| Wednesday 13 September 2006 |
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It's maximum "Mimi"
In 2003, the last time Mariah Carey played Chicago, she walked the stage in a haze, her reputation still on the mend following one of the more public career meltdowns in recent memory, her mind somewhere else. A few years down the line, she's once again thriving commercially, with "The Emancipation of Mimi" the top-selling album of 2005, at six million and counting. By any measure, it's been one heck of a comeback.
As demonstrated by her efficient and mostly just-right set at the United Center on Monday night, Carey's definitely back on track. Yes, the smile permanently stretched across her face was sometimes creepy and cold rather than warm and inviting, and her stage moves occasionally seemed more about hitting her marks than connecting with the crowd. But Carey also looked comfortable and confident, a feeling no doubt bolstered by the near-capacity crowd.
Of course, divas being divas, Carey couldn't just leave it at that. The stage often felt cluttered with dancers, band members, singers, video screens and giant light-up "Mimi" marquees, while indulgent sets by her deejay and backup singer Trey Lorenz took up valuable set time while Carey changed into a series of barely-there outfits. It's Carey's voice that made her famous, not her body, and fans deserved a real performance that spotlighted that instrument. Instead, they got the predicable Vegas-style glamour-and-glitz-gone-bling show.
Maybe that was the idea. That famous voice, always a thing of virtuosity but not necessarily a thing of beauty or soul, was not always in peak form. If Carey somehow hit the freakishly high notes in "Heartbreaker", she had a rougher time with the mid-range material, often betraying a bit of a rasp. All those stage distractions served as convenient misdirection, allowing her to step briefly out of the spotlight (or away from the mic) when she needed to catch her breath or recover from a vocal blast.
The result could have been disastrous, but Carey handled the rocky octave shifts and unnecessary sojourns to a satellite stage well. If anything, the subtle cracks in her singing brought her further down to earth, lending songs such as "Vision of Love" and "Fantasy" a grittier quality than their too-eager-to-please studio counterparts.
The only time the set threatened to topple into self-indulgence came when Carey shifted the night into the obligatory 9/11 tribute, but it was a modest one. Maybe the next time out she'll shrink everything else down too. After all, what better way to make yourself look larger than life than to make everything around you disappear, until all that's left is that big, big voice. (Chicago Tribune)
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