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Post by Deleted on Sept 28, 2009 7:39:55 GMT -5
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Post by Mariah-Mariah-Mariah on Sept 28, 2009 7:47:24 GMT -5
YAY cool
http://www.independent.co...gel-mercury-1792679.html
(Rated 3/ 5 )
Reviewed by Andy Gill
-Once upon a time, Mariah Carey's albums had infantile titles like Butterfly, Rainbow, Glitter and Charmbracelet - sickly-sweet enough to be some pre-teen cartoon superheroine line-up.
Then they started to get serious, the equivalent of Mariah wearing specs to appear more mature: The Emancipation Of Mimi was followed by E=MC2, succeeded now by Memoirs Of An Imperfect Angel, which sounds like a novel by Toni Morrison.
But, whatever she calls them, her albums all feature much the same kind of featherlight R&B grooves, pricked here and there by those wineglass-endangering squeaks which are Mariah's stock-in-trade. So it is with this work, which opens with the suggestion that it might be a concept-album following the singer through her day - a sort of soft-centred Ulysses - but then seems to leap prematurely to the bubble-bath and boudoir that most of us encounter after dark, before ultimately slamming into the brick wall of Foreigner's "I Want To Know What Love Is".
Early accounts reported Mariah working with Timbaland, and Jermaine Dupri, though neither of their efforts have made it to the album. But there's a reason why soul divas employ vast teams of different producers. Here, Carey ended up writing and recording the entire album with co-producers Tricky Stewart and The-Dream, a fact that becomes blindingly evident by the fourth or fifth track, when you start to wonder if you're not just hearing the same track over and over again, with minor variations: it's all pretty much the same drum sounds, the same tempos, the same keyboard textures, fronted by the same downy vocal timbre expressing the same small range of emotions.
Such differences as there are are largely matters of accessorisation: "Candy Bling" is standard bathtime tea-light Chablis chill-out music, "The Impossible" anticipates Marvin Gaye re-making "I Want You" with harpsichords, and "Up Out My Face" features an incongruous reprise in high-school marching-band style. Any notable moments are entirely down to Mimi herself, whether emitting stratospheric squeals on "Inseparable", swapping overlapping vocal phrases with herself on "Ribbon", or layering perfect lines of "oh-oh-oh-oh"s behind her lead vocal on "Standing O". There's no denying her extraordinary vocal facility, but it's akin to a Ferrari laying rubber, spinning its wheels furiously but progressing not one jot.
The sole exception is the single "Obsessed", a stalker song whose lyrics lead one to surmise it's her eventual response to years of jibes by Eminem. It's the best thing here by miles; but of all singers, does Mariah really need to use that Auto-Tune?
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Post by Mariah-Mariah-Mariah on Sept 28, 2009 7:48:52 GMT -5
PUBLICATIONS:
3.5/4 Toronto Sun
3/4 USA Today
3/4 Chicago Tribune
2.5/4 Los Angeles Times
1.5/4 Chicago Sun-Times
B Entertainment Weekly
ONLINE REVIEWS:
3.5/4 All Music
3.5/5 AMG
2/4 TIMES Online
C Examiner.com
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Post by Mariah-Mariah-Mariah on Sept 28, 2009 7:49:15 GMT -5
Mariah Carey's Memoirs of an Imperfect Angel. USA TODAY (* * * out of four) Mariah Carey albums typically boast an assortment of producers, but not so on Memoirs of an Imperfect Angel. Working primarily with hot hip-hop producers Tricky Stewart and The Dream but without her usual supporting cast of guests (rappers) brings the focus squarely on the singer for what, as its title suggests, is essentially a musical memoir. Most tracks stick to midtempo R&B grooves and slow jams, but Carey is all over the place emotionally - seductive, nostalgic, vindictive, occasionally within a matter of lines. Sometimes, she pulls the songs in different directions. First single Obsessed conveys pride and repulsion at being the object of unwarranted advances. Betcha Gon' Know, which plays like a first-person account of The Persuaders' '70s R&B hit Thin Line Between Love and Hate, suggests both vulnerability and violence. Just as many listeners assumed Obsessed to be about Eminem, they'll also hear Up Out My Face, with lyrics like, "I know you're not a rapper, so you better stop spittin' it," to be the continuation of Carey's beef with him. That song also contains one of Memoirs' many funny lines: "If we were two Lego blocks, even the Harvard University graduating class of 2010 couldn't put us back together again." By the album's end, this imperfect angel seems no closer to finding heaven - though her gloriously gospel-infused version of Foreigner's I Want to Know What Love Is certainly comes close. >Download:Obsessed, I Want to Know What Love Is www.usatoday.com/l...of-imperfect-angel_N.htm The New York Times (review) When exactly did Mariah Carey stop singing? Even when she began flirting aggressively with hip-hop in the mid-1990s she was happy to impose her titanic vocals atop even the scrappiest production. And no matter how grimy her surroundings became - Ol' Dirty Bastard, anyone? - she remained inexorably Mariah, an impenetrable acrobat of technique. Of late though, Ms. Carey has been whispering, as if newly scared of grand gestures. In 2005 it made for a surprise success with "The Emancipation of Mimi," one of her best-selling albums, but also one of her most deceptive. Though the melodies were straightforward, Ms. Carey was working hard, imbuing them with vulnerability and ache even while keeping her vocal power in check. That nuance is mostly gone on "Memoirs of an Imperfect Angel," Ms. Carey's 12th studio album, which manages simplicity and clutter all at once. "Memoirs" is produced almost entirely by Ms. Carey with The-Dream and Tricky Stewart, who are masters of compensation, helping elevate mediocre singers - like The-Dream himself or Rihanna, on "Umbrella" - to something sublime. On paper Ms. Carey shouldn't need that help, but her collaborators have underdelivered with largely listless arrangements just as she has thinned her voice to a hush. (The Dr. Dre-esque stomp of "Obsessed" is a notable exception.) On "Betcha Gon' Know (The Prologue)," she's almost mumbling, and the talk-singing on "Ribbon" and "Inseparable" is typically the preserve of far worse singers. Even more troubling are the perplexing, jumbled lyrics full of daffy references and batty assertions. On the unintentionally hilarious "Up Out My Face," she insists, "Not even a nail technician/ with a whole lotta gel and acrylic/ can fix this, when I break, I break." On "Obsessed," she tells an ex, "See right through you like you're bathing in Windex." (Inexplicably, two songs, "Standing O" and "More Than Just Friends," echo "Umbrella," a move unnecessary and outdated.) "H.A.T.E.U." has some of the ease of her recent successes, and "It's a Wrap" swings with girl-group melody. But it's the vintage notes here that resonate most intensely. She lets her voice go at the end of "Candy Bling," a cold splash of water that reminds us what Ms. Carey can do when left unfettered. The same is true of the smoldering "Languishing (The Interlude)," which despite its language of self-improvement seminars, is Ms. Carey at her most astute, devastatingly precise in tone and feeling; notably, it's the only song on this album untouched by Tricky and The-Dream. It bleeds into the closer, a cover of Foreigner's "I Want to Know What Love Is," that begins in surprisingly modest fashion. Then comes the gospel-choir backup and the glass-shattering high notes, restoring Ms. Carey to the role she was born for: a singer unafraid of pomp, of ambition, of herself. END |
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Post by Mariah-Mariah-Mariah on Sept 28, 2009 7:49:30 GMT -5
Mariah Carey, "Memoirs of an Imperfect Angel" (Island) [1.5 OUT OF 4 STARS] "You a mom and pop; I'm a corporation," Mariah Carey sings on "Obsessed," the groovy ode to a stalker that's been released as the first single from her 12th album. Ostensibly a dis of Eminem, who's been taking shots at her on his last few discs, it's actually an apt statement for her entire career, which is more often lauded in terms of sales--160 million albums sold worldwide, the best-selling female performer of the '90s, recipient of an $80 million mega-deal with Virgin Records that was the biggest record contract ever, etc.--than artistic accomplishments. Now we can add the crass marketing of her new disc, which finds the CD packaged with a 34-page insert crafted with Elle magazine featuring ads from upscale fashion, champagne, jewelry and tourism brands. "The idea was really simple thinking: 'We sell millions of records, so you should advertise with us,'" said Antonio "L.A." Reid, chairman of Carey's current label, Island/Def Jam. In other words, the star with the infamous five-octave range essentially is a commodity, so why not use her to sell other products besides her recordings? Carey's boosters in the media (Elle included, of course) and the legions of self-professed "lambs" who comprise her fan base are hailing "Memoirs of an Imperfect Angel" as a return to her R&B roots and a move away from the transparent and base attempts to score street cred and appeal to the teeny-boppers with a more hip-hop-oriented sound on "The Emancipation of Mimi" (her 2005 comeback after a series of flops and a much-publicized personal meltdown early in the new millennium) and "E=MC2" (her last release in 2008). This is true to a point: Working with producers the Dream and Tricky Stewart, the once again happily married Mrs. Nick Cannon delivers an overall smoother sound this time, much heavier on brash ballads and genteel slow jams than dance-floor groovers, with the first single a notable exception. But to consider this a great R&B record requires one to think of the likes of her favorites Jodeci as the pinnacle of the genre, because the fussy, soulless, airless vibe that dominates the album doesn't have much to do with true R&B greats from Aretha Franklin to Erykah Badu. Carey's former and present chart rival Whitney Houston actually comes closer to tapping that storied vein on her latest. Though the 39-year-old Carey boasts of distinguishing herself from other divas by being the driving force behind writing her own songs--unlike Houston--that isn't necessarily something to be proud of, given the predominance of saccharine melodies and clichéd true-romance lyrics. "We would walk in the park every Saturday/Brand new, all in love, kissing time away/You was all up on me, it was plain to see/That I was your girl," she coos in "Candy Bling." Yet even that dreck is better than her choice in covers here: a version of the hoary FM-rock radio staple "I Want to Know What Love Is" that strips away almost everything but piano and vocals but still manages to sound more bombastic, phony and over-produced than the Foreigner original. Through it all, as usual, Carey over-sings at every opportunity, needlessly trilling up and down the scales as if we needed one more reminder of why she's the favorite virtuoso of the "American Idol" crowd substituting skill for soul. Eminem isn't right about much, but he's spot on when it comes to dismissing this butterfly. Source: Chicago Sun-Times Newsday www.newsday.com/en...mperfect-angel-1.1474822 Mariah Carey's early records may have functioned solely as vehicles for her spectacular soprano, but what's been most remarkable about her recent efforts is their tendency toward restraint. "The Emancipation of Mimi," Carey's spectacular 2005 comeback, found the Huntington diva dialing it down, scaling back her theatrics and allowing her voice to be seamlessly woven into the slippery R&B production rather than soaring over the top of it. Last year's underrated "E=MC2" continued that formula, coming off spry, impish and playful. But on "Memoirs of an Imperfect Angel" (Island), restraint has given way to inertia. Low-wattage and low-impact, it's a humdrum descent into midtempo, hopelessly burdened with ballads. In interviews, Carey has described the record as "personal" - the first words she sings are, "Welcome to a day of my life" - and somehow that drive to confess has resulted in slower tempos. "H.A.T.E.U.," which is built around the refrain "I can't wait to hate you," has the steady twinkle of a love song. Even "Obsessed," the synth-laden Eminem kiss-off, trudges instead of snaps. The production, courtesy of the reliable Tricky Stewart and The-Dream, feels boilerplate at best. At 17 songs (plus a six-song remix EP), the record is far too long, and by the time the exuberant "Up Out My Face" arrives, it feels like it was grafted on from a better record. Mostly, "Memoirs" dawdles and sighs, climaxing with a straightforward cover of Foreigner's "I Want to Know What Love Is." Confessional albums generally address mysteries in a performer's life. The real mystery on "Memoirs" is how something so long can feel so slight. |
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Post by Mariah-Mariah-Mariah on Sept 28, 2009 7:49:54 GMT -5
Album review: Mariah Carey's 'Memoirs of an Imperfect Angel'
2.5/4 STARS
Los Angeles Times
She shows off her talent by coming off as just another girl at the nail salon.
On her recently leaked and soon-to-be-released 12th studio album, Mariah Carey and her latest producers, Terius "The-Dream" Nash and Tricky Stewart, attempt to get at something by distilling it. They're seeking the Essence of Mimi, the liquor in the oyster of Carey's famously luscious voice.But instead of showcasing this musical Olympian's dazzling way with a vocal run or her nearly unmatchable whistle register -- obvious choices when it comes to Carey's talent -- she and her team tune into a particular tone, the one that earned her another nickname, Honey.
There's a breathiness to this album that's not only sexy but emotionally intimate. Heavy on slow jams, quiet confessions and kiss-offs closer to the work of the rappers she admires than to Carey's soul sisters, "Memoirs of an Imperfect Angel" capitalizes on an underrated aspect of the singer's talent: Her ability, even when she's scaling vocal heights, to still come off as just another girl at the nail salon.
Carey's lyrics -- she co-writes everything here, except for her fairly unremarkable cover of Foreigner's "I Want to Know What Love Is" -- make this point most obviously. Even when fully dressed in the armor of her glamour, as when she advises an ex (Eminem? More likely it's Latin pop star Luis Miguel) to "pretend you on a sofa, and I'm on MTV" when he spies her walking by.
Carey still compulsively shares details about her runny mascara and her appetite for Duncan Hines yellow cake. "Bubble baths on the jet" might be a ridiculous fantasy, but it's not at all elitist. Any real housewife or working girl has been in that daydream.
What The-Dream and Stewart help Carey realize is that her vocal style also communicates this accessibility. Even at its most extravagant, Carey's singing has a warmth, a sensuality and openness to it that sets her apart from peers like Whitney Houston and younger pretenders like Leona Lewis. When she tones down her singing, those qualities dominate.
Not incidentally for a big-ballad singer who's hit 40, stressing her more endearing small voice keeps Carey from any embarrassing shortfalls.
Throughout "Memoirs" she locates that mode of expression in whispers, murmurs and late-night lovers' quarrels. (She tosses off some amusing zingers in the latter.) The tempos here lean back slowly, and the sound is thick, a little heavy, inevitably responding to the sonic shift that occurred in R&B in the wake of Nash and Stewart's first female foil, Rihanna, and their smash "Umbrella."
Even the more aggressive songs on this album -- "Obsessed," Carey's volley in that silly Eminem feud, and "Up Out My Face," in which she recovers via her now-husband Nick Cannon's specialty, the drumline -- proceed with a laid-back nod instead of a disco spin. After a while, the approach is too much of a mildly interesting thing, and Carey's restraint stops serving her agenda.
As every long-married couple knows, intimacy loses its power when the gestures that define it get repetitive. That happens about halfway through "Memoirs," when Carey's soft outpourings start to melt into each other, and it ceases to matter whether she's mourning a broken heart or celebrating a new start.
Nash and Stewart have settled into their own groove as producers; their unctuous, Caribbean-inflected, R. Kelly-inspired tracks work well song by song (especially on the sad ones, like "Languishing" and "Angels Cry," and the sex ones, like "The Impossible"), but there's a point where a trademark sound starts to be a cage, not a calling card.
"Memoirs of an Imperfect Angel" will stand out in Carey's catalog as an experiment that illuminates her place in the pantheon without either boosting it or damaging it. I wouldn't be surprised if, a decade from now, Carey cites this effort as a personal favorite. It's that kind of wholly decent effort: a self-exploration that settles on its unpretentious insights by not pushing too hard.
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Post by Mariah-Mariah-Mariah on Sept 28, 2009 7:50:14 GMT -5
Chicago Tribune
Rating: 3 stars (out of 4)
Who says being a pop diva is easy? There is the constant pressure to look great and sound all-conquering while staving off a legion of younger sisters nipping at your stiletto heels. Which brings us to Mariah Carey, she of the 175 million worldwide record sales and the multitude of comebacks.
Carey's voice isn't what it used to be, and her last couple of records were lightweight even by her modest standards, brimming with adolescent lyrics and tarted-up production designed to keep her sounding fashionable. They restored her standing as a commercial force, but as an artist she sounded adrift.
On her 12th studio album, "Memoirs of an Imperfect Angel" (Island), Carey doesn't resort to vocal histrionics or production gimmickry. Instead, she plays it low-key, and ends up with her best album since the '90s heyday.
A few caveats: The first single, "Obsessed," isn't typical of the album as a whole, with its Eminem-baiting video, distorted wordless vocal hook and accusatory lyrics. Neither are the rap cadences Carey adopts for the combative "Up Out My Face."
Otherwise, Carey focuses on introspective ballads. Her voice has lost range off the top, but she's learned how to inhabit a song rather than simply knock it around like a rag doll with her rocket-propelled trills. Rather than farm out songs to a series of producers, she primarily sticks with the songwriting/production team of Tricky Stewart and the Dream, who frame her voice in subtle, low-key arrangements. Using sparse keyboards, a spritz of strings, a kick-drum rumble here and there, and lots of slow-motion handclaps and sensual finger snaps, they dial down the bombast considerably. In response, Carey turns in some of the most measured and beautifully understated singing of her career.
Her voice is frequently multi-tracked to create the illusion that she's dueting with herself, with counterpoint melody lines. The effect is nothing new in R&B; Marvin Gaye turned this studio technique into an art form on his 1971 masterpiece "What's Going On." But the old-school soul connection is appropriate: This is Carey building on slow-jam R&B and adult-themed ballads to create a loose song cycle about love lost and regained.
As the album title suggests, the melodrama can get thick at times, and a few of the songs are a bit slow in developing, revealing their hooks reluctantly. "Betcha Gon' Know" aptly sets the melancholy, inward-looking mood, but as an album-opener it's a bit of snooze. It's not until "Candy Bling," with its back-in-the-day reminiscences, that things pick up.
Carey really hits her stride on "It's a Wrap"; she sounds refreshingly raw, surrounded by minimal instrumentation. As she emotes with just a hint of grit, a small squadron of Carey voices loop in and around her lead vocal, giving the song just the right amount of decoration.
"Impossible" is almost impossibly fragile, but Carey turns it into a tour de force of soft-core texture, as if whispering into a lover's ear. "Angel (Prelude)" brings out the high-pitched vocal flights that were the singer's signature earlier in her career. But instead of showing off, she's going for something eerier with a muted, otherworldly tone.
A cover of Foreigner's "I Want to Know What Love Is" is an appropriate closer. After an album in which the distance between pillow talk and recrimination, seduction and betrayal is painfully thin, it's a potentially potent gospel plea. Unfortunately, it resorts to the soft-to-loud-to-louder formula that has ruined many a power ballad in this "American Idol" era. Perhaps this was Carey's opportunity to prove that she can still climb those Everest-like octaves. Fortunately, the restraint she brings to much of the rest proves she's maturing into more than just a vocal acrobat.
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Post by Mariah-Mariah-Mariah on Sept 28, 2009 7:50:34 GMT -5
Entertainment Weekly B Memoirs of an Imperfect Angel Mariah Carey has already found radio rapture with Memoirs of an Imperfect Angel's first two singles, the brash synth kiss-off ''Obsessed'' and a soaring cover of Foreigner's schmaltz-supreme ballad ''I Want to Know What Love Is.'' Still, it's puzzling to hear one of music's most powerful voices continually corralled into a feathery R&B midrange; imperfections are nowhere to be found on Memoirs, but neither are many true revelations. ________________________________ Examiner.com grade= C www.examiner.com/x-15033-Memphis-Celebrity-Headlines-Examiner~y2009m9d24-Mariah-Carey-New-Memoirs-album-makes-debut-and-gets-a-C First, let's talk about the good news regarding Mariah Carey's twice delayed Memoirs of an Imperfect Angel. It's not a disaster. The bad news: It's not very good either. Memoirs of an Imperfect Angel is supposed to be a return to the Mariah of the 1990s. The dog whistles, cattle screams and sudden key changes are all there. The lyrics, which sound like they were copied and pasted from several of other Mariah's songs, can overwhelm the great production. The voice: It's mostly replaced by a lot of whispering. There are a couple gems here. "I Want to Know What Love Is" is a decent remake of the 1985 Foreigner hit that doesn't stray too far or too close to the original. "Ribbon" sounds like a classic R&B song and should definitely be considered for a single. "Candy Bling" is fun and bouncy. Unfortunately, Memoirs is filled with too many "We Belong Together" clones with such songs as "Up Out My Face." "h.a.t.e.u.," and "Inseparable." Mariah tries on her fake ghetto accent on the horrific "Obsessed" and "Out My Face." Mariah is trying too hard to appeal to teenagers; however, she comes off sounding ridiculous. Memoirs of an Imperfect Angel will definitely not help Mariah's diminishing musical career. However, Mariah's "lambs" can take solace in that Memoirs of an Imperfect Angel isn't the complete disaster it was rumored to be. Times Online http://entertainment.time...views/article6847657.ece Live in a critical cocoon long enough and it's easy to forget the extent of Mariah Carey's influence. Out there though, in the world of rough karaoke boozers, where the annual X Factor audition can bring a city centre to a standstill, it's not Radiohead or David Bowie that they're singing. Out there, the holy scriptures for anyone who ever stood in their front room holding an Argos microphone are the early hits of Mariah Carey: Hero, Someday, her shocking evisceration of Without You. In this light, it's no surprise that the most successful British artist launch of the past decade has been Leona Lewis, a sonic facsimile of Carey in her pliant early bloom. But, of course, Carey has long since gone to great lengths to show that she has moved on. It's not that she can't "do" her younger self anymore. That much is made clear by the Mariahfied special edition of Elle that comes with the album, in which the singer recreates the sleeves of her most famous albums. Carey's thirties, however, have been a process of painstakingly chronicled self-discovery. Her marriage to the Sony godfather Tommy Mottola is more than ten years behind her. However, she hasn't managed to record a single album without alluding to some aspect of her marital misery. As the title of her tenth album suggests, Carey may now have found her dream lover - CD purchasers can read about him between features on her shoe collection and her new fragrance - but the unburdening appears to be far from over. In Up Out My Face Carey ventures: "I thought we had something special/And we had something good/But I should have had another mechanic under my hood." However, riding a hook reminiscent of Lauryn Hill's That Thing, it's one of the more spirited displays on an album that sorely lacks them. "I can't wait to hate you/Make you pain like I do," she sings on H.A.T.E.U., a song whose funereal vanilla soul segues into the Prozac-soft reminiscences of first love on Candy Bling. When she slows the pace and relies on little more than a crisp digital fingerclick in lieu of a beat it isn't always easy to discern what Carey is aiming for. The album title - a nod to Minnie Riperton's Perfect Angel - may offer a clue. Not least for its copious use of electric piano, much of Memoirs of an Imperfect Angel is clearly aiming for the gauzy, early-morning sunblindness of Riperton's 1974 album. But only on the understated Languishing - the one song on which Carey and co- producer Antonio L. A. Reid aren't striving to meet the radio-friendly specifications of modern R&B - do they succeed. After almost a dozen songs in which Carey addresses her exes, stopping only to throw in a couple of tetchy stalker ripostes for good measure, her new husband Nick Cannon must have been relieved that she got around to mentioning him at all. It is, however, with customary thoroughness that she finally does so on The Impossible. So comprehensive is her mawkish itemisation of all the things their love resembles (bubble baths, Kool-Aid, pimp Caddy) that the song requires its own reprise to mop up the overspill. Sound sickly? Well, yes, just a little. But these days you feel tempted to forgive Carey an awful lot. In spite or perhaps because of the countless televised car crash auditions she has inspired , the vocal pyrotechnics of yore are mostly gone. At the end of Memoirs of an Imperfect Angel it's a shift highlighted by a fairly straight reading of Foreigner's I Want to Know What Love Is. As recently as ten years ago, you shudder to think what she might have done with the same song. Here though, she sings the tune with a restraint that would have once almost suffocated her. The irony is that, in doing so, she highlights the melodic paucity of almost everything preceding it. |
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Post by Mariah-Mariah-Mariah on Sept 28, 2009 7:50:55 GMT -5
Is Mariah Carey's 'Memoirs of an Imperfect Angel' a Genius Breakthrough? Blackbook.com Goddamn. Pop's leading ladies have taken quite the beating lately. Okay, fine, so I was wielding the cudgel at some point. But it's not like I had a hand in dismantling the greatest girlband of the 21st century. And above all, some pop stars deserved it. But lately, not Mariah Carey, who warmed our hearts on 9/11 when we found it difficult to get out of bed on that very day. So here we are. With digital copies of her new record, Memoirs of an Imperfect Angel having leaked, nay, spilled onto the internet ahead of its worldwide release. The early verdict? Well it's rather nice if you fancy a morphine drip plugged into your ears, what with all of the record's whisper-wailing and computerized blippity-bloops. To be honest, post-rehab Mariah was riding the crest of her creative high with The Emancipation of Mimi and has been slipping since. But some of us are old(-fashioned) and would think that. We're also therefore prone to bitching about musicians needing melodies, vocals, and well-considered lyrics. Others of us, like Mariah, are post-pop. And Memoirs is Mariah's proudest post-pop debut. It's a debut that doesn't thwart itself with such precious tripwires. In fact everything, from "Obsessed" (of which we are treated to four (!) revolutionary club chart-topping remixes on the album's special edition) to that half-assed Foreigner cover are early indicators of how far she was willing to take her Grammy diss. In ways, Memoirs is for Mariah what Aerial was for Kate Bush: an epic thinkpiece. In one regard, the lyrics all appear uniformly clunky. But upon closer inspection, that is part of this post-pop revolution to which Mariah Carey is Eva Perón (sorry, Madge!) It's as if she adapted the charm of spoken-word honesty and then found a way to make spoken-word listenable. Hence the bulk of this album being highly relatable, too. Further proof: the line "I wanna be all on your lips like gelato," in "More Than Just Friends." Another track, "H.A.T.E.U." pushes post-pop just a little further. You see, the five letters spell out a secret message. One which may or may not be "having a typical emotional upset," although a competing argument contends it's "hold and tenderly embrace u." Ultimately, this is one of those mysteries that time and flack will reveal as this track may be the record's next single. But the most post-pop moment here comes in the serene jam "Up Out of My Face." In it, Mariah belts, "If we were two Lego blocks even the Harvard University graduating class of 2010 couldn't put us back together again." More remarkable here is her commitment to avoid singing outright. Throughout Memoirs, Mariah's voice exists in three vocal extremes: whispers, moans, and yells. She doesn't need to concern herself with all those octaves in between one and eight. Basically, this is an album that, like spoiled apples for compost aficionados, gets better with time. But if you are the sort who needs letter grades or gold stars to determine how great this record is, the most I can offer are three words: Better than Whitney's. ____________________________________________ BBC Review Little more than pastiches of past successes. Mike Diver 2009-09-22 Mariah Carey's enduring success - the lead single from this twelfth studio album, the Eminem-baiting Obsessed, was the singer's fortieth hit on the Billboard Hot 100 - may have something to do with how she seems to get younger with each release. Though nearing 40, the New Yorker appears fresher of face and curvier of frame with each sleeve, and Memoirs… features the singer flaunting a degree of flesh not seen since studio album number seven, 1999's Rainbow. Without meaning to set off on the wrong foot - looks first, music second - the imagery associated with Carey is of vital importance in her marketing. Arguably without a great album to her name since 1997's Butterfly, on which the RnB star fully realised her hip hop ambitions through collaborations with Puff Daddy, Missy Elliott and Q-Tip, focus has increasingly been placed on her private life - hence the did-they-or-didn't-they-and-does-anyone-care nonsense over her apparent knee-trembler with Marshall Mathers III in the run-up to this release - and her private parts, with Memoirs… flaunting its box-ticking methodology: girls buy it for the syrupy ballads and middle-finger rebuttals of a partner's too-little-too-late affections, and guys pick it up for, well, other reasons. That's a terrible generalisation, but then again these are terribly middle-of-the-road songs that need the most obvious colour to liven proceedings up. They leap from stereo speakers like salmon on their nth trip back up river, knowing perfectly well what they're doing, where they're going and how to get there, doing nothing to disguise the fact that they've done it all before. Memoirs… plays out like an auto-pilot effort, but coming only a year after Carey's last album, the fairly well received E=MC², perhaps the listener shouldn't be surprised by the dearth of invention on show, and the filler feel of so many of these tracks. But then again: if there's no album ready, don't release an album. Lyrically it's confused, our protagonist alternating between spurned lover with attitude and a big-eyed I'd-do-anything-for-you type; the production team of The-Dream and Tricky Stewart offer no arrangements even nearing memorable; and the record's myriad interlude-style interjections only serve to prolong what's already an over-long non-event release. Her voice is great, but we've known that since day one. The most interesting aspect of the whole album is, sadly, the cover: more thought has probably gone into that than any of these pastiches of past achievements. www.bbc.co.uk/music/reviews/zv4h |
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Post by Mariah-Mariah-Mariah on Sept 28, 2009 7:51:53 GMT -5
All Music: by John Bush Any Mariah Carey album carries a lot of weight ?fan dreams, commercial expectations, the prospect of genuine pop thrill, the star's outsized persona ?and 2009's Memoirs of an Imperfect Angel is no different. Trailing a pair of hits, "Obsessed" and her anthemic cover of Foreigner's "I Want to Know What Love Is," it's a lock for commercial success, and it includes plenty of the soaring vocals and falsetto trills that fans love her for. It's also remarkably unified, with no guest features and a very special coup, in that every song on the album was composed by R&B's best songwriters of the late 2000s, Terius Nash (The-Dream) and Christopher Stewart (Tricky); they give each song the intelligent mid-tempo bump-and-grind they've made into a specialty. Personally, it finds Carey probing and investigating her inner life, with lines like "I can't wait to hate you" and "Why you so obsessed with me?" shot at targets both public and private. www.billboard.biz/bbbiz/content_display/magazine/reviews/albums/e3i4c261e07d5ad7590c1ee8fd2e2d40dbc BILLBOARD Review Mariah Carey is not only revisiting her past appearance-wise (lately the singer has been wearing her hair in loose curls, as seen during the early days of her career), but she's also taking her sound back to her R&B roots. On Carey's latest album, "Memoirs of an Imperfect Angel" (with the exception of the first single, "Obsessed," and the hood-girl-sounding "Up out My Face," among a few others), the singer leaves behind the teeny-bop themes and hip-hop-heavy melodies of 2008's "E=MC2." Instead, she opts for big ballads and R&B tunes about love and heartbreak, which makes the new set more cohesive and age-appropriate. Carey croons in her staple high-pitched voice over piano and finger snaps on "Angels Cry," while singing about true love alongside a thumbing bass on "Inseparable." Meanwhile, "The Impossible" takes its cue from early-'90s group Jodeci's "Forever My Lady." Overall, Carey's throwback vibe on "Memoirs" is refreshing and much welcomed. AMG 3.5/5 Any Mariah Carey album carries a lot of weight - fan dreams, commercial expectations, the prospect of genuine pop thrill, the star's outsized persona - and 2009's Memoirs of an Imperfect Angel is no different. Trailing a pair of hits, "Obsessed" and her anthemic cover of Foreigner's "I Want to Know What Love Is," it's a lock for commercial success, and it includes plenty of the soaring vocals and falsetto trills that fans love her for. It's also remarkably unified, with no guest features and a very special coup, in that every song on the album was composed by R&B's best songwriters of the late 2000s, Terius Nash (The-Dream) and Christopher Stewart (Tricky); they give each song the intelligent mid-tempo bump-and-grind they've made into a specialty. Personally, it finds Carey probing and investigating her inner life, with lines like "I can't wait to hate you" and "Why you so obsessed with me?" shot at targets both public and private TORONTO SUN www.torontosun.com/entertainment/music/2009/09/27/11143881-sun.html Mariah Carey Memoirs of an Imperfect Angel R&B ***1/2 Don't judge Carey's Memoirs by her latest eye-rolling title. The diva's 12th album is neither self-indulgent nor silly. In fact, it's one of her more focused efforts, downplaying the hip-hop and club bangers of late for well-penned, creatively produced R&B ballads that showcase Carey's powerhouse pipes without sacrificing hooks and melodies. Imperfect, but susprisingly good. Download: H.A.T.E.U., Up Out My Face |
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Post by Mariah-Mariah-Mariah on Sept 28, 2009 7:52:21 GMT -5
OK im gonna stop in case i get banned
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Post by Candy Bling on Sept 28, 2009 8:08:07 GMT -5
t4p
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Caution
3x Platinum Member
Joined: January 2006
Posts: 3,245
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Post by Caution on Sept 28, 2009 8:13:36 GMT -5
Mariah to perform on The Today ShowSeptember 24, 2009
MC fans, mark your calendars! On Friday, October 2, Mariah will bring her brand new single I Want To Know What Love Is to The Today Show! The 4 song performance is currently scheduled to take place outdoors at the Rockefeller Plaza outside the NBC Studios in New York City.mariahcarey.com/news/
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H.A.T.E.U.
New Member
Joined: July 2009
Posts: 401 
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Post by H.A.T.E.U. on Sept 28, 2009 8:16:33 GMT -5
What or who is a pimp caddy. Forgive me guys i'm not from the us :(
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weaver
4x Platinum Member
Joined: April 2008
Posts: 4,095
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Post by weaver on Sept 28, 2009 8:41:05 GMT -5
Some of these reviews are stupid. Up Out My Face and Hate U are WBT clones? Um....no! Not even a little bit.
oh and, lol...a pimp caddy is a cadillac, for a pimp. What that entails can vary, but it would be a very flashy cadillac. A sugar daddy may perhaps drive a pimp caddy. lol.
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H.A.T.E.U.
New Member
Joined: July 2009
Posts: 401
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Post by H.A.T.E.U. on Sept 28, 2009 8:43:11 GMT -5
^ Lol ok thanks, I just learned something rather interesting and new haha :)
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Ferrero
Platinum Member
Joined: February 2006
Posts: 1,624
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Post by Ferrero on Sept 28, 2009 8:57:57 GMT -5
satheeson... the album is out in HMV have u got your copy??
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H.A.T.E.U.
New Member
Joined: July 2009
Posts: 401
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Post by H.A.T.E.U. on Sept 28, 2009 9:01:43 GMT -5
I'm not sure if it's out in Singapore yet. I'll download it when it comes out on Nokia music store.
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Junkiex
4x Platinum Member
Joined: June 2009
Posts: 4,431
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Post by Junkiex on Sept 28, 2009 9:29:24 GMT -5
What happened to part 8? :O :O :O Anyway, I wanted to post a screen of the iTunes issue I commented yesterday! Infamous!  |
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Hefty Hanna
Diamond Member
a prettier jesus
Joined: August 2007
Posts: 20,350 
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Post by Hefty Hanna on Sept 28, 2009 9:31:17 GMT -5
I can't believe Pt. 8 is gone! Isn't that the thread where the album leaked! :(
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Junkiex
4x Platinum Member
Joined: June 2009
Posts: 4,431
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Post by Junkiex on Sept 28, 2009 9:34:47 GMT -5
MariahDaily is back up! Tickets to watch Mariah's 10/10 concert online are being sold for $7.95. You think quality would be enough to justify paying??? I can't believe Pt. 8 is gone! Isn't that the thread where the album leaked! :( YES! And it was only like at page 83 or sth! |
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₫anny Jerz ♔
Diamond Member
Irrelevant
Joined: July 2007
Posts: 10,939
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Post by ₫anny Jerz ♔ on Sept 28, 2009 9:40:03 GMT -5
Wow at the entire thread vanishing.  |
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nyjoliebebe
New Member
happy moment before an emotional collapse
Joined: August 2009
Posts: 108
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Post by nyjoliebebe on Sept 28, 2009 9:41:56 GMT -5
they're just desperate to sell the last remaining tickets for said show that's all
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Post by mrsillmatic on Sept 28, 2009 9:49:25 GMT -5
they're just desperate to sell the last remaining tickets for said show that's all Umm please reread, those are for online viewing of the show, not actual tickets for the venue. |
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Post by mrsillmatic on Sept 28, 2009 9:50:15 GMT -5
HipHop DX
By Kathy Iandoli
Rating: Multi-Platinum
Throughout her two-decade career, Mariah Carey hasn't been without flaws. She is at times a prime example of separating the artist from the art - save a few very specific career hiccups (Glitter anyone?). Spraypainting her crazy all over the walls of the music industry didn't help either. Luckily for Mimi, her music has withstood the test of time and Memoirs Of An Imperfect Angel is a continuation of that musical grace.
The Emancipation Of Mimi marked Mariah's third career turning point. We met the first one in between Daydream and Butterfly when she discovered her sexy side - around the time rumors swelled that she'd eventually become a Bad Boy vixen (think "Honey" remix). The next came around the Glitter and Charmbracelet era, circa 2001-2002 when the slow mental decline began for Carey. While her music didn't always reflect that breakdown, it was chock full of overzealous whistle-tones and syrupy Pop ballads that kept her relevant at a time when TRL could have permanently marred her. Then she took a spa holiday and was reinvented for 2005's Emancipation. Both The Emancipation Of Mimi and E=MC² honed in on Carey's new skill-set for crafting songs that would inspire the girl who previously took a breakup a little too far, but eventually put her makeup back on and hit the club again. Now it's a brand new Mariah. Her marriage to Nick Cannon has left those who bet it wouldn't last with empty pockets and she seems sublimely (and scarily) happy. So here's the age-old Mary J. Blige question: if she's happy then what are we left listening to?
Well, the answer can be found in her early career - more "Dreamlover" than "Vision Of Love" - when love fueled her desire to sing and not the other way around. Memoirs is an amalgam of that era mixed with the established divahood that Carey has rightfully earned. There are of course some exceptions. The gossip-kissing "Obsessed" along with a "Shake It Off" revamped "Up Out My Face" (plus a disastrous drum-lined reprise) show that Carey is either really smart or really naive in thinking those songs maintain a fan-base. On the Pop side, they do, but her loyal following who now reside in the 30-40 year old age bracket might beg to differ. Memoirs' plentiful ballads are indicative of one undeniable truth: no one rocks a mid-tempo like Mariah. The opening tale "Betcha Gon Know" smooths the entrance of the album, and songs like "Candy Bling" and "The Impossible" keep the momentum going throughout. An attempted whistle-tone at the close of "H.A.T.E.U." doesn't necessarily indicate that Carey's pipes are rusting, but perhaps she's succeeding more with less blustery vocals these days. The album closes with a near-perfect cover of Foreigner's "I Want To Know What Love Is" that brings you right back to the moment you first heard "Hero" and knew that Carey wasn't leaving anytime soon. It's apparent she still isn't, "imperfect angel" and all, and we're quite all right with that.
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Junkiex
4x Platinum Member
Joined: June 2009
Posts: 4,431
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Post by Junkiex on Sept 28, 2009 9:50:55 GMT -5
they're just desperate to sell the last remaining tickets for said show that's all Umm please reread, those are for online viewing of the show, not actual tickets for the venue. This. |
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The Northern Star⭐
6x Platinum Member
I'll follow you from here like you're the Northern Star....
Joined: June 2006
Posts: 6,653
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Post by The Northern Star⭐ on Sept 28, 2009 9:55:31 GMT -5
Well I have officially heard the album now from Amazon. WOW. I LOVE IT. There's definitely a calmness to the whole CD without being boring but I'll review it later.
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nickcannon
Gold Member
Gotta read between the lines...
Joined: August 2009
Posts: 754
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Post by nickcannon on Sept 28, 2009 9:56:34 GMT -5
Just reposting this from the old thread (Part 7):
Obsessed 9/27/2009 87.243 15698 (+0.379)
I Want To Know What Love Is 9/27/2009 17.693 3172 (+0.407)
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The Northern Star⭐
6x Platinum Member
I'll follow you from here like you're the Northern Star....
Joined: June 2006
Posts: 6,653
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Post by The Northern Star⭐ on Sept 28, 2009 9:57:05 GMT -5
Boyz II Men are releasing a new album and their first single is OPEN ARMS. Their version can't touch the perfection that is Mariah's though.
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Junkiex
4x Platinum Member
Joined: June 2009
Posts: 4,431
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Post by Junkiex on Sept 28, 2009 9:58:15 GMT -5
Well I have officially heard the album now from Amazon. WOW. I LOVE IT. There's definitely a calmness to the whole CD without being boring but I'll review it later. YAY! Finally! I'm glad you loved it! I'm still shocked. I was actually fearing I was not going to like this album but it just wowed me! |
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