Eminem is speaking candidly about why he issued an apology to Rihanna on his latest album.

While appearing on Sirius XM’s Shade 45, the 48-year-old rapper openly discussed why he apologized to his “Love the Way You Lie” collaborator, 32, on his new track “Zeus” from his recently released project, Music to Be Murdered By: Side B.

Back in 2019, a previously unreleased verse by Eminem was leaked, in which he was heard saying, “Of course I side with Chris Brown / I’d beat a bitch down too,” Entertainment Weekly reported.

This time around, Eminem acknowledges his past behavior on “Zeus,” where he rhymes about the controversial line: “Long as I re-promise to be honest / And wholeheartedly, apologies, Rihanna / For that song that leaked / I’m sorry, Ri / It wasn’t meant to cause you grief / Regardless, it was wrong of me.”

In conversation with SiriusXM host Gray Rizzy, the “Lose Yourself” crooner said of the leak, “When it first happened, I was like, first, I didn’t know how, how somebody got it. Second of all, I have no, zero recollection of even remembering doing that, that verse, like the rhyme schemes, didn’t even sound like familiar to me.”

“So I was caught off guard too,” he added. “I was like, ‘what the f—, I said that?’”

Then, detailing that the leaked song was crafted during the early stages of his 2009 album Relapse, Eminem (né Marshall Bruce Mathers III) noted, “It’s 10 plus years old, but I’m not making excuses for it.”

“I said it and I was wrong for saying that, it was f—ing stupid,” he shared. “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 rhymes say it.”

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“I think that being able to look back, I mean, that’s not even an excuse, but I’m just saying like that there was a phase I was going through with that Relapse record,” he continued. I don’t know. It was one of those things.”

Eminem, who has now been sober for 12 years, added: “I think I just said it cause it rhymed. And I think I’m sure looking back now, I should have thought better of it.”

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Eminem and Rihanna have been longtime collaborators through the years, even jointly landing the No. 1 spot on the Billboard rap singles chart in 2010 for their smash hit, “Love the Way You Lie.”

The dynamic duo are also one-time tour mates, after successfully completing their 2014 Monster tour.

Eminem’s sentiments were shocking to many fans, as the pair had previously teamed up on several incredibly popular music projects and were considered friends.

At the time, Eminem’s rep Dennis Dennehy said in a statement, per EW, “After Eminem recorded it, he scrapped it and rewrote it.”