Eminem’s new single “Houdini” has indeed made a remarkable debut. It was released on May 31, 2024, and it has earned 7.85 million streams on its first day of release on Spotify. This makes “Houdini” the biggest streaming debut of Eminem’s career, surpassing his 2020 song “Godzilla,” which accumulated 5.77 million streams globally on its first day.
“Houdini” is the first single off of Eminem’s forthcoming new album titled “The Death Of Slim Shady (Coup De Grâce)”. The song is produced by Eminem himself and the track is named after Harry Houdini, a popular magician known for his death-defying stunts. The song interpolates the 1982 song “Abracadabra” by Steve Miller Band as well as sampling his own 2002 song “Without Me”. The lyrics of “Houdini” reflect on how different the world is now compared to how it was when Eminem started rapping.
The song also debuted at No. 4 in the United States Spotify charts with almost 3 million streams, No. 2 in the United Kingdom with 815k streams, and No. 2 in Canada with 600k streams. It also hit No. 6 in Germany with 503k plays.
“Houdini” also had a huge success on iTunes. It reached No.1 in Worldwide iTunes Chart and No.1 in 17 Countries. It was also the most watched music video in the last 24 hours on YouTube with 13.5 million views.
The music video for “Houdini” imagines Eminem’s antagonist character Slim Shady emerging in the present day via a “portal”. The video was directed by long-running collaborator Rich Lee and freely calls back to classic Eminem videos such as Joseph Khan’s “Without Me” and Phillip Atwell’s “Real Slim Shady”. The video features cameos from Dr. Dre, Pete Davidson, Snoop Dogg, 50 Cent, Jimmy Iovine, Grip, Westside Boogie, Denaun Porter, Royce 5’ 9”, Paul Rosenberg, The Alchemist, EZ Mil, Ryan Keely, Samantha Mack, and comedian Shane Gillis.
“Houdini” was the most-watched music video in the last 24 hours on YouTube with 13.5 million views.
