Classic Track Review – Stan

Eminem’s classic ballad Stan is heralded as one of his best songs of all time. The song follows an obsessed fan as he repeatedly tries to contact Slim Shady, becoming angrier and angrier with each verse at Shady’s lack of communication. Eminem alternates between two personas: the first three verses are delivered from Stan’s point of view, and the final verse is a response from Slim Shady. Eminem’s superb lyricism allows him to create a song that is filmic in nature, without sacrificing any musicality.
Stan tells a haunting story, and is a leap away from Slim Shady’s normally jokey sound. It cemented Eminem’s reputation as an extremely talented rapper. It showed the flexibility of the hip-hop genre, by proving to the mainstream that it could elicit genuine emotion. The song is built around samples from Dido’s Thank You: the beat is a slightly altered version of Thank You’s backing and the chorus is a direct sample. Eminem uses Dido’s song to create a completely different sound by taking only a fragment from a happy song.
Eminem’s talent was recognised as Stan earned numerous accolades, including reaching number one in twelve different countries, achieving multi-platinum status, and being named Rolling Stone’s tenth best song of the decade. The track still remains powerful today, although it was released 16 years ago in 2000, in an era when social networks (e.g. Twitter) have made extreme fandoms even more visible.