Eminem - Curtain Call: The Hits Album Reviews & Song Lyrics

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Eminem "Curtain Call: The Hits" album

- Release date : December 2005 -

Curtain Call: The Hits is a 2005 greatest hits compilation album by American rapper Eminem. It collects Eminem's most popular songs, as well as four new tracks; a live version of "Stan" featuring Elton John, plus new songs "Fack", "When I'm Gone" and "Shake That" featuring Nate Dogg, the latter two of which were released as singles and would become top ten hits. It was released on December 6, 2005, under Dr. Dre's Aftermath Entertainment. The album was certified double-platinum in the US, triple-platinum in Australia and the UK, and quadruple-platinum in New Zealand. It reached no. 1 on several charts, including the UK and the US. A special edition was also released which included a second CD, named Stan's Mixtape, which included a selection of seven songs not included on the main album.

Curtain Call: The Hits debuted at number 1 in the UK Albums Chart, after two sales days, in a similar fashion to Eminem's previous album Encore. The album racked up first-week sales of nearly 441,000 and with close to 324,000 scans the second week for a two week stay at number one. It slipped from no. 1 to no. 4 in its third week but surged 33 percent to finish with sales close to 430,000. The disc scored nearly 1.2 million scans in its first three weeks of release. It also gave Eminem his fifth straight number 1 album in the US and UK when including the 8 Mile soundtrack. Curtain Call was certified double-platinum by the RIAA in the United States.

The booklet in the album contains pictures from throughout Eminem's career, including him performing at the Grammy Awards of 2001 with Elton John, a group shot of D12, an image from the video for "Superman", the cover of The Marshall Mathers LP, and images previously featured in the booklets from his past albums.

"Curtain Call: The Hits" album tracks and lyrics

"Curtain Call: The Hits" album reviews

If Eminem's Curtain Call: The Hits really is his final bow and not merely a clever denouement to his series of Eminem Show and Encore albums, it's a worthy way to retire. And even if he stages a comeback years from now, there's little question that the first five years of his career, spanning four albums plus a soundtrack, will be his popular and creative peak, meaning that the time is right for Curtain Call -- it has all the songs upon which his legend lies. Which isn't necessarily the same things as all the hits. There are a few odds and ends missing -- most notably one of his first hip-hop hits, "Just Don't Give a F***," plus 2003's "Superman" and 2005's "Ass Like That" -- but all the big songs are here: "Guilty Conscience," "My Name Is," "Stan," "The Real Slim Shady," "The Way I Am," "Cleanin' Out My Closet," "Lose Yourself," "Without Me" and "Just Lose It." They're not presented in chronological order, which by and large isn't a problem, since the sequencing here not only has a good, logical momentum, alternating between faster and slower tracks, but they're all part of a body of work that's one of the liveliest, most inventive in pop music in the 21st century. The only exception to the rule are the three new songs here, all finding Shady sounding somewhat thin. There's the closing "When I'm Gone," a sentimental chapter in the Eminem domestic psychodrama that bears the unmistakable suggestion that Em is going away for a while. While it's not up to the standard of "Mockingbird," it is more fully realized than the two other new cuts here, both sex songs that find Shady sounding as if he's drifting along in his own orbit. "Shake That" has an incongruous Nate Dogg crooning the chorus, while the wildly weird "Fack" finds Eminem spending the entire track fighting off an orgasm; it seems tired, a little too close to vulgar Weird Al territory, and it doesn't help that his Jenna Jameson reference seems a little old (everybody knows that the busty porno "It" girl of 2005 is Jesse Jane; after all, she even was in Entourage). Even if these three cuts suggest why Eminem is, if not retiring, at least taking a long break, that's fine: they're reasonably good and are bolstered by the rest of the songs here, which don't just capture him at his best, but retain their energy, humor, weirdness, and vitality even after they've long become overly familiar. And that means Curtain Call isn't just a good way to bow out, but it's a great greatest-hits album by any measure.

*** by Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All Music Guide ***