S. Samuel
NBA player-turned-rapper Shaquille O'Neal has weighed in on Eminem's Relapse landing atop the charts and spoke on the contribution he made to the biggest debut of the year.
The rapper phoned into DJ Whoo Kid‘s radio show and voiced his thoughts on Slim Shady.
“Congratulations to my man Eminem,” Shaq said. “600,000 for the first week and I bought 300,000 of those. Of course dawg, I bought 300,000 and passed ’em out, like ‘Yo this is my man Em, check him out.’ You know good thing about me is I know everybody, I show supprot to everybody and you know, street rule number 25 is stay outta other people’s beef. You guys make me who I am ’cause I could throw in the CD in the jammie, get pumped up and blow up in the fools’ face. Today is old school wack white boy week, I got Vanilla Ice [in the CD player.] (Radio Planet TV)
Em recently shared his reaction to landing No. 1 last week.
“I mean, record sales to me, honestly, since the beginning of my career I’ve always said they’re not as important to me as the respect and things like that,” Em explained in an interview. “I would just rather rap and get respect from the fans and my peers and things like that. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t want to sell any records, but at the same time it’s not my main priority.” (106 & Park)
Dr. Dre previously spoke on Em’s diligent work ethic.
“It’s hardcore, it’s dark comedy,” Dre said in an interview about Relapse. “I talked to my son about [Em’s return] and he was like ‘The kids want to him act a fool. We want to hear him be crazy, we want to hear him be Slim Shady and nothing else.’…Once he makes a painting, once he lays a lyric down, it’s impossible to get him to change it. If there’s a couple of lines he says on a record that’s not relevant today, it’s ‘No, that was that painting. That was for that moment.'” (New York Times)
After selling over 600,000 copies its first week, Relapse is reportedly on track to sell more than 200,000 records this week.
Not a whole lot to get excited about in terms of numbers, as the chart-topping debuts of the last two weeks settle into their sales patterns, each tallying more than enough units to easily occupy the top two slots on the leader board. Here’s how we’re looking at the moment: Eminem (Shady/Aftermath/Interscope): 200-225K, Green Day (Reprise): 60-75K, Marilyn Manson (Interscope): 50-55K, Hannah Montana: The Movie Soundtrack (Walt Disney): 50-55K, Lady Gaga (Interscope): 40-45. (Hits Daily Double)
Be sure to check Sales Wrap this week for a full music sales run-down.
Check out Shaq’s interview below:
