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12th Sep 2022

Eminem opens up about drug overdose that nearly killed him

JOE

‘It took a long time for my brain to start working again’

Eminem has opened up about nearly losing his life after suffering a drug overdose years ago.

During a recent episode of Paul Rosenberg’s podcast, the Grammy-winning rapper spoke about his near-fatal overdose on methadone 15 years ago.

“It took a long time for my brain to start working again,” Eminem said to his longtime manager.

Rosenberg recalled asking the doctors about any potential brain damage when things were looking grim in the hospital.

“Didn’t you ask the doctors when I first started rapping again, didn’t you say, ‘I just wanna make sure he doesn’t have brain damage’?” Eminem asked.

“Yeah. I thought you might have some permanent problems,” Rosenberg responded. “Yeah. I was concerned, for sure.”

Eminem also spoke about having to relearn his craft in the period after his recovery, and how that changed his next album, Relapse.

“I remember when I first got sober and all the shit was out of my system, I remember just being, like, really happy and everything was fucking new to me again,” he said.

“It was the first album and the first one that I had fun recording in a long time.”

He added: “It was like the first time I started having fun with music again and relearning how to rap. You remember that whole process, [it] took a long time for my brain to start working again.”

In the song ‘Deja Vu’ from the album, Eminem rapped in detail about the incident and how he tried to hide his addiction from his loved ones.

The interview comes on the back of Eminem releasing his second greatest hits collection, Curtain Call 2, last month.

The 35-track project included cuts from The Marshall Mathers LP2, Relapse – and album the rapper admits was not his best work, as he was still regaining his skills – and Recovery.

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