Musical Analysis of Lose Yourself

When faced with the decision of which pop song really stood out to me during my youth and adolescent years, the song “Lose Yourself” by Eminem immediately came across my mind. From listening to this song during soccer game warm ups, to quietly being indulged in my own headphones while studying for high school exams, this song was like no other in my ITunes library. On top of its amazing use of musical elements, I especially love this song because of its connection to certain socio historical factors and the pure raw meaning behind its lyrics. Although the reaction to this song was quite mixed, and stirred a lot controversy, it was the most defining rap song of the early 2000s. While sitting at my seat pondering about this piece, it brought me to a scene of reminisce to all the milestones that I’ve gone through with this song playing in the background. This feeling serves as a foreshadow to the content and messages delivered in this song that will be further discussed. I will attempt to dissect “Lose Yourself” in this paper and provide a thorough analysis of its different musical elements, its social background, and my own personal thoughts towards it. Eminem’s ingeniousness in creating this masterpiece resulted in an academy award for the best original song in 2002 – a vindication to the impact that this song has had.
In discussing its musical elements, something which makes this song so easy to enjoy and popular among all audiences is its duration. Its combination of piano, guitar and drums creates a simple layering which rocks to a common 4/4 time measure. Its rhythm is simple but strong, and gives Eminem a good framework to rap on. Similar to many rap songs, the time measure does not change throughout the whole piece and keeps a repetitive beat. The consistency of guitar chords playing on the downbeat creates an engaging feeling for the listeners to nod their heads to. Most notably, in the beginning of the song where the guitar is first introduced, the use of