Search and Destroy: Mariah Carey

Message Bookmarked

Bookmark Removed

Not all messages are displayed: show all messages (222 of them)

"Search: "Vision Of Love". Call me out of it, but this really is her best single. Best song, best use of her voice, best emotional impact... I get chills just thinking about it."

Dan Perry OTM in 2001.

― scott seward (scott seward), Wednesday, 20 April 2005 10:40 (twenty-one years ago)

SEARCH: the Def Club remix of "Dreamlover"

― Mr. Snrub (Mr. Snrub), Wednesday, 20 April 2005 11:01 (twenty-one years ago)

"stay the night" off of mimi is her greatest song yet. it's a really sad album though -- mariah isn't allowed to be mariah anymore.

― Jams Murphy (ystrickler), Wednesday, 20 April 2005 13:06 (twenty-one years ago)

The video for "Without You" is an utter atrocity - AN UTTER ATROCITY!!! It's the way that she stomps her feet, waves her hands, her face contorted in agony (as if she was having her liver removed without the benefits of anaesthetic) in order to show us just how emotional she feels when she sings. What's almost as bad is the audience response - who holler and applaud and delight in every single vocal inflection (or whatever it is that she does.) Whenever it's on tv i can't help but watch it - even though it's the most toe-curlingly, cringe-inducing thing i've ever seen.

search: Mariah Carey
when you find her: DESTROY! DESTROY! EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE!

― Neil FC (Neil FC), Wednesday, 20 April 2005 13:14 (twenty-one years ago)

Oh please. She's great. I don't care for the ballads, too mushy mushy, but the rest is ace, including her out of control personality. You gotta a love a woman who apparently "doesn't do stairs" (-> whatever THAT means) and demands puppies so as to appear nicer.

― nathalie doing a soft foot shuffle (stevie nixed), Wednesday, 20 April 2005 13:21 (twenty-one years ago)

Several years on, I upgrade "Vision Of Love" to mega-classic status, and remember that "Love Takes Time" wasn't half bad either. I felt sorry for her, she had dead eyes all through her mega-stardom-years...

― edward o (edwardo), Wednesday, 20 April 2005 13:22 (twenty-one years ago)

R&B in general needs to get over this "ballad" thing - bless DC (NOT BEYONCE) & their producers for finding a way to do slow-burnin' songs that don't get stuck in the mud.

&, yeah, to piggyback SS's endorsement of Pope Dang, "Vision of Love" makes her first album.

― David R. (popshots75`), Wednesday, 20 April 2005 13:25 (twenty-one years ago)

David, you mention in your PFM review of "It's Like This" that the song uses the tired "Bacardi/party" rhyme, which has been "kicking around for about five years now" (actually, try fifteen!!) and then you ask "Where's the Asti Spumanti love?"

May I direct you to "Knockin' Boots" by Candyman, in which he decides to "break off a bottle of Asti Spumanti, pop off the top, and rock with my posse."

― jaymc (jaymc), Thursday, 21 April 2005 14:10 (twenty-one years ago)

There's a pretty funny piece on Mariah in the Guardian, where she talks about the puppy thing and comes across as pretty likeable.

― Baaderonixxxorzh (Fabfunk), Thursday, 21 April 2005 14:18 (twenty-one years ago)

NICE! Thanks, jaymc!

Yeah, I pulled that "five year" thing out of the buttocks - I'd love to know when it ("Bacardi / party") first popped up, tho.

― David R. (popshots75`), Thursday, 21 April 2005 14:21 (twenty-one years ago)

Search: Glitter soundtrack, minus perhaps a couple of the ballads.

Destroy: "Hero," "The Beautiful Ones" cover w/ Sisqo

― Eric von H. (Eric H.), Thursday, 21 April 2005 14:28 (twenty-one years ago)

R&B's needed to get over ballads for like 30 years. Search "Glitter" the movie, oh man

― Schwip Schwap (schwip schwap), Thursday, 21 April 2005 14:30 (twenty-one years ago)

why does r&b need to get over ballads?

― Jams Murphy (ystrickler), Thursday, 21 April 2005 14:34 (twenty-one years ago)

Cos they're boring and noone remembers them and they bring out the worst in the genre whereas fast songs bring out the best (as a rule). That 30 years thing was a stretch, tho.

― Schwip Schwap (schwip schwap), Thursday, 21 April 2005 14:36 (twenty-one years ago)

Search: Great R&B ballads of the last (let's say) 20 years.

― Eric von H. (Eric H.), Thursday, 21 April 2005 14:38 (twenty-one years ago)

That's a long list.

― Lethal Dizzle (djdee2005), Thursday, 21 April 2005 14:38 (twenty-one years ago)

I draw a blank after Next's "Butta Love."

― Eric von H. (Eric H.), Thursday, 21 April 2005 14:39 (twenty-one years ago)

Well, actually that's not true at all, now that I think about it.

― Eric von H. (Eric H.), Thursday, 21 April 2005 14:39 (twenty-one years ago)

Since 1985? None?

― Schwip Schwap (schwip schwap), Thursday, 21 April 2005 14:40 (twenty-one years ago)

I'm sure there're a lot, but none come to mind which isn't promising

― Schwip Schwap (schwip schwap), Thursday, 21 April 2005 14:41 (twenty-one years ago)

Just to clarify what I really meant - there's a type of weepy bathetic overinstrumentalized (sic?) (or, worse, overSYNTHstrumentalized) ballad that comes off as a limp & pale copy of the aforementioned great ballads from the last 20 years that I wish wasn't as prevalent (& probably isn't as prevalent as I think).

Most of these ballads I'm bitching about, now that I think about it, are more from R&B-influenced folks (cf. teenypop) than from actual R&B artists (though I'm not sure such a distinction means a damn thing).

Conclusion: I'm full of it; carry on.

― David R. (popshots75`), Thursday, 21 April 2005 14:43 (twenty-one years ago)

No yr not, I took you to mean that and the genre so needs to get rid of that shit. What "actual RnB artists" are there working/charting today, tho? Any? Isley Bros? Wondering what yr definitions are.

― Schwip Schwap (schwip schwap), Thursday, 21 April 2005 14:45 (twenty-one years ago)

argh, there's a song from the early 90s that used the "bacardi/party" rhyme, but i can't remember it. fuck.

― jaymc (jaymc), Thursday, 21 April 2005 14:58 (twenty-one years ago)

I'm wondering that myself - I'd consider Mario's "Let Me Love You" R&B, & as an example of a modern ballad I like. (Kanye's "Slow Jamz", too!) Ginuwine & Musiq, on the other hand, annoy the hell out of me, as does Beyonce's record version of "Dangerously In Love" (tho I liked the version she did on SNL). "DIL" is what I was thinking of when I said "yay DC, boo B" up there - there's a great atypical ballad on the last DC record; maybe it's the last track, I can't recall.

Sorta on-topic (& I swear I've brought this up before): there's a bit during The Kings of Comedy where Steve Harvey goes off on how no one does love songs anymore, & it's all blustery dick-swinging bullshit (my words, not his). & then they put on some Teddy Pendergrass, & most of the people in the crowd stand up, & SH is yelling at people that haven't moved - "STAND THE F*CK UP!" (again, my words) - & he's kicking over the small endtable on stage & the mic stand & he's FEELING IT, lipsynching and swaying, and Spike Lee cuts to women in the audience, clutching their hands to their chest and singing & swaying along. &, yeah, he might have a point, but then love's changed a bit, too, Steve, so the woo you pitch isn't going to be the woo your son or daughter pitches (though it's coming from the same place).

Is "ballad" (musically speaking) a matter of tempo & sound or of subject matter?

― David R. (popshots75`), Thursday, 21 April 2005 15:05 (twenty-one years ago)

Schwip you clearly don't even LIKE R&B!! For great R&B ballads, how about every Mary J. song ever? LOTS of Mariah, "Dangerously in Love" by Beyonce, "One in a Million" by Aaliyah, etc. You are completely nuts.

― Jams Murphy (ystrickler), Thursday, 21 April 2005 15:06 (twenty-one years ago)

oh fuck me I forgot Mary J & Aaliyah.

― David R. (popshots75`), Thursday, 21 April 2005 15:08 (twenty-one years ago)

Oh good that should save me some money! David, just tempo.

― Schwip Schwap (schwip schwap), Thursday, 21 April 2005 15:09 (twenty-one years ago)

Also OMG ROBERT FUCKING KELLY! That's it - I need more sugar.

― David R. (popshots75`), Thursday, 21 April 2005 15:13 (twenty-one years ago)

boo-hoo-tee

― David R. (popshots75`), Thursday, 21 April 2005 15:13 (twenty-one years ago)

"I Believe I Can Fly" was bad enough on its own to put me off a good 10-15 ballads at 16 or whatever I was, I wouldn't bring him up ("Ignition"! Good! NOT A BALLAD! GOOD!)

― Schwip Schwap (schwip schwap), Thursday, 21 April 2005 15:14 (twenty-one years ago)

in so many ways r&b itself is balladry! ballads are the songs that pull everyone together -- the great unifiers in love, life, pain, etc. sure, the no-tempo ballad is like musical water (see: a majority of toni braxton's singles)(but not all of them!), but they can also be great SONGS just like in any other genre. the aversion to ballads among (GENERALIZATION ALERT!) white R&B/hip-hop listeners comes from being beholden to only the beat, and not considering the lyrics, tone, subject matter that those productions deliver. the bangers are where you lose yourself in a crowd, but the ballads are where you lose yourself in yourself...

― Jams Murphy (ystrickler), Thursday, 21 April 2005 15:17 (twenty-one years ago)

oh and i think the mary j. remix of "hate it or love it" might be the greatest R&B ballad ever, as i blathered about on the blog today

― Jams Murphy (ystrickler), Thursday, 21 April 2005 15:19 (twenty-one years ago)

Ok yeah the thing is (see above. Do YOU like "I Believe" etc?) is that SO SO SO SO SO many of the charting rnb ballads're so fucking awful I/WE (THE WHITE LISTENERS) end up w/an unrelenting hate of the whole idea. A good ballad is, to me, prob a bit better than a good FAST number, but when a section of the ballad genre's so cluttered w/shit how can I hear the good stuff? There're LOADS of old rnb ballads I adore. The thing is I don't even notice them AS ballads, they're just songs, just a bit slower than normal. This whole modernish long boring notune warbling thing, all INSPIRATIONAL, fuck it. xpost I'll get someone to dload that for me (if I remember. Is it THAT good it''l give me the faith to listen out for good ballads once more?)

― Schwip Schwap (schwip schwap), Thursday, 21 April 2005 15:21 (twenty-one years ago)

download each of the individual songs that i have mentioned and your faith will be restored

― Jams Murphy (ystrickler), Thursday, 21 April 2005 15:24 (twenty-one years ago)

Although that's kinda like dismissing all rock ballads because that "Everything I do" song is such a "modernish long boring notune warbling thing"

― Baaderonixxxorzh (Fabfunk), Thursday, 21 April 2005 15:25 (twenty-one years ago)

Yes, it is. See above. Luckily rock's/was an album genre!

― Schwip Schwap (schwip schwap), Thursday, 21 April 2005 15:27 (twenty-one years ago)

"Luckily rock's/was an album genre!"

Um, OK?

― David R. (popshots75`), Thursday, 21 April 2005 15:45 (twenty-one years ago)

It's lucky if you wanna get acclimatised to rock ballads after being inundated w/that Bryan Adams song

― Schwip Schwap (schwip schwap), Thursday, 21 April 2005 15:54 (twenty-one years ago)

xpost-

yeah the mary j version of "hate it or love it" came on the dancefloor at this hip hop club in Seattle while I was there with my newfound EMP pals and it was lush and pretty damn heart-tuggin' -- a great song . . .

― Drew Daniel (Drew Daniel), Thursday, 21 April 2005 16:02 (twenty-one years ago)

This whole modernish long boring notune warbling thing, all INSPIRATIONAL, fuck it.

I really wish that people would actually have some clue as to what they were talking about before uccumbing to the impluse to say stupid, ignorant bullshit.

― The Ghost of Dan Perry (Dan Perry), Thursday, 21 April 2005 16:22 (twenty-one years ago)

trudat!

― j blount (papa la bas), Thursday, 21 April 2005 16:25 (twenty-one years ago)

btw david, "it's like that" isn't the first single from mimi. the first single was "we belong together," which is a GREAT ballad.

― Jams Murphy (ystrickler), Thursday, 21 April 2005 16:26 (twenty-one years ago)

"we belong together" is the first thing she's done that really sounds like a mariah song to me in a long time. she actually sings (instead of breathes) on it.

― j blount (papa la bas), Thursday, 21 April 2005 16:27 (twenty-one years ago)

"we belong together" is wonderful. really, blount, track down mimi. it's fantastic.

also, going along with what i wrote on the blog about mimi, "it's like that" isn't even a mariah song -- it's such a mary j track! (the weirdest thing on the disc is jermaine dupri's nelly impersonation on "got your number").

― Jams Murphy (ystrickler), Thursday, 21 April 2005 16:28 (twenty-one years ago)

Thanks for assuming I don't have years of experience of this stuff Dan, really, ta v much

― Schwip Schwap (schwip schwap), Thursday, 21 April 2005 16:30 (twenty-one years ago)

Sorry for not being as into vocal technique as you, what a dope I must be

― Schwip Schwap (schwip schwap), Thursday, 21 April 2005 16:31 (twenty-one years ago)

Etc etc

― Schwip Schwap (schwip schwap), Thursday, 21 April 2005 16:33 (twenty-one years ago)

Interesting digression.

the aversion to ballads among (GENERALIZATION ALERT!) white R&B/hip-hop listeners comes from being beholden to only the beat, and not considering the lyrics, tone, subject matter that those productions deliver. the bangers are where you lose yourself in a crowd, but the ballads are where you lose yourself in yourself...

I think this is a good explanation, Jams, but I also think it smacks of injunctions as to how to listen 'correctly' (your generalization point is noted, though!). I'll freely admit to preferring the beat straight up, but I would prefer this most of the time in just about ANYTHING, r'n'b or not. Reflective musical introspection from where I sit more often than not relies on music providing/enabling that mood rather than lyrics, tone etc. Not universally, sure, but consistently and much more often than not for me at least.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Thursday, 21 April 2005 16:34 (twenty-one years ago)

Someone who has had "years of experience" with this type of stuff wouldn't say something as asinine and incorrect as "This whole modernish long boring notune warbling thing, all INSPIRATIONAL" as if groups/artists like Otis Redding, Earth, Wind and Fire, Parliament, Stevie Wonder, Aretha Franklin, Curtis Mayfield, Marvin Gaye, Minnie Ripperton, Donna Summer, Billie Holliday, etc etc etc didn't exist.

― The Ghost of Dan Perry (Dan Perry), Thursday, 21 April 2005 16:36 (twenty-one years ago)

Read the thread

― Schwip Schwap (schwip schwap), Thursday, 21 April 2005 16:37 (twenty-one years ago)

Skipping 122 messages at this point... Click here if you want to load them all.

Nice work, jaymc!

― 📺👁️ (peace, man), Wednesday, 30 September 2020 19:51 (five years ago)

I didn't find it! Annie Zaleski posted it on Twitter.

― jaymc, Wednesday, 30 September 2020 20:11 (five years ago)

Those cultural refs are perfectly aligned with what bands like Bunnygrunt were singing about that same year ('70s kitsch, cheesy TV, etc.)

― I Hate the Aedes (morrisp), Wednesday, 30 September 2020 20:13 (five years ago)

seven months pass...

Pitchfork talked to a few people about the recording/release of the Chick album: https://pitchfork.com/thepitch/the-story-behind-mariah-careys-secret-90s-alt-rock-album/

― like a d4mn sociopath! (morrisp), Sunday, 23 May 2021 04:04 (five years ago)

three years pass...

i'm pretty spotty with mariah so i had not heard "touch my body" from e=mc2. what an absolute delight that song is!

― spoonman (steve aoki remix) (map), Sunday, 16 February 2025 02:15 (one year ago)

seven months pass...

The new album's good. A fully inhabited cover of Paul McCartney & Wings' "My Love," solid co-writes with Anderson Paak, and she drops the big words with her usual insouciance (this time: "rigamarole," "narcissistic," "endeavor").

My jam:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RRJ35Xf-VU0

― The Luda of Suburbia (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Sunday, 28 September 2025 19:04 (eight months ago)

Yeah the lyrics to “Dangerous Type” are excellent:

I came in the door, dripped in Balenci’
Cropped leather coat and some nine inch Fendis
The crowd opened up and I started to strut
I need my space, but I’m signing autographs and such
Hit the little girls’ room to powder my nose
Then came in three hatin’ ass hoes
They don’t know the meaning of water nor soap
I don’t have time for the rigamarole
Taking off my coat, clearing my throat
Certified diamonds like the songs I wrote
Look at my wrist, check out the light show
Can you handle this? I don’t know
You can meet me up at the pent’
Knock ‘em out the box with a chocolate kiss
Hope I ain’t sayin’ too much
I like ‘em dangerous

Autographs and such!

― Tim F, Monday, 29 September 2025 03:35 (eight months ago)

You must be logged in to post. Please either login here, or if you are not registered, you may register here.