Trivia

• “When I’m Gone” was released as the album’s lead single on the same day as the album itself. The song peaked at No. 8 on the Billboard Hot 100 and reached No. 1 in both the UK and Australia.
• The song, and its album, came at a time of uncertainty. Following the release of Encore, rumours began to spread that the album would be Eminem’s final bow. Eminem addressed the rumours in July 2005, telling MTV, “I never said Encore was my last album... I’m taking a break from my music to go in the studio and produce my other artists.”
  The following month, Eminem suddenly cancelled the European leg of his Anger Management tour due to “exhaustion”, before his publicist later revealed he was being treated in hospital for drug dependency. Then, with the announcement of Curtain Call: The Hits, rumours of his retirement began to circulate again. Eminem later told MTV in December, “I’m at a point in my life right now where I feel like I don’t know where my career is going. This is the reason that we called it Curtain Call, because this could be the final thing. We don’t know.”
  Ultimately, Eminem did take a break from releasing studio albums until 2009, though he still released several new songs on the compilation album Eminem Presents: The Re-Up. During the hiatus, he also produced more than thirty songs and appeared on numerous guest features.

Words from Eminem

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I got the question with “When I’m Gone” of, “Did we already visit this with ‘Mockingbird’?” I felt like, well, I talked about Kim and Hailie throughout my entire career, but this is my song to the public saying, “This is the guilt that I felt.” My life was being pulled and I was being tugged in 18 million different ways. I felt like I was neglecting, especially Hailie, at that time, because of everything else.

Going through a divorce, criminal cases, and, you know, “Daddy don’t leave.” It was a tough situation. So that was the song where I explain to people why I’m going away for a while. And that was the message I was trying to convey to Jimmy [Jimmy Iovine], who objected to the song coming out.

It was like, “Yeah, we’ve been down this road before, but it’s never been told like this.”