Mariah unleashes Glitter
After closing out the 90's as the undisputed biggest-selling female recording artist of the decade - in excess of 150 million albums and singles have been sold worldwide - singer/ songwriter/ producer Mariah Carey unleashes Glitter, her eagerly awaited Virgin Records debut and first musical offering of the new millennium. Released in conjunction with her 80's-reminiscent motion picture debut of the same name, Glitter features 12 newly recorded tracks that run the musical gamut, from Mariah's highly stylized dramatic pop ballads to straight-up urban-oriented party tunes. Mariah enthuses, "I came up with the original idea for Glitter because I grew up when there were movies like Fame, Flashdance, Grease and Purple Rain. These films incorporated music in a way that hadn't been done in a while so I got the idea and started to write songs immediately."
Co-executive produced by Carey, veteran super-producers Jimmy Jam & Terry Lewis, DJ Clark Kent, DJ Clue (co-producer of her #1 hit, "Heartbreaker"), Damizza (producer of "Crybaby" from her Rainbow LP) and others, "Glitter" takes a musical ride through the mind of Carey's troubled character, "Billie". "Because my love interest in the film is a DJ," Mariah explains, "and because this movie is set in the club world of 1982, I wanted to go the authentic route in working with DJ's. Clark [Kent] was a really young kid who DJ'd in those days. And Clue, he was just natural. Damizza is just an all-around, amazingly talented guy who helped me enormously with this project."
The effervescent, radio-ready pop-funk of "Loverboy", co-produced with Clark Kent, serves as the perfect kick-off single. Riding a loop of Cameo's 1987 hit, "Candy", Mariah enlisted Cameo's own Larry Blackmon and Thomas Jenkins to join her in the 2001 smash remake. "I had the original members sing with me in the studio, which was an incredible moment." The single's rap remix features the interplay of Da Brat (who co-stars in "Glitter") and Ludacris, in tandem with newcomers Twenty II and Shawnna. Continuing to wax nostalgic, Glitter features Mariah's true-to-the-original renditions of 80's songstress Cherelle's "I Didn't Mean To Turn You On" (later covered by Robert Palmer) and "Last Night A DJ Saved My Life", a New York area smash during the 80's. "I was obsessed with I Didn't Mean To Turn You On," Carey remembers. "Jimmy (Jam) and Terry (Lewis) gave me that original track, and singing on top of it gave me chills. Last Night A DJ Saved My Life fit perfectly because Billie falls in love with the main character who is a DJ, and most DJ's love that record anyway. I did Last Night... with DJ Clue, Busta Rhymes and Clue's new artist, Fabolous, who did a great job. I also worked with Rick James, and when I told him I wanted to do something in the vein of All Night Long, he gave me this great track which sounds like it's from 1982."
Glitter also features some of Mariah's most stirring and emotive ballads, taken from the perspective of her sometimes-troubled character. Through the voice of "Billie", Mariah conveys thoughts going through her character's mind, which center on the hurt associated with being abandoned as a child. Mariah explains, "I wrote songs in order to carry different scenes in a certain way. The songs about a mother/ daughter relationship are about Billie and her relationship with her mother; the same thing applies to the songs I wrote for Billie and Dice, (the male lead), and what's going on in their lives. It was a different experience for me, musically, catering songs to specific situations. I think people who were fans of Vision Of Love and similar type songs are going to really like these ballads." There is a newfound depth in the remarkably moving pop-soul selections like "Reflections", "Lead the Way" (the movie's love theme) and "Never Too Far".
Mariah Carey is no stranger to winning musicality. Raised in New York by her mother, a former opera singer and vocal coach, Mariah started singing at age four, and writing songs by junior high. Not long after she graduated from high school, Mariah's singing back up for Brenda K. Starr ultimately led to her signing with Columbia Records. As millions listened and watched, she christened her recording career with 1990's self-titled Mariah Carey CD, which ultimately produced four Number One singles ("Vision Of Love", "Love Takes Time", "Someday" and "I Don't Wanna Cry"), eventually selling more than 12 million LP's worldwide. By the time the decade came to a close, each of Mariah's nine multi-platinum releases had gone Top Five (four have gone Number One), producing an unrivaled string of fifteen #1 hits. Aside from her chart-topping cover of the Jackson 5"s "I'll Be there". Mariah co-wrote all her #1 smashes. As well as being the only artist to have had a #1 record in each year of the 90's, and have more singles debut at #1 (three) than any artist, Mariah has more #1 singles than any female artist ever. Mariah also has had more #1 singles than any contemporary recording artist today - only the Beatles (20) and Elvis Presley (18) have more. In addition to the magnitude of winning multiple Grammy, Soul Train and American Music Awards, she was the first female to witness two albums reach the diamond-certified, 10 million sales mark. With this tremendous amount of success garnered in her relatively young career, Mariah Carey was named "Artist of the Decade" by the Billboard Music Awards, and the "Best Selling Female Artist of the Millennium" by the World Music Awards.
With Glitter, her newly formed association with Virgin Records, and a budding movie career - she recently wrapped the independently produced "Wise Girls", in which she co-stars opposite Academy Award winning actress Mira Sorvino - Mariah's star continues to burn bright. (MariahCarey.com)
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