USA Today Rating: 3.5 stars out of 4
For a woman who has one of the most technically astonishing voices in pop music, Mariah Carey has at times seemed oddly inclined to try too hard. And who could blame her, really, given the gleeful snark that she has inspired in detractors — first for sounding (and looking) too perfect, then for her forays into hip-hop and attempts to sustain her viability as younger acolytes crowded the field.
So what’s most striking about Carey’s new album — titled, rather insistently, Me. I Am Mariah …The Elusive Chanteuse and now streaming on iTunes Radio ahead of its May 27 release — is how relaxed and confident she sounds. Gone is the self-consciousness that marred her last studio album, 2009’s Memoirs of an Imperfect Angel. Instead, Carey — whose delays of Chanteuse’s release date inspired predictable hand-wringing (as did the less-than-spectacular performance of the lead singles) — gives the impression that her only concerns are meeting her own standards, and those of the fans who have stuck with her through everything.
The tender, aching ballads and joyful pop-soul numbers here both mark a return to form and reveal increased nuance, particularly in the singing. The artful melisma, robust belting and decorative high notes are still there, but Carey spends a great deal of time using her supple middle and lower registers to convey feeling simply and directly.
Tunes such as the pensive, piano-driven Cry and the dreamier Supernatural, an account of maternal love featuring Carey and husband Nick Cannon’s young twins, showcase the creamy and husky textures of her voice while keeping the focus on sentiment, not ornamentation. The spine-tingling Camouflage, co-written and produced by Carey and Big Jim Wright (other collaborators include longtime colleagues Jermaine Dupri and Rodney Jerkins), finds her pining performance embellished with gospel-tinged backing vocals.
There’s also a poignant cover of George Michael’s One More Try, and the snappy, twinkling Meteorite, which begins with Andy Warhol’s observation that everyone will be famous for 15 minutes — which seems truer today than it did when he made it, or when Carey’s career launched 25 years ago, for that matter. Elusive or not, this chanteuse is a survivor, and that’s a rare thing in today’s fickle, polarized pop landscape.
Download: You Don’t Know What to Do (featuring Wale), Camouflage, Cry
New York Daily News Rating: 4 stars out of 5
Mariah got the memo.
For her first pop album in five years — housed under the diva-like title “Me. I Am Mariah….The Elusive Chanteuse” — the star needed to heed the warning of her disastrous last work. And she has.
That disc, 2009’s “Memoir of an Imperfect Angel,” became the worst selling, and most creatively dire, recording of Carey’s nearly quarter-century career. It also set off the longest stretch since she scored a slam-dunk smash single, dating back to 2008’s “Touch My Body.”
Carey’s new music was long-delayed. In between, she put out an indifferent Christmas album and started fresh recordings, only to abandon them. The star also had personal challenges, like a pregnancy (with twins) she has described as “really difficult.” Worse, she had to co-judge “American Idol” with Nicki Minaj
While the new “Chanteuse” has a formal release date of next Tuesday (May 27th), iTunes started streaming it early this morning.
The music reacts to Carey’s fallow years in most every way it should. It returns her to the type of grand balladry, and formal melodies, that first made her a star. It’s her most melodic, least-trendy album in memory – both moves that greatly flatter her.
Though the disc contains cameos from rappers like Nas and Wale, it has far fewer hip-hop inflections than the faux-hip “Memoir” disc. Instead it stresses songs like the opening weeper “Cry,” an inspired throw-back to initial hits like “Vision of Love.” Accompanied primarily by piano, Carey unfurls the full range of her instrument, something she had too often scaled back of late to suit songs over-indebted to their beats. The result lets her lean into the song’s drama, which she engages completely.
That’s not to say that Carey has abandoned more up-beat material. “Meteorite,” which starts out quoting Andy Warhol’s “15 minutes of fame” line, shoots us back to the days of Studio 54, with a spiraling, string-drenched disco beat. The pre-release single “#Beautiful,” with guest star Miguel, has a classic R&B melody, boosted by a looming backbeat.
Whether in more elegant ballads, or most assertive R&B songs, the new tunes give Carey more to play with than usual. It’s as if she’d been listening to Beyonce’s albums, gaining tips for how to bridge trendy music with the classic type. Even a hip-hop influenced ditty like “Thirsty” has a broad tune.
As on many discs, Carey sticks in a famous cover. They’re often corny ones (see: her run at Foreigner’s “I Wanna Know what Love Is” last time). But here she makes a smarter choice – George Michael’s “One More Try.” Backed by a gospel organ and choir, Carey dances over the notes, wringing every ripple out of the tune. She even tailors her worst tics – those endless melismas – using them to mine emotion rather than to falsely impress.
Contrary to its title, the new album may be Carey’s least elusive work. Rarely has she made her talent more clear.
Entertainment Weekly Rating: B
Let’s start with that subtitle: The Elusive Chanteuse? It’s hard to take it seriously when the first two words in Mariah Carey’s new album title are Me and I, and she’s standing right there on the cover in a crocheted swimsuit like a vision of Aphrodite that somebody airbrushed on the side of a van. And although the singer hasn’t released a proper studio full-length since 2009’s Memoirs of an Imperfect Angel, she’s been everywhere: claiming she needed ”a fragrant moment” with her perfume on HSN; telling 20/20 that she gave birth to her now 3-year-old twins while blasting her own song, ”Fantasy,” in the delivery room; having a hold-my-hoops showdown with Nicki Minaj on American Idol. (Her time as a judge on Idol, she told Billboard, ”was not festive.”) So it’s genuinely exciting that she opens her new album with ”Cry,” an emotional Mariah-at-the-piano ballad that could make people start to care about the music again.
Working with longtime collaborator Jermaine Dupri, Carey front-loads the track list with midtempo R&B and soulful torch songs that spotlight her best asset: That Voice. She comes on strong with Jennifer Holliday-in-Dreamgirls bravado on ”You Don’t Know What to Do.” (”You’d better SING IT, girl!” yelps guest Wale appreciatively.) And she’s whistle-toning all over the end of ”Dedicated,” a fun, Wu-Tang-sampling tribute to hip-hop’s golden age, featuring Nas.
Nostalgia is a big theme here, both lyrically (she’s looking through old photo books on ”Faded”) and musically, with arrangements that borrow from Inner Life’s disco rave-up ”I’m Caught Up (In a One Night Love Affair)” and the O’Jays’ Philly-soul classic ”Let Me Make Love to You.” Stevie Wonder even whips out a harmonica solo for ”Make It Look Good” that could’ve been unearthed from the crates. There are still way too many slow, generic love songs and too much schmaltz, like the harp-strumming ”Supernatural” (featuring the giggles and babblings of ”DemBabies, a.k.a. Ms. Monroe and Moroccan Scott Cannon, a.k.a. Roc N’ Roe,” according to the album credits). But it’s easy to get nostalgic yourself during the gospel epic ”Heavenly (No Ways Tired/Can’t Give Up Now),” backed by a full choir and samples of the late Rev. James Cleveland, with Mariah trilling like crazy. This might not be the ”Vision of Love” Mariah, but she sounds more like that girl than she has in a while.
That Voice has been through a lot, and you can hear it. There are times on The Elusive Chanteuse when she’s trying to power through a note where it sounds like digital technology might be holding her up by the straps of that crocheted swimsuit. But who else has survived EDM and Auto-Tune and still climbs her way up the octaves like this? Ariana Grande may have been christened the ”new Mariah,” but we still need the old one. And she is telling you that she’s not going.
Best Tracks: ”Heavenly” | ”#beautiful”
Yahoo! Music writes: Mariah Carey accomplishes a feat with Me. I Am Mariah… The Elusive Chanteuse that pop stars rarely achieve: Twenty-four years and 13 other studio albums into her career, she compiles one of her best sets yet.
As the title states, Me. I Am Mariah captures her essence. Oblivious to shock value trends plaguing pop music, Carey sings a collection of love songs over a mixture of gospel-tinged ballads, 1980s R&B, and hip-hop soul.
Her last pop albums, 2009’s Memoirs of an Imperfect Angel and 2008’s E-MC2, only scored one top 10 hit each. Carey has apparently taken the three and a half years since she dropped her 2010 Christmas record to hone the Me. I Am Mariah tracklist.
As her singles “You’re Mine (Eternal)” and “Beautiful” featuring Miguel reflect, Carey is sticking to the basics — straightforward, undeniable vocals. The album’s emotional opening track “Cry” sets the pace. On the stripped-down piano production, her tone matches the song’s sombre story of longing for intimacy.
Me. I Am Mariah offers many moody moments. On “Camouflage,” she makes a plea for compassion from a mate. She delivers one of her most authentic church-singer styling’s on the hymn “Heavenly (No Ways Tired/Can’t Give Up Now” with the heartfelt lyrics: “Nobody told me the road would be easy/I don’t believe he brought me this far to leave me.” Her children, Monroe and Moroccan, appear on “Supernatural,” one of the album’s few blissful songs. Monroe even displays her talent, repeatedly crooning a lyric during the song’s one-minute outro.
The album offers several other upbeat moments. Carey’s current single “Thirsty” is a catchy, smack-talking track fit for urban radio. She teams with Miley Cyrus’s “We Can’t Stop” producer Mike Will Made It for the rumbling “Faded.” And she goes old school R&B on the Nas-assisted “Dedicated,” the roller-skating jam “You Don’t Know What to Do” with Wale, and the Q-Tip-produced house track “Meteorite.” Surprisingly, her cover of George Michael’s 1987 ballad “One More Try” is not a standout; instead, she sounds like she’s just going through the motions, overproduced and detached.
Me. I Am Mariah (the deluxe edition of which includes songs with Mary J. Blige and R. Kelly) could spark a buzz as big as her 2005 smash, The Emancipation of Mimi, which spawned the classic “We Belong Together.” Regardless, it will absolutely shut down the comparisons to new kid on the block Ariana Grande.
Me. I Am Mariah comes out May 27.
Mariah Carey’s new album “Me. I Am Mariah… The Elusive Chanteuse,” is available for pre-order from:
iTunes by clicking one of the following links: Standard Edition | Deluxe Edition
Amazon is also offering pre-orders of the CD editions of the album by clicking one of the following links: Standard Edition | Deluxe Edition