Hip-hop star Eminem has hinted his new album Revival will be his last.
The follow-up to 2013’s The Marshall Mathers LP 2 is the rapper’s eighth solo studio project, but the lyrics to the track Castle suggest it will also be his last.
The song is dedicated to his daughter Hailie Jade, and features verses in the form of letters addressed to his little girl at various stages in her life, starting from when she was born.
He raps, “I’m trying to build these castles out of sand, baby girl/For you to sit on the throne, I got plans, baby girl/Welcome to mum and dad’s crazy world. Love, daddy.”
Eminem goes on to express his guilt at rapping about her in so many songs, apologising for seemingly exploiting her existence and his disputes with her mother, Kim, for the sake of his art.
“I said your name but always tried to hide your face/This game is crazy, I wanted to claim my love for you but damn. I never knew it’d be like this/If I did, I wouldn’t have done it. You ain’t asked for none of this s**t. Now you’re being punished?/ Things that should’ve been private with me and your mother is public.”
The reclusive MC then spits, “They can take this fame back, I don’t want it/I’ll put out this last album then be done with it.”
Elsewhere on Revival, which hit retailers on Friday (December 15), Eminem reiterates his struggles with fame on In Your Head, while he gets personal again on Arose, in which he recalls the night he almost died from a drug overdose in 2007 as he shares his final apologies to Hailie Jade, his adopted daughter Whitney – Kim’s child from a previous relationship, and his niece Alaina, whose mother Dawn, Kim’s twin sister, died last year, after doctors almost pulled the plug on his life support machine.
“Little ladies, be brave. Take care of your mother,” he raps. “Smile pretty for pictures. Always cherish each other/I’ll always love ya. And I’ll be in the back of your memory/And I know you’ll never forget me. Just don’t get sad when remembering.”
“Consider the last four minutes as the song I’d have sent to my daughters if I’d have made it to the hospital less than two hours later. But I fought it,” the now-sober star states towards the end of the track.
