It's been 25 years since Eminem announced himself onto the international scene with his iconic, revered 1999 album The Slim Shady LP. The album—technically his second, but his first on major label Interscope—featured huge singles like “Guilty Conscience,” “Role Model” and, most notably, “My Name Is,” which introduced his alter-ego character Slim Shady in the world. His even bigger next album, 2000s The Marshall Mathers LPdoubled down with “The Real Slim Shady,” which reached No. 4 on the Billboard Hot 100 and created one of the most iconic awards shows of all time, with the blonde-haired hip-hop superstar ruling his legion. of the like.
But a quarter of a century has passed since then, and Slim Shady is dead, locked in Eminem's basement. The final nail came with his latest album, The Death of Slim Shady (Coup de Grace), which this week became Em's 11th album to debut at No. 1 on the Billboard 200, amassing 281,000 equivalent album units and notching the biggest week for a hip-hop album this year so far. In addition to the star power that Eminem brings with each new release, the album's big first week was also the result of a meticulous, months-long marketing campaign that included Fortnite activations, a mockumentary of a true crime video, obituaries in print newspapers, and big singles like “Houdini,” which reached No. 2 on the Hot 100 upon its release. And it helps earn Interscope Geffen A&M senior marketing representative Jason Sangerman its title Advertising sign's Executive of the Week.
Here, Sangerman – who himself has worked on 11 Eminem albums over the course of his career – talks about this extensive marketing plan, his collaborations with Eminem and his longtime manager and CEO of Shady Records Paul Rosenberg to set the record straight and what follows. “The great thing about an artist like Eminem is that he keeps everyone guessing, and that includes us, so it keeps you operating at your highest level,” he says.
This week, Eminem's latest album, The Death of Slim Shady (Coup de Grace), debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 with the longest first week for a hip-hop album this year. What key decision did you make to help make this happen?
Everything we do when we start to engage in conversations around marketing strategy is led by Eminem and his partner and manager Paul Rosenberg. Once we have our initial design, the Shady Records team and the larger Interscope team start building it. There's a lot of brainstorming and we all work well, bouncing ideas off each other — but when it comes to execution, precision is non-negotiable.
The key to this growth was thinking and working holistically. It always starts with the music. Marshall has delivered another amazing album. this time it also came with a high concept narrative woven throughout. We did a plan together with Paul that gave us plenty of runway to activate all the essentials — social platforms, press, radio, DSP, D2C, gaming, our complex relationship, IRL pop-ups, etc. Not only did the plan enable us to appeal to his global fan base, but we created new entry points for prospective fans, which was key to a successful launch.
The concept of this album – killing off the iconic alter ego of one of the most successful rappers of all time – must have been both a marketer's dream and almost overwhelming to think about. How did you approach the setup?
The character of Slim Shady and the world built around him is all Marshall's creation. It's always a privilege to help deliver a tangible experience to fans based on his ideas, and so a large part of the marketing plan starts directly with Marshall and Paul. The larger Interscope team then creates a space to scale and leverage these innovative ideas. It's always critical, but especially given the nature of this particular album, to find the right chronology for each moment. We couldn't make a move that would potentially yield something programmed for a future reward.
In what ways were you able to return to the original Slim Shady character from 25 years ago?
It's so wild to hear '25 years ago' because Eminem was the first concert I saw growing up. It was the Slim Shady Tour at the House of Blues on Sunset. I still have the original t-shirt. This colorful lipstick-style Slim Shady logo was one of the tracks brought back into the mix for this album. Once “Houdini” came out, there were elements of nostalgia in everything we did and they became Easter eggs for marketing the album – the “Rap Boy” outfit, the blonde hair, a flash mob of the “real” Slim Shadys appearing in Washington Square Park in New York, etc.
The mix track “Face Off” is of course an integral part of the campaign and a key element in explaining the concept around the album. It goes without saying that Marshall has earned the right to be very discreet about how he presents himself out there to the world. Complex came to us with a really creative concept that builds on the narrative of the album and brings it to life in a way that makes sense to him and his fans.
Another important thing in all of this is that many of us at Interscope have been working with Eminem and Paul for years. Some of us, like [vice chairman] Steve Berman, from the very first disc. So there's an institutional knowledge built into the team that we bring to every Eminem release, and we certainly tapped into that for this campaign.
How were you able to use the singles and music videos to help promote the album and its themes?
The great thing about an artist like Eminem is that he keeps everyone guessing, and that includes us, so he keeps you operating at your highest level. Of course, he has recently released albums with little to no warning as a surprise, but in this case, we were talking with Paul and Marshall in Detroit about the best way to release this project last year. Given the theme of the album, they wanted real singles along with videos to set up the project. Paul and his Shady team led these conversations. They have always had an extraordinary vision.
Obviously, Eminem's songwriting is unparalleled, but he's also a super visual artist. So the video for “Houdini” was critical in launching this campaign. It has a similar energy to the first singles from previous albums — so right there you get another benefit of the group's long-term continuity. We were able to leverage a collective knowledge base from previous releases. The “Houdini” video allowed fans who had always loved Slim to reconnect, introducing the character to a new generation of fans.
“Houdini” was the spark that activated everything we had been planning for so long. Each person on the team did their part to help mobilize and expand the fandom around the track. We always try to build an entire world around a release, and the immediate global reaction to “Houdini” allowed the entire team between Shady, Aftermath and Interscope to add fuel to the fire.
How was the development of this project different from any other in Eminem's career — and your career as well?
This plan started long before the album was announced. If you look back at Eminem and Fortnite after being active since late last year, you'll see that some of the aspects of this collaboration included throwback Slim Shady themes — the popcorn route started back then. There was a long road map to the release of the album that had elements of storytelling every week, using every medium that made sense. We used advanced AI technology in some of our graphics, but we also ran a fake “true crime” TV ad to announce the album, and then released Slim Shady's obituaries as print media only in physical newspapers. Some of the music critics in those papers didn't even see them until they got the pull from other outlets. Career-wise, this is the 11th Eminem project I've worked on — I'm just lucky to be anywhere around something like that.
Slim Shady is dead. Where does Eminem go from here?
Eminem always likes the element of surprise, and since I don't need him to make an album called “The Death of Jason Sangerman,” I'll leave it to him to answer.
