Vibe.com, April 24th, 2005
Throughout her career, Mariah Carey has been a lot of things to a lot of people. But, from her early years as the ear-shattering, all-American princess to her most recent position as the queen of the rumor mill, Carey's overwhelming vocal ability and knack for crossing boundaries to appeal to a diverse hip pop and R&B audience have not changed. She's also unusually resilient, and her latest album The Emancipation of Mimi - continues the public therapy that began not long after her hospitalization for "exhaustion" in 2001.
Mimi pulls Carey in two opposite directions. Most of the tracks find her paired with the hottest hip hop producers of the day; there, she exercises restraint and settles into a groove. But on the rest, she does what comes most naturally to heróbelting to her heart's desire, perhaps to mollify those who don't care much for her detours into raunchier rap territory.
The first single, "It's Like That," is an aggressive, off-kilter joint with a harshly stiff beat, produced by Jermaine Dupri. Obviously, this is the kind of tune that's going to solidify her comeback to the MTV crowd. Carey's voice adds a thick layer of gloss to Dupri's heavy bass. Her phrasing is more staccato than ever, and her interplay with late-night New York radio personality Fatman Scoop on the outro gives this song a credible hip hop feel. A more typical R&B composition from Dupri is "We Belong Together," a broken-hearted lament for lost love. Here, Carey's vocals ride in and out of a kick-drum, finger-snap-driven track. The hip hop, slow-jam hybrid (a la Lil Jon's "Lovers & Friends"), combined with her bottle-breaking high notes, creates an appeal that will cut across generations.
Joints like the funky break-up song "Shake It Off" and the Twista-assisted street jam "One and Only" prove Carey's continuing hip hop affinity. But her vocal pyrotechnics push the boundaries of that genre while keeping more conservative heads in the loop. And nothing on this album says that more than the Neptunes-produced "Say Somethin'," a musical oddity marked by strange instrumentation, weird melodic shifts, hectic drum patterns, and Carey's upper-octave doodles. As she coyly sings, "If it's worth your while, say something good to me," Snoop Dogg mutters about getting buckwild.
Meanwhile, "Mine Again" is sure to resonate with the old guard and give the new generation another Carey groove to emulate. The track starts out as a ballad - just Carey, accompanied by an electric keyboard and a rhythmic vinyl sound - then builds into a traditional gospel R&B song. It's a heartfelt performance that's more emotionally honest than other songs here. The slightly jazzy "Fly Like a Bird" is another down-home production that's a cry for unconditional love. Its inspirational message allows Carey to fully exercise her vocal acrobatics, proving that she can still blow her army of imitators off a stage.
Although she botched that crazy, sexy, cool approach with her two previous efforts (Charmbracelet and Glitter), Mariah gets back to her winning formula with Mimi. Her yin and yang method, with its schizophrenic mix of the '80s and 21st-century hip hop, works wonders for Emancipation. So if she wants to continue brandishing her gift for over-the-top expression and capitalizing on savvy collaborations with today's hottest stars, she should go right ahead. Her fans are still craving it.
