Thank God he did –
Jan. 5, 2021 – “Like the rhyme schemes didn’t even sound like familiar to me,” Eminem said. “So I was caught off-guard too. I was like, ‘What the fuck, I said that?’ I said it and I was wrong for saying that [line about Rihanna]. It was fucking stupid. “You know, a lot of times, especially with the ‘Relapse’ record, when I first started learning how to rap again, because of the drug situation that I went through and having to relearn a lot of things, that was one of those things that it was like: ‘Well, if it rhyme, say it.’”
Eminem initially wrote the offending verse for his 2009 album ‘Relapse’ but the song it featured in was scrapped, although it eventually leaked online in November 2019.