Eminem and Snoop Dogg have teamed up for a new Detroit to Long Beach track, "From The D 2 The LBC," the first-ever collaborative effort from the two veteran rhymers.
"This probably should have happened awhile ago," Em says at the top of the song, before trading verses with Snoop over the Eminem-produced instrumental, built on a spare drum beat, strings and an operatic vocal sample.
Em and Snoop have teamed up before, on "Bitch Please II," a posse cut from Eminem's 2000 album "The Marshall Mathers LP," which also featured Dr. Dre, Xzibit and Nate Dogg. "From The D 2 The LBC," which hit streaming services on Friday, is the first time the pair has co-headlined a song together.
The partially animated video for the song sees Em and Snoop performing in a recording studio together and also appearing as their Bored Ape Yacht Club NFT counterparts.
The video, which was viewed more than 1.1 million times in its first eight hours, also makes a reference to "Curtain Call 2," which appears on an animated pinball machine in the duo's cartoon world. Em also hashtagged "#curtaincall2" on Instagram when posting the video.
The set would be a follow-up to Eminem's 2005 greatest hits compilation. "Curtain Call — The Hits," which rounded up Eminem's hits from his first four major label albums, has been certified Diamond by the Recording Industry Association of America, signifying sales of 10 million units, and remains a top seller; the set has spent 584 weeks — more than 11 years — on Billboard's Top 200 albums sales chart, and is No. 55 on this week's chart, one spot ahead of 2Pac's 1998 "Greatest Hits" album.
"From The D 2 The LBC" follows a 2020 spat between Eminem and Snoop Dogg that emerged when during an interview Snoop didn't include Eminem on his list of top MCs.
Snoop insinuated it was Em's affiliation with Dre that was the reason for his success, before listing a host of rappers — "like Rakim, like Big Daddy Kane, like KRS-One, like LL Cool J. Shall I go on? Like Ice Cube" — that he felt Em couldn't touch. Snoop then followed up by saying he "can live without" Eminem's music.
Eminem fired back on "Zeus," a track from his 2020 set "Music to Be Murdered By — Side B." "And, as far as squashin' beef, I'm used to people knockin' me, but just not in my camp/ and diplomatic as I'm tryna be, last thing I need is Snoop doggin' me/ man, Dogg, you was like a damn god to me/ nah, not really, I had 'dog' backwards," Em rapped.
The two eventually settled their beef after Snoop reportedly apologized to Em, and all was good in the camp by the time the pair shared the stage with Dre, 50 Cent, Kendrick Lamar and Mary J. Blige at this year's Super Bowl halftime show.
"From the D" is Eminem's second new song this month; last week he released "The King and I," his song from the soundtrack to the Baz Luhrmann's "Elvis."
