Magazine: Eminem's Low Note

Magazine: Eminem's Low Note Plays '93 recording of rapper disparaging black women

By Glenn Gamboa STAFF WRITER

November 19, 2003

The ongoing battle between Eminem and The Source magazine escalated to the next level yesterday, as the magazine called a news conference to play an untitled song that features the Detroit rapper using a racial slur and disparaging black women.

"Never date a black girl because blacks only want your money," Eminem raps in the song, which was recorded in 1993 and given to the magazine by three Detroit area fans. "Black girls and white girls just don't mix because black girls are dumb and white girls are good chicks," he raps later.

Eminem doesn't dispute the tape's authenticity, which sounds like a freestyle rap.

"The tape they played today was something I made out of anger, stupidity and frustration when I was a teenager," Eminem said in a statement, referring to The Source co- founders Ray Scott and Dave Mays. "I'd just broken up with my girlfriend, who was African-American, and I reacted like the angry, stupid kid I was. I hope people will take it for the foolishness that it was, not for what somebody is trying to make it into today."

However, Kim Osorio, the magazine's editor, said, "These are racist remarks by someone who has the ability to influence millions of minds."

The magazine plans to devote its February issue to the tape and plans to include a CD of the song in the issue so fans can hear it. "This is something we can't turn a blind eye to," said Mays, the magazine's publisher. "This is the key unlocking a much bigger picture."