Can’t get enough Mariah Carey? The endless droning of “All I Want For Christmas Is You” during the holiday season not exciting enough a proposition for you? Then you’re in luck! Pop empress Carey might release another version of her (double checking source material) alternative rock album.
That’s right, the singer who brought you “Always Be My Baby” and “We Belong Together” recorded vocals on a rock album in 1995 that her record company shelved. Carey was absolutely one of the biggest pop stars on the planet at the time, so depending on your point of view, it was either smart or cowardly to hold it back.
The album was actually released in 1995 with Carey’s friend Clarissa Dane on vocals as the band Chick after Sony refused to release her version. The band released two singles and made some videos but never really got anywhere, and disinterest from the label didn’t help.
In a recent Rolling Stone podcast interview, Carey said she was going to release her own version of the album and was also planning to potentially release something related or an update of it with another artist.
“[The recently discovered version] will become something we should hear, but also, I’m working on a version where there will be another artist working with me…. Possibly something built around the album,” she said on the podcast. She also shared that the songs were a creative release in a way she wasn’t usually allowed to sing.
“This was my outlet, and nobody knew about it. I honestly wanted to put the record out back then […] and let them discover that it was me, but that idea was squashed.”
She also revealed it was “like a girls’ Green Day group moment. And, of course, there was the Courtney Love era of Hole going on at the time. I even did the artwork—it was a dead roach and some lipstick.”
Carey worked on the album while she was simultaneously working on her hit album Daydream, according to a deep-dive on the album by Pitchfork. Because Daydream was so poppy and based on a Malibu Barbie character, the alter-ego goth princess music was seen as a good outlet for daily frustration.
“I was playing with the style of the breezy-grunge, punk-light white female singers who were popular at the time. You know the ones who seemed to be so carefree with their feelings and their image,” she said in her memoir The Meaning of Mariah Carey. “They could be angry, angsty, and messy, with old shoes, wrinkled slips, and unruly eyebrows, while every move I made was so calculated and manicured. I wanted to break free, let loose, and express my misery—but I also wanted to laugh.”
There’s no release date for the album, but we’ll keep you posted as things develop.