Mariah Carey works out her emotions through song
Fame and fortune doesn't always erase a star's private pain. Mariah Carey's life seems to be littered with various life-defining moments, including growing up biracial in a town that didn't understand, dealing with a sister's struggles with addiction, being trapped in an unhealthy marriage, and coping with her father's death.
Despite the carefree, childlike aura she so desperately wants to emulate now (how else can you explain her past album name choices such as Daydream, Butterfly and Rainbow?), there are things that still attack her subconsciously and can only work their way out through song when she spins the negativity into something positive, lucrative, and spiritual.
More than a decade since Carey left that most recent private hell of "Sing Sing", she certainly still has a lot of emotions (pardon the pun) boiling inside of her, and on her twelfth studio release, E=MC2, she still remains strongest when belting them out from her gut.
E=MC2 is the perfect title for this point in Carey's career because of the very simple formula she adopts for success: one part "praise the Lord" ("I Wish You Well"), two parts autobiographical ("Side Effects", "Bye Bye"), two parts wedding/prom themes ("I Stay In Love", "Love Story", "Last Kiss"), and two parts just-for-fun club tracks ("Touch My Body", "Migrate", "O.O.C"). After eighteen years (that's a whole child of legal age!), Carey knows how to work the numbers to top the charts, get airplay, sell out huge arenas, and most importantly, stay relevant, and it is the tracks where she sings alone that are the strongest.
Jermaine Dupri's influence is well-felt by his beats; it is just superfluous (and kind of annoying) that he feels the need to offer grunts and/or intros on just about every other song. Carey does not need an introduction; everyone knows who she is, and J.D. might only weigh her down from flying (like a bird) back up to the top.
Carey should have stuck with her original album title, "I'm That Chick", taken from the very Janet Jackson-reminiscent track (in part due to the breathiness of the vocals and in part because of the "Off The Wall" sampling, and let's face it, Michael always sounded just as feminine as his sister), to drive that point home to critics, haters, and collaborators.
And Mariah gets the numbers when it comes to fans coming out to show their support, as well. While fan listening parties pop up all around the globe (and there was even a fragrance release party in Japan back in November), this past week seems to have been unofficially deemed MC week. First there was her second single dropping on Monday, a day before her full album, and then were days of back-to-back television appearances, with dozens of people lining up outside the gates of the various studios to get a picture, an autograph, or just a look. Almost one thousand of her "lambs" showed up at the Hard Rock Cafe at Universal Citywalk in Los Angeles on Thursday for the chance to see her donate some memorabilia and sign her new CD.
Two weeks ago, Mariah stamped her place in history by surpassing Elvis for the amount of number 1 singles, making her the top selling solo artist, and now she is on track to take the throne as the top selling artist in general from the Beatles. Through the years she has most certainly made her way from the outside, where she used to just look in, to the front and center of music and pop culture. Next Friday, Mariah will make history yet again when the Empire State Building lights up for the weekend in her colors. Who else could influence the city (and in turn generations) in that way? (Starpulse)
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