The musician didn’t take too kindly to the fact that his skin tone came before the word rapper

Eminem might get called a lot of things, but being dubbed a ‘white rapper’ really seems to rub him up the wrong way.

It is something which he has dealt with since Dr Dre signed him to Aftermath Entertainment way back in 1998 and has been somewhat synonymous with the trajectory of his career.

Eminem explained he was ‘getting a lot of heat’ for being a white man on the rap scene when he first entered the industry from both the media and fellow artists.

Eminem hits out at being called a white rapper
Credit: Black Entertainment Television

0 seconds of 1 minute, 19 secondsVolume 90%

During an interview with XXL in 2022, the 51-year-old said: “Coming up, I had to deal with that a lot. I wanted to be respectful because what I do is Black music. I knew I was coming into it as a guest in the house.

“I understood, at the same time, everybody’s perception of a white guy coming into hip hop and all of a sudden things start happening for him… Obviously, I was upset, and it wasn’t just magazines.

“I had rappers left and right taking shots at me. I was used to that, too. Coming up through the battle scene, that didn’t mean s**t to me, you know? I would go head-to-head with whoever.”

I mean, this is a bloke who owned the fact that he is ‘not the first king of controversy’ but is the ‘worst thing since Elvis Presley to do Black music so selfishly and use it to get himself wealthy’.

Amy Sussman/WireImage

Dre didn’t even know he was a white guy the first time he heard him rapping – but he previously revealed that this aspect of Eminem’s identity ‘kind of actually made it better for me, because it was so different’.

As we have established, Eminem’s skin colour has been a constant conversation throughout his 26-year career.

So you can understand why he got a little irate when discussing the topic during a 1999 interview which has recently resurfaced online.

Discussing how he felt about his skin colour constantly being brought up, he fumed: “To put a label on something…it kind of disgusts me that it’s 1999 and people still get labelled as ‘white rapper’.

Black Entertainment Television

“I just want to live to see the day that we don’t put labels on anything. I want to live to see the day that I’m just a rapper, I’m just an artist,” he explained.

“You listen to music, you don’t watch music, you listen to it – unless you’re watching the video, of course.

“You see the image and everything is a part of the whole thing, but I’m like this – I’m like music is music, and music is for the ears.”

Social media users thought that he handled the situation admirably – although we’re all still waiting for that ‘day’ he was talking about.

One said: “Eminem’s perspective on identity and music has always been thought-provoking. His impact transcends labels.”

Another wrote: “Deep. The man has always made sense, even from way back.”

A third added: “This is exactly why Eminem is the GOAT.”

And a fourth added: “A powerful reflection from Eminem on identity and music. “His words resonate beyond time.”

Maybe we should try and think more about blonde buzz cuts, his mom’s spaghetti, or the great city of Detroit where he grew up when we think of Eminem in future.