Eminem’s ‘The Real Slim Shady’ Surpasses 1 Billion Views on YouTube

More than a billion people have now begged the question: Will the real Slim Shady please stand up? Eminem‘s iconic “The Real Slim Shady” music video has joined YouTube’s Billion Views Club, a full 14 years after it was uploaded to the site and nearly a quarter-decade after the 2000 smash first dropped.

As the Detroit rapper’s visuals often do, “Real Slim Shady” takes viewers on a wild journey. Beginning with Em in a hospital gown in a mental health facility with comedian Kathy Griffin as one of the nurses, the video proceeds to show him terrorizing pedestrians in a red-and-yellow superhero suit, rapping in the center of a group of bleach-blond doppelgängers and serving up onion rings at a fast-food restaurant.

The Philip G. Atwell and Dr. Dre-directed project also features visual representations of some of the song’s biggest call-outs. When Em name-checks Britney Spears, for example, the video cuts to the “Lose Yourself” artist dressed up as the pop star in “…Baby One More Time” drag. And when the 15-time Grammy winner spits, “Dr. Dre’s dead, he’s locked in my basement,” viewers watch as Em drinks from a milk carton with a “Missing” poster for the Death Row Records founder on the side.

Released in 2000 as part of The Marshall Mathers LP, “The Real Slim Shady” reached No. 4 on the Billboard Hot 100. The track isn’t the first to earn Em a billion plays on YouTube, as his videos for “Without Me,” “Mockingbird,” “Rap God” and “Lose Yourself” also all boast 10-digit view counts on the platform.

Nearly 25 years after the release of “The Real Slim Shady,” Eminem revisited his Y2K greatness on July’s Billboard 200-topper The Death of Slim Shady. Lead single “Houdini” also found the hip-hop titan channeling his mid-20s self in a nostalgia-filled music video, for which Em used AI to resurrect his younger self.

Watch Eminem’s “The Real Slim Shady” music video above.