LOS ANGELES — Eminem has debuted his new single "Not Afraid," a track that shows the artist making a musical change for the positive.
The track leaked early Thursday on the Web, just before the 37-year-old rapper was scheduled to debut it on the Shade 45 Sirius Satellite radio show, "The Morning After With Angela Yee."
"Not Afraid" is the first song from Eminem's highly anticipated new album Recovery, which drops on June 22. The track shows a different side of the rapper, whose often fiery lyrics have ruffled more than a few feathers during the course of his career.
"I'm not afraid to take a stand / everybody, come take my hand / we'll walk this road together, through the storm / whatever weather... you're not alone / holler if you feel that you been down the same road," Eminem sings on the hook.
More positive lyrics follow in the bridge as Em sings, "I just can't keep living this way, so starting today I'm breaking out of this cage / I'm standing up, Imma face my demons / I'm manning up, Imma hold my ground / I've had enough, now I'm so fed up / time to put my life together right now."
"I'm raising the bar, Imma shoot for the moon / But I'm too busy gazing at stars, I feel amazing and I'm not afraid," he raps at the song's conclusion.
Recovery, the rapper's seventh major studio album, features several first-time collaborators, including DJ Khalil, Just Blaze, Jim Jonsin and Boi-1da, among others. It is a follow up to his 2009 release, Relapse.
"I had originally planned for Relapse 2 to come out last year," Eminem said last month. "But as I kept recording and working with new producers, the idea of a sequel to Relapse started to make less and less sense to me, and I wanted to make a completely new album. The music on Recovery came out very different from Relapse, and I think it deserves its own title."
Listen to Eminem's "Not Afraid" below (warning parental advisory - explicit lyrics):
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