STACK #228 October 2023

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OCTOBER MUSIC

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When singer-songwriter Bebe Rhexa came up with the hook ”I’m friends with the monster who’s under my bed” in-studio in November 2012, she reportedly mumbled out loud in the booth: ”This is an Eminem record, y’all.” And an Eminem track The Monster became, when the producer for the rapper’s The Marshall Mathers LP 2 heard Rhexa’s chorus idea; but it wasn’t Rhexa’s voice which ultimately ended up on the song. Instead, Eminem decided to mark his fourth collaboration with Barbadian singer Rihanna, explaining that the song’s message suited the outward perception both artists seem to unintentionally project: ”I think people look at us like we’re both a little nuts,” he said upon the track’s release. ”That’s one of the things that I was telling [Rihanna] in making the record: ’I think that people look at us a little crazy.’”

THIS MONTH:

Angie McMahon

Eminem and Rihanna in the clip for The Monster , 2013

Kylie Minogue

Teen Jesus and the Jean Teasers

Photo credit Erik Melvin

Looking back at the stories behind our favourite album covers, this month it’s a brand newie: Ed Sheeran’s Autumn Variations (2023).

W e’re going contemporary for our Art of the Album segment this month, as we’re so taken with the cover of Ed Sheeran’s brand new album Autumn Variations. The artwork was created by Scarlett Curtis, an English writer, activist and journaist who – according to Ed – loves to create personalised posters for friends’ birthdays, filled with little illustrations of all of the person’s favourite things. How cute is that?! ”I’ve always loved them,” Ed has said of Curtis’s birthday gifts. ”I asked her to start drawing Autumn-themed things and compiling them, so we could make a cover for [the album].” On her part, Curtis was stoked as a roaring fireplace to participate in Ed’s vision. ”About a year ago one of my favorite people on the

planet asked me to draw him an album cover,” she wrote on Instagram just after the artwork’s would ever happen, but then it did, and I have spent all day sobbing at the announcement of [ Autumn Variations ]. It’s my favourite of his albums / any album, and just being reveal in August. ”I didn’t really think it

Scarlett Curtis

a small part of this magical thing has meant more to me than anyone will ever understand.” If you’ve yet to listen to Ed’s beautiful new record, get onto that immediately – it’s out now. ZKR

OCTOBER 2023

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