel old. Checkout Eminem's daughter Haley now and
um and it was making the rounds and Machine Gun
Kelly apparently saw it and wrote that Eminem's daughter is
hot as fun and she was sixteen and he was
(13:51):
in his um mid twenties, I believe. Um, yeah, yeah,
that was uh, you know, we were talking about this earlier,
about just like the wonderful people that we're gonna be
talking about in this episode, and uh yeah that that's
uh talking about the normally you feel like, Okay, Eminem,
he's often in the wrong maybe with his with his
(14:11):
rivalries and like his smack talking with other people. But
I feel like, yeah, if someone tells your daughter that
she's hot as fuck, yeah, it would be wrong. And again,
like you know, and this was around the time that
he was trying to get his career going too, right.
I mean, he had a record I think that came
out around two thousand and twelve. Um, yeah, yeah, this
(14:32):
is very very Machine Gun Kelly's career. So yeah, so
so so he's kind of reaching out to the King's
daughter here, and you know, and we alluded to this earlier,
but you know, Eminem, you would think that by two
thousand twelve, that he would have been off the stage,
and that this young up and coming guy from Cleveland,
you know, who has some skills as a rapper. I mean,
(14:55):
as you said, he won the amateur night at the
Apollo Theater. And you think, Okay, Eminem's going he's he's
going to exit the white rapper lane, and uh, I'm
gonna go in there. You know, if you're thinking that
machine gun Kelly, that's his That's probably what he was
thinking at the time. And uh, I personally don't think
there was a deeper thought behind this tweet. I don't
think there was any kind of of deeper, deeper feeling
(15:17):
behind this. I think it was just a pure impulse. Uh.
And you know, I mean, obviously, referring to anybody's teenage
daughter in these terms in a public farm isn't the
best thing you could be doing. In fact, I would
argue it's a not good thing that you're doing. But
this is Eminem we're talking about, who you know, has
been known for writing rap verses about killing people and
(15:37):
having sex with those skulls, for significantly less in referring
to his daughter and these very uh ungallant terms. So
don't he's poking the bear. He's poking the bear here,
and it's a bear bear that he idolizes. So I
don't really understand what he thought was gonna happen. Well,
I think I think in his mind he probably thought, well, Okay,
Eminem is gonna fade. I'm coming up and we'll have
(15:58):
like a little back and forth and it will help
me because I'm the young guy, and Eminem will go down.
But what's weird about this is that he doesn't go down. Yeah,
his Pavlovian need to respond to any sort of slight
he doesn't respond to this. And I wonder if maybe
he didn't even notice it. You know, maybe he had
like really good blockers on his Twitter, you know, like
(16:20):
a really good filter that like the Machine Gun Kelly
tweets don't go through because um, there's like really no
response to this at all, and it doesn't really continue
it for until like three years later. Well, yeah, machine
Gun Kelly goes on Hot ninety seven and he talks
about how he believes that Eminem had him banned from
(16:42):
Shade fort presumably due to this tweet, and um, and
Shade forty five is is eminem serious radio station? By
the way, and he's convinced that he's been banned from
it because of this. And apparently that's what really pissed
Eminem off the most was that this kid thought that
he would be he would get to Eminem to the
(17:03):
degree where he would he would have him blacklisted. I
guess that's the thing that really offended him most. Yeah,
this another interesting wrinkle here, because you know, Eminem ended
up doing an interview um several years later after all
this happened. By the way, this this this, this rivalry
moves at a snail's pace. By the way, this is
like the you know, the gun with the wind of
musical of rap rivalry and very slow build. But anyway,
(17:28):
Eminem didn't interview was Sway many years later, and he
said that it wasn't the fact that machine gun Kelly
said his daughter was hot as fuck that made him mad.
It was the fact that you, like you just said
that that machine gun Kelly was shooting his mouth off
and saying that Eminem was like trying to somehow hurt
his career. And Eminem was like, I don't care about
(17:51):
your career. Why would I care about your career. I'm
I'm Eminem in your Machine Gun Kelly, like, there's really
nothing to stop with your career. You think it was
actually think about you at all. Yes, he's given him
the Don Draper too, you know in the other of it,
you know, it's like I don't think of you at all,
which I think is a pretty plausible explanation. Again, he
(18:11):
seems weirdly cool with the Hailey stuff. It's like, I
think you were justified and getting piste off about that.
But you know, if this is the thing you're mad
about that, I guess that's fine, all right hand, We'll
be right back with more rivals. Even after Machine Gun,
(18:35):
Kelly says this stuff about and I'm trying to hurt
my career and I'm still not saying anything. Skip ahead
another three years. Okay, So we've gone six years now
since the initial volley, and we finally get to a
disc track, the first disc track of this rivalry, and
(18:55):
this is where things start to pick up a little bit.
So like in March of Machine Gun, Kelly appears on
a song by Tech nine called No Reason, and he
appears to reference the eminem A single Rap God, from
which is a pretty crappy song. By the way, do
you know rap God. Yes, uh not one of the
better ones. No, No, I think that's from like the
(19:17):
Marshall Mathers, which if you're making sequels to albums, that's
not a bad sign. That's a bad sign. I mean.
And also he did the Monster, which I thought was
a sequel to Love the Way You Lie with Rihanna,
which I think it was a much better song. Yeah,
it's like, you know, like like it's like meat Loaf
did sequels to his albums, and it's like you're following
(19:39):
in meat loafs foot stuff and actually meat Loaf in
Defensive meat Loaf the Baron of Hell saga, it demanded
a sequel, but like the Marshall Mathers saga, I don't
think really needed a sequel. It just seems like a
cash in. I would like to say, would if you
if you do a memoir, I would like your memoir
to be titled in Defensive meat Loaf. Well, and I'm
also defending Jim Steinman shout out to Jim Stein. Then
(20:00):
I just watched The Class Jim Simon, if you're listening
to this episode, so this is the lyric where machine
Gun Kelly takes a shot at Eminem. He says, I
popped cherries and pop stars. You popsicles. It's not hard,
popped in and out of the top charts, out the
cop car to remind y'all, you just wrap. You're not God,
and I don't care who got bars. I think Jordan
(20:22):
I wanted to be honest with me. I need I
need to be honest with me here. Um, how stupid
do I sound reciting Machine Gun Kelly lyrics on a
scale of one to ten, ten being extremely stupid. Um,
I don't think you would have one amateur night against
machine Gun Kelly at the Apollo. Let me put it
that way. Okay, I my flow is not very good,
(20:43):
but I'm gonna the emotion was the size the material there? Yeah,
the material was not that great. But anyway, Um, so, Eminem,
here's this. He hears machine gun Kelly saying you popsicles
is not hard, And this is finally the thing, the
popsicle line. This is finally the thing that sets Eminem off. Uh,
(21:04):
He's finally gonna respond to machine Gun Kelly. Six years
after the initial transgression by machine Gun Kelly, happens in August,
and it's from a song called not Alike. It's a
collaboration with Royce to five nine. Is it five inch
five ft nine inch? I think I'm not sure. I
think it was Royce the five nine. But okay, Royce
(21:26):
the five nine, Andy, Royce the five nine. In this song,
he says, but next time, you don't got to use
tech nine if you want to come at me with
a submachine gun. And I'm talking to you, but you
already know who the funk you are, Kelly, I don't
use sublimbs. Is it sublish? Is it okay? So it's
sort of like a little abbreviate. Yeah, is that like
(21:48):
a common thing. I've never heard someone say sublims. I've
never done that. But I sound like the most middle
aged white dude of all time talking about this right now.
I apologize, but I gotta come correct and say I
got a question to Blooms anyway, So Blooms and sure
as fuck don't sneak this. But keep commenting on my
daughter Haley referencing. That's whole mess. I keep on telling
(22:12):
motherfucker's bitches. In case you forgot, We're gonna need that
little explicit sticker on this episode. By the way, I
think we've already said some pretty big swears. I don't know.
Hopefully your kids are not listening to this episode anyway.
The only thing we have in common is I'm a
dick and you suck. Oh man, I don't feel good.
(22:36):
I don't feel good saying that last part that No,
I definitely, yeah, I feel terrible about that. What's funny
about this is like, Okay, this is a Tech nine
track and apparently technic I didn't know that he was
talking about Eminem. So then like he like totally like
through machine Gun Kelly under the bus. Isn't that what happened?
Oh yeah? He Uh. Instagram's a tech screen shot between
(23:00):
him and the producer saying, oh my god, I had
no idea he was talking about m which kind of
has a little bit of it. It smacks of, you know,
he Goth protest too much a little bit, but pretty
pretty funny. So yeah, like machine Gun Kelly, he's just
totally on an island at this point. Yeah, like Eminem,
he's finally got an Eminem's attention, and not only did Eminem,
(23:20):
everybody's just left him. Yeah, exactly, And because they all
know it's like, wait, why am I with Machine Gun
Kelly when I could piss off Eminem. That's not good
for me. You know, that's just smart thinking on Tech
nine's part. So machine Gun Kelly, instead of crawling back
under the rock where he may maybe he should have stayed,
(23:44):
he comes back. He goes nuclear at Eminem. Yeah, and
and this is like his magnam opus. Can we call
it that? This is yeah, I would say so. I
I have a hard time imagining that he's going to
top this, but hey, I'd love to be proven wrong.
I mean, this is it's certainly like the I think
(24:04):
the most famous song of this rivalry, Like this is
the first song that I remember hearing about um, like
when these two were squabbling. So it was you know,
this was the song. And I'm referring to Wrap Devil
by the Way, which came out in September. I feel
like this was the first song to sort of transcend,
maybe like the rap circles where people were you know,
(24:24):
mildly interested in this important came out like maybe a
week and a half after after not alike, because the turnaround,
right was really quick. Now this is when the huge
starts picking up exactly because we've you know, as we've said,
it took forever to get this for this to get going.
You know, I think I said gun with the wind earlier.
It's sort of like a Lord of the Rings movie, maybe,
(24:44):
you know, to use a more topical reference. You know,
it's like, Okay, we're finally getting to the battle, like
we've we've been in the shire for like an hour
and a half, you know, like, but we're finally getting
too good stuff. And so Wrap Devil comes out, you know,
a week and a half after Eminem's volley, and uh,
I gotta say that there are some lines in the
(25:05):
song that I think are pretty good. Like okay, so
at the beginning, he says, I, yeah, yeah, yeah, someone
needs to like record me reciting these lyrics and like
put like a rapiat under it, you know, and just
like like the worst hip hop song of all time.
Um I somebody grabbed him some clippers. His fucking beard
(25:28):
is weird. Now I think that's an app I think
that's an app criticism. You know, by this time, you know, Eminem,
he uh he emerged with this beard that um you know,
it made him It looked like one of those that
have a beard. But then there's like if you can
wash it off with water. It was kind of like that, right.
(25:52):
You know. Look, he's a guy in his forties, so
he has like the forty ish guy bod at this
point to so it's it's hanging out a little bit,
and he has the beard and he kind of looks
like a guy. It looks like you should be in
Three Doors Down or Shine Down or like one of
those bands, you know, like just like like the one
(26:13):
of the like we're just guys being dudes type bands.
That's what he looks like at this He makes fun
of these sweatpants too, or a sweatsuit. I think it's
a song he makes fun of his sweatsuit in the
song too Yeah, which again apt criticism. You know, we've
been taking a lot of shots at machine Gun Kelly.
But there's in Wrap Double he really does step up. Okay,
there's another line here. He says, took you six years
(26:35):
in a surprise album just to come up with a
diss apt criticism. Well done, fucking do we All you
do is read the dictionary and stay inside. I don't.
I don't think it's a bad thing to read the
dictionary and try to improve your vocabulary. I mean, you
know that's a that there's a positive attributes, especially as
(26:56):
one ages into middle age. Exactly, I'm I'm gonna the
ducks some points for that one. So yeah, he makes
fun of the sweatsuits, as you said, and he makes
fun of Eminem's corny hats, you know, he makes some
of his heights. He calls him Oscar the Grouch and
then makes fun of him for being an Oscar winner,
(27:17):
which again, it's like, how many people are Oscar winners?
You know. I don't know if that's something you should
make fun of someone about, but anyway, it threatens to
call ems his ex wife, presumably to do all sorts
of things that you wouldn't want someone like Machine Gun
Kelly to do to your ex wife. Um, what's your
(27:38):
favorite line from the song? Because you have a line
that you that you love from this man. I mean
my favorite is that is all you do is read
the dictionary and stay inside. I just think that's that's
pretty choice in this well, because we were talking about
this before and owner outline, you said you love the
line last time you saw eight mile was at home
on a treadknot, which is a good line. Again. Okay,
(28:00):
so I was kind of mad at Machine Gun Kelly
for the dictionary line, and also for making fun of
the oscar. Yeah, because I think you're out of your
depth there. But yeah, the treadmill line and the line
about the beard, I think he's right on. So this
is like where he's kind of hitting his peak, I
think with with wrap double oh. Absolutely. And the best
part is he shares the song with a sort of
(28:23):
manifesto posted on Twitter machine gun Kelly does. He says,
I'm standing up not just for myself but my generation.
And he's now he's addressing eminem right. I mean this,
he's criticizing somebody's you know, love of the Dictionary for
his generation. Um well again, I mean but I think
it goes back to what we were talking about at
the beginning, where on his part, and this might have
(28:45):
been subliminal on some level that he felt like, well,
it's my generation's turn to have the spotlight. It's my
turn basically to be the reigning you know, white guy,
surly uh attitude, you know, grumpy guy at the top
of the rap heep, get out of the way, grandpa,
(29:06):
and Grandpa won't leave because he's just way better than him.
And and that's his frustration with that, and it becomes
this sort of generational battle. Eminem's official response to this
comes very soon after September. It's like mid September. I
guess it's about a week and a half again after
Wrap Devil comes out, so we're really moving at a
(29:28):
quick pace here, and he puts out the song kill
Shot and man, this song is awful. To god, this
is a I gotta say, I think, like Wrap Devil
is like my favorite song out of this whole run,
even though I think Eminem would win this battle overall,
because I mean, kill Shot sucks, even even if like
(29:49):
Eminem is in the right for going back at machine
gun Kelly, like this is uh, this is line. He says,
here's the autograph of your daughter. I wrote it on
a starter Cap stands on. Listen, man dead isn't mad,
But how are you going to name yourself after a
damn gun and have a man bun? I mean, if
you're gonna make that of a man's beard and sweatsuit,
(30:11):
a man bun, comment is probably gonna come your way,
I guess. But he's punch Seminem punching down. He's punching down,
and he's also rhyming damn gun and man Bun, I mean,
come on, man, And also he's dragging a bunch of
innocent women into this. He's talking about Rihannazalea Halsey, who
(30:33):
I guess um machine Gun Galley had some kind of
relationship with. Um. Yeah, it's punching down all around, but
he does have a really good sort of death blow
in it. He says, I'd rather be eighty year old
me than twenty year old you, which, yeah, that's game,
set match right there. I think even if he is
(30:55):
talking about man Bun's, you know, it's still better to
be Eminem. At this point, we're going to take a
quick break and get a word from our sponsor before
we get two more rivals. After kill shot, this whole
(31:18):
revelry is starting to lose some steam, and I feel like, uh,
in the way that Machine Gun Kelly responded to this,
he was letting, I think some of the hurt come
out uh that. Uh, you know, I think you really
just wanted acknowledgement from Eminem and maybe for them to
throw some volleys back and forth good naturedly and ultimately
(31:40):
be friends, whereas Eminem is just annoyed by this guy
and wants nothing to do with him, you know you're
right when when he put that message out on Twitter,
when he put Rapped Devil out, he said, I'm doing
the same thing you did back in the day, and
and reading it in context, it seems like he's saying, like,
you know, I'm I'm just responding the way you would have,
but kind of looking back out on it. From the
(32:01):
stuff that he says later, it almost seems like he
is looking for his approvi. He sa, and I'm doing Look,
I'm Aren't you proud of me for on some level
for coming out either way you would have back in
the day. Don't you see something in me? Don't you
see me as a young you in any kind of way,
because he does say in an interview in the Breakfast
Club Um after kill Shot comes out, he basically says, yeah,
(32:22):
you know, I have another song, another distract ready to go.
But kill Shot was so weak that we're just I'm
just gonna holster that I'm gonna put that away for
later because I don't want to do that to him
because he's so pathetic, and he says, I really just
wanted to talk to him, to have a conversation to
hash it out as two guys and Eminem never responded,
so he said, you know, you know what he blew it.
He blew it. I'm I'm I'm done with him, uh,
(32:45):
which is is sad. As he said, it's almost like
he did want some kind of recognition from his hero
and it never it never came. He got the disk
track and nothing else. And there was also that weird
thing about like Machine Gun Kelly's entourage beating up a
guy was on the Netflix show Ozar like It's like
it was like Gabriel g rod Rodriguez, who's an actor,
(33:09):
He's on that that show Ozark, and apparently he like
videotaped himself calling Machine Gun Kelly a pussy and then
he said it he said it wasn't right for machine
Gun Kelly to go for Eminem's family, which I mean,
it is is a fair criticism. And then I guess
machine Gun kelly security team jumped him in the parking
(33:30):
lot of a Hampton Inn in Atlantic, which you know,
of all the terrible things that have happened in the
parking lot of a Hampton Inn in Atlanta, that at
least makes the top one d Yeah, it at least
makes the top one hundred. Uh So, you know, we're
really seeing a real de evolution at this point. And finally,
(33:51):
in in January, Eminem puts out the song accommodating the
track on his surprise album, Music to be Murdered By?
I have you listened to Music to be Murdered By?
By the way, did you put that record on it all?
I put it on right when it came out. I
I skimmed it. I didn't get too deep into it.
I gave myself a treat by not listening to it.
I'm like, I'm gonna treat myself by not listening to
(34:13):
this record. Um self, care care, so Eminem, He takes
another shot at machine gun Kelly. I don't know why.
At this point, he's saying, I won't topple. I'm not
giving it to anyone who want to come and get it.
I'm not gonna stop. But when they asked me, is
the war finished with mg K? Of course it is.
(34:36):
I cleansed them of his mortal sins. I'm God, and
the Lord forgives even the Lord, even the devil worshippers.
I'm moving on, But you know your scruples are gone
when you're born with Lucifer's horns so he says he's
done with it, but then he says, oh, by the way,
machine Gun Kelly, you're the devil, so I'm done with you.
But in closing, you're you're literally satan. Also, it's not
(35:01):
really a criticism. I mean, if Machine Gun Kelly have
the song Rap Devil, which he identifies himself as the
wrap Devil, so on a way, that's just kind of
like restating, do you think so you think it's just
sort of like tying a bow right on it and saying, yeah,
I guess I don't know. I mean, I don't really
care at this point. Well, that's the thing about fuse
(35:21):
that continue whether we want them to or not, and
this feud has kept going is that the world didn't
have enough problems already. You know, we can't have a
moment's peace anywhere we go. But the best part is
Machine Gun Kelly here's unaccommodating and he's not happy, and
he tweets about it, saying, mad a f I just
stepped out of a loud room to hear this bullshit,
(35:43):
which maybe a new low and hip hop trash talk
when you think about it, like I'm so mad, I'm
gonna leave the room, I mean right now. Well then okay,
So then he drops this song in March called Bullets
with Names. Have you have you heard this song? I
have it has some That song takes me to a
bad place, Stephen, I have to say it really does. Okay,
(36:06):
So all right, because I guess I'm the one who
has to read all the Machine Gun Kelly lyrics, so
I will go through this one as well. He says, Look,
I got a bullet with somebody's name on it. I
get up on him, killed me a goat g o
a t as in Greatest of of All Time. So
my jacket got stains on it, wiping my nose like
(36:28):
I got some cocaine on it. YadA, YadA, YadA YadA.
So he just he just decides again Machine Gun Kelly
to perpetuate this meaningless feud, which you know is pretty
weird because as far as like Valedictory distracts, go unaccommodating
was pretty zen, especially for Eminem. I mean, he's citing
(36:50):
forgiveness and moving on like those are definitely new words
in the m palette. I feel like the m of
Old would have had at least, like, you know, one
on complimentary reference to machine gun Kelly's or something in there.
But so we should have just let it lie. Yeah,
but you know, we can't ever let things lie on
this show. People have to feud or else we wouldn't
have anything to talk about. So let's try to find
(37:12):
meaning in this meaningless feud. If you were going to
make a pro machine gun Kelly case, I mean, wait,
what would it be? I mean, is it is it
essentially that he was just like this kid that wanted
attention and Eminem overreacted. I mean, is that his case? Basically?
I don't know, man, I mean talking about someone's daughter. Uh,
(37:34):
you're seating, You're seating. You're seeing the high ground to Eminem,
which which can be very hard to do. Um. That's
something that's interesting is that there are a lot of
sort of online Twitter conspiracy theorists who think that this
whole thing was staged, and there's actually some kind of
compelling evidence too. I guess that um Rap Devil was
uploaded to soundclouds six months before it was released, but
(37:54):
then it was immediately put to private. So there are
a lot of people who think this whole thing is
just a giant act to try to boost Machine Gun
Kelly's career. They're on the same uh label Interscope, and
I think that at least two of the of the
dis tracts Not Alike and Rap Devil have the same
producer I forget his name, but so there there's some
(38:17):
evidence to support that, which is interesting compelling. I don't
know if it's true or not, but um, but okay,
arguing for Machine Gun Kelley man, yeah, I you I
got nothing. Yeah, I mean, I think the case is
that he's just like this kid that was trying to
(38:38):
get attention. And even if it's staged, which even makes
talking about this a bigger waste of time, but even
if it is staged, I think it does point to
the fact that that he had nothing to lose really
by doing this. That I mean, unless you want to
count his dignity. You know, he had his dignity to lose,
(38:59):
but I don't know if he had dignity, probably not.
So it was, you know, taking a shot at eminem um.
There's really no downside for him because either way if
if it if it works, it helps his career. If
it doesn't work, well, he already doesn't have a great
career to begin with. I don't know about. I mean,
is it is it worse to be known for just
taking shots at a much more famous and successful and
(39:22):
talented person, you know, I mean like that almost feels worse,
Like like, is it worse to not be famous or
known as some famous persons funky? You know, I'd almost
prefer nominemity. Well in a way, you know, Machin Gun
and Kelly I think benefited from Eminem getting worse as
the two Thousand Tents war on because I think one
reason why Rap Devil works, I think relatively speaking, like
(39:47):
I'm not saying Wrap Devil was a great disc track
or or a great song or anything, but in the
realm of this exceedingly stupid rivalry between these very one guy,
Eminem is very talented, but he's like maybe not the
best guy. But um, I think one reason why that
works because Eminem actually did become someone that you could
(40:08):
make fun of, like fairly easily. Like there were a
lot of things about him that were pretty mockable. Uh,
you know, starting with the beard that's weird, and you know,
his his corny hats, and and and and and the
list goes on forever, Like all the sort of corniness
that I think Eminem inevitably sort of devolved into as
he got older. But the gap between these two guys,
(40:31):
it never was going to close enough for Machine Gun
Kelly to bridge the gap. You know, even if like
Eminem became someone that was easier to make fun of, um,
he was, as you said, always going to be way
more successful, way more famous, and and and more talented.
So I guess coming into the conclusion of this, this
(40:55):
is the part of the episode where we like to
sort of step back and say, what have we learned,
what can we take from this story to improve ourselves,
and what can we say to perhaps spark reconciliation between
these two opposing forces, you know, who have been battling,
in this case battling throughout the two thousand tens and
into the early twenties. But I'm really tempted to say
(41:17):
that these guys should not be friends, and maybe no
one should be friends with either one of them. Well,
I think maybe a broader theme in this whole real
or staged rap battle is, uh, what does what does
a rap feud mean? In now? Are they kind of
a played out, spent thing they've been as something that
(41:39):
started as a very real. Um, competition between two artistic,
talented people devolved into a way to basically just sell albums. Yeah,
I mean I think that for something like this to work,
you definitely need two people that are on a similar plane. Um.
And if you don't have that, and you have this
situation where it's either it feels trumped up or it's
(42:03):
just flat outstaged. You know, as the conspiracy theorists say, Um,
all the noise in the world isn't going to make
it compelling enough as a battle for people to really
kind of invest themselves in it as we do with
the great rivalries. So in a way, this is sort
of like a meta rivalry to comment it's a commentary
(42:25):
on like how rivalries maybe have changed over the course
of the last several decades in pop music history. Um.
I also feel like the lesson here for anyone, and
it applies to pop stars and it applies to us
normal people. Don't feed the trolls. If you have a troll,
(42:48):
don't feed the trolls. And really, Eminem went a long
time without feeding the trolls. You know, he blew a
lot of stuff off, either knowingly or just because he
was in a different stratosphere for Machine Gun Kelly, and
he even noticed what was happening. But in a way,
when he opened his mouth, he made himself look stupid,
you know. He he kind of seemed cooler when he
wasn't responding to this stuff, and then when he responded
(43:10):
to it, um he seemed kind of fish. And he
addressed that too in interviews. He would say, he would say,
you know, I'm in this weird position where if I
don't say anything, that's gonna look like he won. But
if I say something, that's giving him all sorts of validation,
not to mention attention and making him way more famous.
So he was in a difficult position, specifically him. I mean,
he's not if we can just avoid trolls because nobody cares,
(43:32):
but being Eminem and having somebody takes shots at you,
even if it is somebody who's comparatively a flee like
Machine Gun Kelly, it does his psyche. I don't think
we'll allow it in this way. Eminem is all of
us because we all say, don't feed the trolls, but
then we all kind of have our weak spots and
we give in. And it's like, even as he was
(43:53):
doing it, he knew it, like, shouldn't be doing this.
I'm making a mistake, but I'm still gonna take a
out his man bun. I'm still gonna do it. And
he did it, and it was a mistake. So we'll
live and learn. We can learn, so so maybe we
can learn from that. This is what we'll take from
this episode. You know, don't feed the trolls. If there's
(44:15):
an annoying person in your life, ignore them, don't make
fun of their ponytail on top of their head. Move on,
and we'll all be happy. We won't be like M
and M and the machine Gun Kelly, which is really
I think the point of all of our existences. Everybody,
just where your man buns and your weird beards with pride.
(44:36):
It's all good, it's all love. I think inadvertently we've
we've arrived at the message of reconciliation in peace that
I didn't think we're going to get to in this episode.
But you know, I think that's it. Weird beards and
man buns join joint hands, hair strands. Alright, Jordan, Well,
(44:57):
I'm gonna go take a shower now, as I said,
and I'm going to forget that I recited all these
machine Gun Kelly lyrics and in a public for I'm
gonna go chop up some beats and put it over
them all man, Well until next week, all right? Looking
forward to it. Rivals is a production of I Heart Radio.
(45:22):
The executive producers are shaun Ty Toone and Noel Brown.
The supervising producers are Taylor Chi Coogn and Tristan McNeil.
I'm Jordan run Talk. I'm Stephen Hyden. If you like
what you heard, please subscribe and leave us a review.
For more podcasts for My heart Radio, visit the I
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