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Elton John Talked to Eminem About Sobriety, Trump, and Loving Hip-Hop

"Oh, I was for sure on drugs when we met." - Eminem to Elton John for 'Interview' magazine.
Phil Witmer

Eminem is about to release a two-disc monster called Revival into the world on December 15, and instead of talking to a writer, he's been interviewed by his longtime friend Elton John for Interview magazine. It reads far less "dad talk" than you'd imagine, as Em greets John with an affectionate "How are you doing, cunt?" before the two discuss more serious matters.

One of those matters is their first meeting, performing Em's "Stan" as a duet at the 2001 Grammy Awards. Eminem semi-jokes about being on drugs during the performance, which causes him to reflect on his nine years of sobriety, saying that, "getting clean made me grow up. I feel like all the years that I was using, I wasn’t growing as a person."

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In more current affairs, John praises Em on the latter's now-infamous anti-Trump freestyle at the BET Awards, which Em uses to elaborate on his position.

EMINEM: It was about having the right to stand up to oppression. I mean, that’s exactly what the people in the military and the people who have given their lives for this country have fought for—for everybody to have a voice and to protest injustices and speak out against shit that’s wrong. We’re not trying to disrespect the military, we’re not trying to disrespect the flag, we’re not trying to disrespect our country. But shit is going on that we want to make you aware of. We have a president who does not care about everybody in our country; he is not the president for all of us, he is the president for some of us. He knows what he’s doing.

JOHN: Everything that he does is deliberate.

EMINEM: As long as he’s got his base, he does not give a fuck about anybody else in America. But guess what? There’s more of us than there are of them. I still feel like America is the greatest country to live in. This is my opinion. But we have issues that we need to work on and we need to do better.

Finally, Em and Elton fanboy over their shared love of hip-hop (as we already know, the two of them are big Tech-N9ne fans). Eminem lists some of his favourite younger rappers, including Kendrick Lamar, Travis Scott, J. Cole, and Joyner Lucas, while John also shows appreciation for modern rap beats, saying that "these days, when I’m listening to records by hip-hop artists, I hear the production. It’s just astounding how great the productions have become." There are other tidbits about Em's creative relationship with Dr. Dre and what to expect from Revival, so read the entire interview here.

Phil is on Twitter.

Tagged:EminemElton JohnTrumpTech N9neRapTravis ScottrevivalKendrick LamarJ. ColeMusicNoisey
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