let the muSSSic play

On this melancholy song Eminem raps about his struggles with drug addiction. In August 2005 Eminem entered drug rehabilitation in order to treat a dependency on sleep medication. He subsequently took a break during which he battled his addiction whilst industry insiders speculated that Shady had ended his rapping career. Eminem is now sober and he told Vibe magazine that this song is the only one he kept from the recordings he made during that dark period in his life. He explained: "One of the only reasons that I put that track on there is that I feel like it's the best song out of that batch that I did when I wasn't sober. At the time I felt like, 'This is it for me.' I wrote the first verse and a half in rehab, and when I came out, I finished it. It was the only song that marks that period without bringing me back to that place. Every other track not only didn't fit with the album, but when I listened to it, it would bring up bad memories."

This is the only track on Relapse that Eminem produced himself.

This samples Paul Rodgers and Queen's version of Rock Therapy's 1996 charity single "Reaching Out."

Eminem expanded to the Observer Music Monthly May 2009, on why this is the only song that he retained from the dark period in his life when he wasn't sober. He explained: "It's the only one I could actually listen to and feel OK about. It brings me back to a time when I was really depressed and down, but at the same time it reminds me of what that space is like and what never to go back to. There is a lot of honesty in that song that I wouldn't want to just throw away. I started writing the first verse and half of the second when I was in rehab going through detox. I didn't have a beat in my head or anything like that… I wrote the verse and just knew I wanted it to be a bounce-style, I guess. I got that first bit out and finished it when I got out of rehab, when I relapsed right back into taking pills. If you listen to that song and how it starts off, I'm just so f--king depressed."

Eminem told The Observer Music Monthly that he when he wrote this song he was "sitting on the end of the bed in detox, not fully committed to it and not fully detoxed. They give you medicine to make your detox not as rough." He added: "I wrote it during that period – the first two days. I was sitting there not knowing where I wanted to be in my career. I didn't even know if I wanted a career any more, because this s--t was too much. It just wasn't worth it."

This was the 5th song of that title to chart in the Hot 100. The four previous "Beautiful" songs were by Gordon Lightfoot (#58, 1972), Christina Aguilera (#2, 2003), Snoop Dogg featuring Pharrell & Uncle Charlie Wilson (# 6, 2003) and Akon featuring Colby O'Donis & Kardinal Offishall (#19, 2009).

Paul Rogers told Spinner he was not a great fan of the way Eminem sampled his song. Said the frontman: "It was interesting, the Eminem thing because it wasn't quite what I had planned. When we were touring, they tossed around a version of that song and how they planned to sample it. And it was very different to the final result. I wasn't actually crazy about the final result, in all honesty. I never use foul language onstage or on records. It's just not my thing. I do like Eminem, and I think he has a very credible point and lots to say, but he does it in a different way than I would ever do."