Columbia 45202
Executive producer: Tommy Mottola
Track listing: Vision of Love / There’s Got to Be a Way / I Don’t Wanna Cry / Someday / Vanishing / All in Your Mind / Alone in Love / You Need Me / Sent From Up Above / Prisoner / Love Takes Time
March 2, 1991
11 weeks
“I’ve been writing songs my whole life,” says Mariah Carey. It was that preparation, a little luck, and an unforgettable voice that helped Carey secure a record deal at the age of 18.
Carey grew up with music. Her mother, Patricia, was a vocal coach who sang with the New York City Opera. At the age of 16, Carey was already making demo tapes and writing songs with partner Ben Margulies.
“‘Someday’ and ‘Alone in Love’ I wrote while I was in high school,” Carey says of the two tracks, which turned up on her debut album. Carey’s first professional gig, however, didn’t come until after she graduated high school. Through a friend, Carey learned that Brenda K. Starr was looking for a back-up singer. Carey auditioned and got the job.
During a break in touring, Starr encouraged Carey to accompany her to a CBS Records party. Starr passed Carey’s demo tape to CBS Records Group president Tommy Mottola, who listened to the tape in his limousine on the way home from the party. Mottola was so impressed after hearing a mere two songs that he ordered his driver to return to the party, but Carey had already left. (Mottola’s fondness for Carey would eventually go beyond her music — the two were married in 1993, but later divorced.)
Eventually, Mottola tracked down Carey and offered her a recording contract. He subsequently became so involved in the project that he served as executive producer.
“I had a lot of the songs before I got my record deal,” says Carey, “so the songs remind me of different things in my life while I was growing up. Right when I got the record deal, I wrote ‘Vision of Love’ and ‘Vanishing.’ It was an ongoing process.”
Instead of going for a single, big name producer, Mottola hooked Carey up with a number of different people to work with in the studio, including Rhett Lawrence, Ric Wake, Narada Michael Walden, and Walter Afanasieff. Margulies also received production credits, as did Carey herself on “Vanishing.”
Once the album was completed, Carey’s success came quickly. “Vision of Love,” her debut single, hit the top on August 4, 1990, a mere nine weeks after debuting on the Hot 100. The follow-up single, “Love Takes Time,” a last-minute addition to the album that was not even listed on the initial pressing, proved Carey was no fluke. That track hit the top on November 10, eight weeks after its chart debut.
With “Someday,” her third single, in the number two position on the Hot 100, Mariah Carey hit the top spot in its 36th week on the Top Pop Albums chart.
Yet Carey’s Number One single streak was far from over. On March 9, “Someday” knocked Whitney Houston’s “All the Man That I Need” from the top spot, to become her third consecutive chart-topper. When “I Don’t Wanna Cry” became Carey’s fourth Number One, she became the first artist since the Jackson Five to have their first four chart singles go to Number One. Says Carey, “It was the culmination of a lot of hard work and a lot of dreams.”
THE TOP FIVE
Week of March 2, 1991
1, Mariah Carey, Mariah Carey
2. To the Extreme, Vanilla Ice
3. The Soul Cages, Sting
4. Please Hammer Don’t Hurt ‘Em, MC Hammer
5. I’m Your Baby Tonight¸ Whitney Houston