Entertainment Weekly reports that the rapper is currently at work in the studio, putting together his first new CD in four years. T

here's no release date as of yet, but BISHOP LAMONT, a friend of Em's, tells Entertainment Weekly that he's heard, quote, "some amazing stuff" from Em's recent recording sessions.

Noting that Eminem was shaken by the 2006 shooting death of his friend PROOF, Lamont says, "He went through what he had to go through, and now he's been able to take all the pain and stress and put it out in his music."