Trivia

• In the song’s liner notes, Justin Trugman is credited as the song’s original producer. His produced version can be heard on a leaked demo of the album, unofficially dubbed Unmastered Sequence.

Words from Eminem

“

The first verse of “As the World Turns” was inspired by a girl Eminem used to clash with in gym class. “We used to have swimming every Wednesday,” he recalled. “There was this big, fat, butch-type chick. Like a female bully that used to fuck with me.” The verse stemmed from those experiences, including lines about taking a girl to the highest diving board and throwing her over.

The second verse was inspired by artwork created by Skam that appeared inside The Slim Shady LP. Eminem said he wanted to capture a trailer-park, white-trash atmosphere and build a humorous story around it.

Like “Brain Damage,” the song was assembled from verses written at different stages of his career. The first verse was written before he secured a record deal, while the second came afterward. Initially intending to discard the first verse or use it for college radio freestyles, Eminem ultimately combined the two after coming up with the hook. “I’m gonna put these two verses together,” he recalled. “So then we just went and did the beat.”