Mariah Carey

Featuring a mix of upbeat dance pop and tearjerker balladry, Emotions was one of the biggest albums of 1991. Carey's vocal pyrotechnics were pushed to the front of almost every song, an obnoxious thing to do at the time. But hearing her dog-whistle register now is kind of amazing. That sound may stand as the definitive nostalgia-inducer on future oldies radio.

A rookie success as spectacular as Mariah Carey's tends to spark a backlash, and Carey was
derided by skeptics who saw that Columbia Records had spared no expense in
accessorizing her with the most dependable collaborators money could buy. Emotions
addresses the perception of Carey as a fabricated star, as well as the comparisons to
Whitney Houston, by giving the twenty-one-year-old singer greater control: She... More >