There's a reason why Mariah Carey has always given her albums ("Butterfly," "Daydream") the blandest, most uninspired titles imaginable: They contain the blandest, most uninspired songs imaginable.
Carey's ninth studio album, "Rainbow," proves no different. Hey, at least she's consistent.
Long gone are the days where the diva explored every note of her phenomenal eight-octave range to express a "Vision of Love" or to hope that a man would "Always Be My Baby." Here, Carey's innocence has turned to experience and she's inviting people - er, rather, insisting that they come along and listen to her as she copes.
In all fairness, Carey isn't simply retreading the same pop roots she parlayed to stardom nearly a decade ago. "Rainbow," which also lists her as songwriter and album producer, features Carey incorporating a more rhythm-and-blues sound to her mix.
And she's getting a little help from her friends. No fewer than five of the album's 12 full tracks (not to mention two insipid little interludes) feature Carey collaborating with performers ranging from Snoop Dogg to Missy Elliott to 98 Degrees.
One of these joint efforts is the album's first single, "Heartbreaker," pairing Carey with Jay-Z. This song, the album's first track, sounds decidedly out of the loop for an album populated by slow jams. Carey pouts about the end of a sour relationship but the tune's upbeat feel makes it sound as though she were already over the louse: So why bother even talking about it?
"CryBaby" is a somewhat more successful post-breakup song, where Snoop Dogg attempts to comfort a tear-ridden Carey. The number is surprisingly soulful, though Dogg gets in little more than "Dry your eyes / Baby don't cry."
Not even pop hit-meister Diane Warren (writer of such hits as Aerosmith's "I Don't Wanna Miss a Thing" and Celine Dion's "Because You Loved Me") can make "Rainbow" shine. The first of two songs penned by Warren for the album, the ballad "Can't Take That Away (Mariah's Theme)" sets the tone for the album.
In what seems like a rebuttal to all those skeptics who have criticized her over the years, Carey insists that "They can say anything they want to say / Try to bring me down / But I will not allow anyone to succeed hanging clouds over me." While it may be nice to know that she has such strong personal resolve, it's not worth paying $17 to hear her talk about it.
Warren's second song, "After Tonight," is a little better, echoing "My All," the best song from Carey's "Butterfly" album. William Ross' lush orchestrations are a nice accompaniment to Carey's questions about the durability of a newly discovered love. She begins sweetly enough, but by the end of the song, her vocal histrionics have again taken over. When Carey shouts, "Baby will you return to love me / After the night becomes the day," one almost wants the lover to get out while he still can.
Arguably the weakest layer of "Rainbow" is Carey's obligatory 1980s cover tune. Just as she mimicked Journey's "Open Arms" on "Daydream," here she manages to deprive Phil Collins' once heartrending ballad "Against All Odds (Take A Look At Me Now)" of all of its original freshness. She turns what was once levelheaded recognition of the end of a love into mere whining.
The song itself meshes well with Carey's theme of resilience, but where Collins' version managed to convincingly portray the determination and fear involved in going out on his own, Carey sounds a tad too deliberate and rehearsed to sound truly heartbroken.
The best song on "Rainbow" is "Petals," one that Carey wrote with Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis (the team who launched Janet Jackson to stardom) and James Wright. It is a tribute to the friends and relatives with whom she has lost touch.
She hints that perhaps her marriage to Sony headman Tommy Mottola is what severed Carey's ties to her past: "I gravitated towards a patriarch / ... I was resigned to spend my life / With a maze of misery." It's a welcome relief to hear the private singer be so candid. This may be the first real hint of honesty she has given in her career.
Carey's liner notes say "Rainbow" is meant to describe the emotional roller coaster she experienced over the last year, though she insists, "there's a story here with a very happy ending." Not quite - though if Carey continues to produce songs like "Petals," "Rainbow" could be the beginning of something beautiful.
Grade: C-
Read More
The best albums of 2014
By Noah Zeidman | December 4, 2014Across genres, it has been a pretty great year in music.
Top 10 movies of 2014
December 4, 2014This has been an excellent year for film, offering everything from gripping blockbusters to innovative personal films.
Iggy Azalea is “Reclassified”
December 4, 2014It has become common practice among music artists to repackage their albums in an effort to simultaneously boost single sales and dish out new content by slightly renaming the album or slapping “Deluxe” onto the title.
