Mariah
Carey (born March 27, 1970 on Long Island, New York),
who is one of the best selling female recording artist
of all time, is an American pop music singer. She is
famed to have a 5 octave vocal range. She is also the
only female artist to have a #1 song on the US charts
in every year of the 1990s, the most Hot 100 #1's of
any female artist in history, and also lays claim to
only the second song in history ("Fantasy")
to ever debut at #1 on the Billboard Hot 100 (the first
being Michael Jackson's "You Are Not Alone"),
however her debut was more amazing as while "You
Are Not Alone" managed only a week at the top,
"Fantasy" spent 8 weeks at the top. With 61
cumulative weeks at #1, she is also the artist with
the second-most weeks spent at #1, beating the Beatles
by two weeks and falling only behind Elvis Presley (80
weeks).
Carey was named after the song "They
Call The Wind Mariah" from Paint Your Wagon.
Mariah Carey has no middle name.
Early Life and Family 1970-1990
Mariah is the third and youngest child
of Patricia Hickey, an opera singer of Irish ethnicity,
and Alfred Roy Carey, a aeronautical engineer of Venezuelan
of African decent. She has a sister named Alison and
a brother named Morgan, both of them are about ten
years older than her. The Carey family experienced
racism and this brought so much tension that by the
time Mariah was three, her parents divorced. Mariah
and Morgan stayed with their mother while Alison stayed
with their father.
Alison Carey is undoubtedly the black
sheep of the family, she was a drug addict for a long
time, was diagnosed with HIV and promised to write
a tell-all book of how she worked as a prostitute
to support Mariah's career at the beginnings. Mariah's
family denied this, and in fact it was Mariah who
took care of Alison's children when Alison lost custody.
On July 4th, 2002, Alfred Roy Carey
died from cancer.
Early Career Success 1990-1999
Her career began in with the release
of her debut album in 1990, when she was just twenty
years old. She became a commercial success almost
overnight, and the album produced four huge #1 hit
singles: "Vision Of Love," "Someday,"
"Love Takes Time," and "I Don't Want
To Cry". Carey's second album, Emotions, was
released in the fall of 1991 and its first single,
the title track, also was an American #1 hit. This
song gave Carey the record of being the only musician
or band ever to have had their first five singles
all hit the top of the Billboard Hot 100 chart in
America. Emotions had several other top five singles,
such as "If It's Over," "Can't Let
Go," and "Make It Happen".
In 1992, Carey perfomed all of her
hits on MTV Unplugged, as well as a new song, a cover
of the Jackson 5's "I'll Be There". It,
too, rose quickly to the top of America's pop charts.
Carey's next studio album, Music Box,
was released in 1993 and spawned the hits "Anytime
You Need A Friend," "Never Forget You,"
and the hugely popular number one songs "Hero"
and "Dreamlover". These songs, and Carey's
duet with Luther Vandross of Diana Ross' "Endless
Love," made Carey one of the most-played musicians
on the radio in 1993 and 1994. During the Christmas
season of 1994, Carey released the album Merry Christmas,
and had a perennial hit with her original holiday
song, "All I Want For Christmas Is You".
In 1995, Carey released Daydream.
This album and her previous studio album, Music Box,
would eventually go on to sell over 20 million copies
each worldwide, making them Carey's two best selling
albums. It's lead single, "Fantasy", got
heavy play on urban radio, thanks to a remix which
featured a rhyme by the Wu-Tang Clan's Old Dirty Bastard.
This also marked the start of a new trend for Carey's
singles. She realized that she had a higher potential
at having massive crossover hits if she employed the
use of various genre-specific remixes for each single.
Daydream's second and third singles, "One Sweet
Day," a duet with Boyz II Men, and "Always
Be My Baby," respectively, were arguably even
bigger hits than "Fantasy". "One Sweet
Day" spent 16 consecutive weeks at #1 in the
US, beating the original record of 14 held by Whitney
Houston's "I Will Always Love You" and Boys
II Men's "I'll Make Love To You". It still
holds the record for the longest consecutive stay
at #1 in the US. "Always Be My Baby" received
huge airplay from pop, adult contemporary, and adult
top 40 radio, and its urban remix which featured rhymes
by Da Brat and a more soulful sounding chorus, sung
by R&B group Xscape got huge airplay on urban,
rap, and R&B radio stations. "Forever,"
and "Open Arms" were the last singles off
of the album, did not make #1 but were still top 10
hit's in America.
Carey's 1997 album, Butterfly Carey's
second consecutive album debut at #1, saw her continuing
to move in an R&B/hip hop direction. The first
single, "Honey" was huge a number one hit
and featured a remix with rappers Puff Daddy, The
Lox, and Mase. It was also her 3rd single to debut
at #1 on the Hot 100. Its video, filmed shortly after
her divorce from Tommy Mottola, VP of Sony Records,
displayed a much more sexual and sultry Carey than
any previous video. Other singles and videos off the
album included "Butterfly;" "The Roof;"
"Breakdown," a duet with Bone Thugs-N-Harmony
featuring Carey singing in a style similar to the
way the Bone Thugs rap; and the #1 hit "My All".
In 1998, Carey released the album
#1s, a collection of all her American number one singles
up to that point. It also included the new singles
"When You Believe," a duet with Whitney
Houston which featured in the DreamWorks animated
film The Prince of Egypt; "Sweetheart,"
a hip-hoppy duet with Jermaine Dupri; "I Still
Believe," a cover of the '80s song by Brenda
K. Starr; and "Whenever You Call," a duet
with popular R&B singer Brian McKnight.
During the late summer of 1999, Carey
began promoting her upcoming album, Rainbow by releasing
a single and video for "Heartbreaker". By
this point, Carey had begun to alienate audiences
by striving to create songs that tried too hard to
appeal to all people. In the case of "Heartbreaker",
it received criticism for sounding like her previous
singles "Dreamlover" and "Fantasy",
and many people viewed the guest rap from Jay-Z as
a desperate attempt to get the single airplay on urban
radio, since Carey could no longer depend on adult
contemporary or even top 40 radio to necessarily play
her new singles as they once had. At this point in
Carey's career, adult-contemporary fans were feeling
betrayed by Carey, while urban fans felt that she
was just jumping on the rap bandwagon. With people
unsure what to make of her changing sound, style,
and image, and several types of radio stations--including
adult contemporary, pop, and urban--unsure whether
the song fit their format and their audiences, "Hearbreaker"
was not the smash that first singles from new Carey
albums had always been prior. Nevertheless, it managed
to crack the top 20 in overall radio airplay, garnering
smaller amounts of airplay from a combination of different
formats, and was Carey's fourteenth #1 on the Hot
100, thanks to a commercially available single, which
sold over 300,000 copies in its first week alone.
The single went on to achieve platinum (1,000,000
copies sold) status and was one of the last singles
to do so in America, once the Napster craze took off
in 2000 and decimated the American singles industry.
"Heartbreaker" featured
a popular music video which got heavy airplay on MTV's
TRL. With a cost of over $2.5 million, the video is
Carey's most expensive to date and one of the top
5 most expensive music videos in history. A video
was also filmed for a remix to "Heartbreaker",
which was much more hip-hop oriented than the original,
featuring a sample of Snoop Dogg's "Ain't No
Fun" and guest raps by Missy Elliott and Da Brat.
The remix video, which has cameo appearances by Brat,
Elliott, and Snoop, also became popular on TRL. Combined,
both versions of "Heartbreaker" spent 65
days on TRL and become her first and only TRL-"retired"
video.
Rainbows second single, "Thank
God I Found You" became Carey's fifteenth #1
single on the Hot 100. The song was a duet with Joe
and featured 98 Degrees singing background vocals
on the chorus. The song didn't fare as well on the
radio as Carey's earlier songs, but solid sales assured
that the song became a chart hit. Like "Heartbreaker",
following in the trend that Carey seemed to use at
the time for each new single, a video for a remix
of "Thank God I Found You"--which contained
a sample from Keith Sweat's "Make It Last Forever"
and featured Joe and Nas--was released.
The album's next two singles, "Crybaby"
and "Can't Take That Away (Mariah's Theme)",
were released almost simultaneously. "Crybaby",
a hip-hop song which featured Snoop Dogg, was promoted
to urban and hip-hop radio, while "Mariah's Theme",
a ballad in the vein of "Hero", was promoted
to top 40 and adult contemporary radio. Neither song
really took off with any audience. Even with a commercial
single release "Crybaby" only managed to
peak at 28 on the Billboard Hot 100, Carey's lowest
peaking single up to that point. This led to widespread
speculation that Carey's career was in massive decline.
To date, Rainbow has sold over 3 million copies in
America and another 6 million internationally.
Though her release singles are usually
in the pop genre, she has also combined her talents
with rap artists such as Lord Tariq, Peter Gunz, and
Bone Thugs-N-Harmony. Most of her recent singles have
also been remixed as dance music, where she worked
with DJs such as David Morales and Junior Vasquez.
2000-present
Carey suffered physical and mental
exhaustion in 2001. Her acting debut in the film Glitter,
panned by many popular movie critics, coupled with
her many years of excessively hard work appeared to
have taken a toll on her. She complained her record
label wasn't promoting her albums. She left her longtime
label to sign a contract with Virgin Records, under
which her 10th album "Glitter" was released.
The lead single "LoverBoy" reached #2 in
the Hot 100 thanks to Virgin's massive campaign to
sell the single for only 99 cents across America.
However, sales were disappointing and airplay almost
nonexistant. The album peaked at #7, Carey's lowest
peaking album ever, despite being hailed as some of
Mariah's best work. To date, it has sold 3 million
copies worldwide, which is about what "Rainbow"
sold in the US. Finally, Mariah made an appearance
on MTV's TRL, where she was scantily clad and acting
strangely. After that, she checked into a mental health
facility and announced that she was taking a break
from performing.
Mariah released a new album, Charmbracelet
in December 2002, it debuted at #3. She's interested
in writing music that is more profound having meaning
to her and her fans. The album included the singles
"Through The Rain", "Boy (I Need You)"
featuring rapper Cam'ron, and a cover of Def Leppard's
'80s hit "Bringin' On The Heartbreak". None
of the three singles really took off with radio though
fans continued to buy her singles in the thousands,
leading to the conclusion that Carey had lost her
"radio magic" after a decade of one radio
hit after another.
However, in 2003, a duet with Busta
Rhymes entitled "I Know What You Want" fared
considerably better, having reached the top five (#3)
of Billboard's pop singles chart and the top five
in rap radio airplay. It is also featured on the latest
release The Remixes, a double CD containing a series
of remixes. That year, she was awarded the World Music
Awards "Diamond Award" in honor of over
150 million album sales worldwide.
Carey spent the majority of 2004 preparing
for the release of her tenth studio album, entitled
"The Emancipation of Mimi". That Fall she
was featured on Jadakiss's hit single "U Make
Me Wanna". Although the song was not as great
of a success as her Busta Rhymes collaboration, it
managed to hit the Top 10 of Billboard's R&B chart.
In November, a new song from her upcoming album entitled
"Say Something" featuring rappers Snoop
Dogg and Pharrell leaked on to the internet. The song
was planned as the first single, but was met with
a lukewarm response. Another Neptunes production,
"Tonight," which featured rapper Nelly also
leaked on to the Internet around this time. On New
Years Eve, Carey premiered a Jermaine Dupri production
at the Pure Club in Las Vegas. The song, "It's
Like That" received a positive response and began
receiving airplay a day later. The song debuted on
the Billboard Hot 100 at #53 on January 22. It was
her highest debut in nearly five years. Within weeks,
it zoomed into the top 20. Media sources hailed the
song a triumphant return for Carey. Billboard wrote
"After years of underwhelming singles, Mariah
Carey finally returns with a hot track..." and
put it in their list of the week's essentials. "The
Emancipation Of Mimi" will be released on April
12, 2005 (tentative).
The next single will be released about
the same time as the album, is titled "We Belong
Together" is a mid-tempo ballad as critics call
it "a return to the days when Mariah made great
songs that where very well recieved by the general
public...she's going back to her roots..." It
is already receiving moderate airplay through-out
the country and is expected to put Carey back on the
map in terms of Hit singles.
Discography
1990 Mariah Carey #1 US, #6 UK; US
Sales: 9 million (18 million--worldwide)
1991 Emotions #4 US, #4 UK; US Sales: 5 million (14
million--worldwide)
1992 "MTV Unplugged" #3 US, #3 UK; US Sales:
3 million (15 million--worldwide)
1993 Music Box #1 US, #1 UK; US Sales: 11 million
(28 million--worldwide)
1994 "Merry Christmas" #3 US, #32 UK; US
Sales: 5 million (16 million--worldwide)
1995 Daydream #1 US, #1 UK; US Sales: 10 million (25
million--worldwide)
1997 Butterfly #1 US, #2 UK; US Sales: 5 million (17
million--worldwide)
1998 "#1's" #4 US, #10 UK; US Sales: 5 million
(17 million--worldwide)
1999 Rainbow #2 US, #8 UK; US Sales: 3 million (12
million--worldwide)
2001 Glitter #7 US, #10 UK; US Sales: 1 million (5
million--worldwide)
2001 "Greatest Hits" #52 US; US Sales: 1
million(4 million--worldwide)
2002 Charmbracelet #3 US; US Sales: 2 million (6 million--worldwide)
2003 "The Remixes" #26 US, #35 UK; US Sales:
1 million (2 million--worldwide)
2005 The Emancipation of Mimi (coming April 12)
US Sales Total : 61,000,000 Worldwide Sales Total:
179,000,000
Hit singles
(Note: Bold are Billboard Hot 100 or UK Top 40 singles
that reached #1)
MARIAH CAREY
1990 "Vision Of Love" #1
US, #9 UK
1990 "Love Takes Time" #1 US, #37 UK
1991 "Someday" #1 US, #38 UK
1991 "I Don't Wanna Cry" #1 US
1991 "There's Got To Be A Way" #29 UK (Not
released in the US)
EMOTIONS
1991 "Emotions" #1 US, #17
UK
1991 "Can't Let Go" #2(#1 R&B) US, #20
UK (1992 release)
1992 "Make It Happen" #5 US, #17 UK
MTV:UNPLUGGED
1992 "I'll Be There" #1
US, #2 UK
1992 "If It's Over" #3 UK (Not released
in the US)
MUSIC BOX
1993 "Dreamlover" #1 US,
#9 UK
1994 "Hero" #1 US, #7 UK
1994 "Without You" #3 US, #1 UK
1994 "Anytime You Need a Friend" #10 US
#4 UK
MERRY CHRISTMAS
1994 "All I Want for Christmas
Is You" #2 US
DAYDREAM
1995 "Fantasy" #1(Debut)
US, #3 UK
1995 "One Sweet Day" (with Boyz II Men)
#1 US, #6 UK
1996 "Always Be My Baby" #1 US, #3 UK
1996 "Open Arms" #10 US, #4 UK
1996 "Forever" #9 US
1996 "Underneath The Stars"
BUTTERFLY
1997 "Honey" #1 US, #3 UK
1997 "Butterfly" #12 US, #22 UK
1998 "My All" #1 US, #4 UK
1998 "The Roof"
1998 "Breakdown"
1998 "Whenever You Call"
NUMBER ONES
1998 "When You Believe"
(with Whitney Houston) #15 US, #4 UK
1998 "SweetHeart" (Feat. JD) #18 US
1999 "I Still Believe" #4 US, #16 UK
1999 "Do You Know Where You're Going To?"
RAINBOW
1999 "Heartbreaker" (feat.
Jay-Z) #1 US, #5 UK
2000 "Thank God I Found You" (feat. Joe
and 98 Degrees) #1 US, #10 UK
2000 "Against All Odds" (withWestlife) '#1'
UK (Not released in the US)
2000 "Can't Take That Away (Mariah's Theme)"
2000 "Crybaby" #28 US, # 7 UK
GLITTER
2001 "Loverboy" #2 US, #12
UK
2001 "Never Too Far"
2001 "Don't Stop (Funkin' 4 Jamaica)" (feat.
Mystikal) #32 UK
2002 "Never Too Far/Hero Medley" (with Westlife)
#4 Uk
CHARMBRACELET
2002 "Through the Rain"
#81 US, #8 UK
2003 "Boy (I Need You)" (feat. Cam'ron)
#17 UK
2003 "Bringin' On The Heartbreak #23 UK
GUEST APPEARANCES
1994 "Endless Love" (with
Luther Vandross) #2 US
2003 "I Know What You Want" (with Busta
Rhymes feat. The Flipmode Squad) #3 US
2004 "U Make Me Wanna" (with Jadakiss) #21
US
THE EMANCIPATION OF MIMI (Coming April 12th)
2005 "It's Like That" (f.
JD & Fatman Scoop) #16 US
2005 "We Belong Together" (To Be Released)
source from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki
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