Paul Rosenberg, co-founder of Shady Records and longtime manager of Eminem, has been a constant presence in the legendary rapper's career. He's even made it onto a fair number of Slim's albums, often acting as the voice of reason -- albeit to futile ends. Suffice it to say, Paul knows what's what when it comes to Shady business, and when news of a mysterious Shady XX project surfaced, it didn't take long for questions to follow.
For those catching up, artist Mike Saputo recently shared several scrapped logo concepts centering around Shady XX. Given that he designed the logo for Eminem's 2014 label compilation project Shady XV, it prompted speculation that the label intended on following-up with a thorough look at the new roster. After all, the Shady Records lineup has changed drastically, with Slaughterhouse, Yelawolf, and D12 no longer active. Now, Eminem's label features Boogie, Westside Gunn, and Conway.
"So sometime last year, we started working on some things to celebrate Shady’s 20th," confirms Saputo, on his Instagram. "I worked up a ton of logos and other assets for it. Ended up the project never made it to the light of day unfortunately." Upon reporting the development with speculation of an intended purpose, Westside Gunn and Boogie seemed rather blindsided by the existence of anything Shady XX related. Their surprise only served as fuel on a quietly-spreading fire, prompting Paul Rosenberg himself to bust through with extinguisher in hand.
Clearing the air about the intended origin of the Shady XX logo batch, Rosenberg claimed that none of the news surrounding the project was accurate. "The art was created for a vinyl box set that was scrapped due to production time," writes Rosenberg, quashing hopes that Shady's stellar new lineup would get a similar showcase to its 2014 predecessor. Unfortunately, the initial report seemed to further propel a narrative that -- while speculative -- was interpreted as accurate. Still, it's good to see Rosenberg stepping forward to clarify the situation, especially given Gunn's previous misgivings.
Though it doesn't seem that we'll be getting a Shady XX compilation, we can only hope to see more new music from the label as a united front -- if only to hear how Boogie, Westside Gunn, Eminem, and Conway sound on wax.