Using a variety of Shady Records artists, as well as those heavily involved with the label, Complex TV recently documented the success of the label powerhouse as part of their newly-released documentary, “Not Afraid: The Shady Records Story.”
Among those featured in the half-an-hour long documentary are Eminem, Dr. Dre, 50 Cent, Peter Rosenberg, and Royce Da 5’9.
“Not Afraid: The Shady Records Story” begins with both Eminem and Peter Rosenberg speaking on the birth of their artist/manager relationship. Rosenberg revealed that he met Eminem through Proof and added that at that particular moment, he wasn’t fully convinced of the Detroit, Michigan emcee’s potential.
Additionally, Eminem stated that he didn’t expect Rosenberg to “be the coolest manager ever,” but was excited about his soon-to-be manager’s connections in New York.
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“I wasn’t like ‘Oh my God, this guy is gonna be the coolest manager ever. Oh my God,’” Eminem said. “At that time, on some real shit, I’m sure I was just excited to have anybody even listen to me. You know what I’m saying? And take me seriously. Especially Paul being based in New York or whatever. Even the excitement of that. ‘Oh my God, he’s got connections in New York. He could—.’ Anything was a lead. Anything was a ray of hope. Back then it was like everybody’s just trying to make connections and Paul was a really good one.”
Another relationship that was discussed in the video was the one between Eminem and longtime collaborator, Dr. Dre. In the documentary, Dre stated that he first heard Eminem’s music while at Jimmy Iovine’s house and “thought it was incredible.”
The famed producer then recalled working on “My Name Is,” the first song the two worked together on.
“Well, I first heard Eminem’s music at Jimmy Iovine’s house,” Dr. Dre said. “He just happened to have gotten Eminem’s tape maybe a couple of days before. He actually got it from an intern that used to work at Interscope. He popped it in and then I heard it. And I thought it was incredible. At this time, I had no idea he was a white guy. I didn’t find that out until a few days later. And I was just like ‘What the fuck is this? I really need to meet this guy.’ The first thing that we did was ‘My Name Is.’ I had already prepared a sample that I thought he would sound great on. Immediately after I put it on he just went ‘Hi, my name is’…When I heard he was gonna start his own label, I thought it was an amazing idea. I was excited to see what they were going to be able to do with it.”
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The full “Not Afraid: The Shady Records Story” documentary can be found below.
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