Notes

MARIAH GOES IN DEPTH WITH THE ARCANE ERA AND THE NEW SOUNDTRACK SINGLE ON BEATS ONE

Mariah Carey has had an incredible year following the release of Arcane. The music industry expected Arcane to debut with around 1.2 million copies. However, she managed to exceed expectations when she debuted at #1 with over 1.7 million copies sold worldwide. This cemented her position at the top and brought Mariah back onto the commercial map, proving doubters wrong. Throughout the month of November, Mariah has remained silent, making lambs believe that she is preparing for Christmas. Fooling everyone into thinking a Christmas release is the only thing that's coming, Mariah surprised everyone with a soundtrack single, where she's featured as the lead actress in a highly anticipated movie. The announcement and release of the new song shook the entire world, because this is possibly one of the biggest promotional campaign Mariah has done thus far. Making an exclusive appearance on Beats One, Mariah was interviewed by Zane Lowe, who is known for giving artists in depth interviews when they are on his show. Mariah sat down with Zane for an hour long exclusive interview, where she talked about her experiences during the Arcane era, what's it like to embark on the Drifting Away World Tour, and the campaigns that she took on during the era itself. She also talked about her brand new soundtrack single and how the theme of the song relates back to the forthcoming movie she's starring in.

We have a very special guest joining me on the show today. She has sold millions of records and broken multiple records this year as well. And now, she has recently announced that she will be featured as a lead character on a highly anticipated movie that will come out soon enough! Please welcome, Mariah Carey everybody!
Thanks a lot Zane! That was an incredible introduction by the way! (Laughs)

You’re welcome! (Laughs) This year has been such an incredible year for you, don’t you agree?
Yeah, it has definitely been an incredible year for me. But I really don’t think I can take all the credit for it because without God and my fans, I wouldn’t be here today. Therefore, I’m really grateful for all the success I’ve received this year.

Let’s start from the beginning of the Arcane era, before you released ‘Across The Hallway’. There was so much hype surrounding the project that when you unveiled the single in a secret iHeartMedia conference, fake threats emerged that the song had leaked. What was your reaction towards those leaks back then?
Honestly, it was really daunting for me because I’ve been working so hard behind the scenes, and to hear that someone got hold of your record was just demotivating. I think most of us artists strive to keep our projects as silent as possible and subsequently, release the project out for the world to enjoy. Sometimes these experiences are ruined by possible leaks by hackers and it really hurts because it’s something that you would want to reveal yourself. But instead of that, that moment would be ruined by someone else. However, coming back to the fake threats, I was relieved when Universal told me that it was fake threats and nothing more. That got me back to the groove of working hard again because I had that reassurance that my music didn’t leak, that my music was well guarded.

Back when you released ‘Across The Hallway’, did you have any expectations for the song commercially?
Honestly, I did have some expectations for the song because I wanted to do well, mainly because I wanted to pay back Universal for their unconditional support they’ve given me during my whole lawsuit with Sony Music. It meant a lot and I do understand that in the end, music corporations would want their investments to gain profit for them. But the thing was that I wasn’t just an investment to them. I was like family to them and they didn’t treat me like a money making machine, if you get what I mean. Most of the promotion I did for the Arcane era was my own personal decision. I think it was a mutual teamwork and equal effort between the team at Universal, and also my own.

You were off to a great start during ‘Across The Hallway’ but then you fell off momentarily because you went to Taiwan. We’ve never really found out why you vanished and I wanna get to the bottom of it today! (Laughs)
(Laughs) Well, I had to get away for a little while because of how overwhelmed I was really, and I don't want to push myself too hard after the debut week for ‘Across The Hallway’. I actually remember one of my team freaking out when I vanished and I was like, don't worry too much about it (Laugh) because at the time, I already had the ‘Across The Hallway’ remix with Celine all lined up for the Grammy award show performance. Back to the topic though (Laugh), I feel like some timeout was needed so that I would get my inspiration for the Arcane album to be honest.

Well, is it true that Arcane was partially inspired by your trip to Taiwan?
Actually, I have a song on the deluxe edition of the Arcane album titled ‘Good Memories’ and that was inspired by my trip to Taiwan. If you take notice of the outro of the song, the CEO of Faded Records actually recorded those Mandarin words on my behalf because I wanted to pay homage. The song is inspired by an experience I had in Taiwan and no matter what happens, I am grateful that I have had these memories in me. Also, the visuals on Arcane were actually heavily inspired by my trip to Taiwan actually (Laughs). I remember just being there up in the mountains and suddenly, the thought of using mountains as the main visual came to me. It made sense to the central theme of the album as well because in order to get to the top of the mountain, you have to go through hardships and challenges. If you ask some people who hike mountains, they would say that sometimes it's difficult and they want to give up. However, when they reach the top of the mountain, it was all worth it because the scenery is gorgeous. I think the same thing applies to the album. I went through so many challenges only to emerge victorious and hopeful at the end.

Okay, this may sound a little weird but I’m really curious. Out of all the songs that were released from Arcane, what surprised you the most critically and commercially?
(Laughs) Honestly? It’s Drifting Away that surprised me the most. I remembered playing the instrumental of the song to an executive and he didn’t seem fond of the song at first. So, the thought of releasing the track wasn’t at the top of my head. But when I released the album, the commercial performance of ‘Drifting Away’ really surprised me. I wasn’t expecting the amount of people loving the song. From what I heard, the song remained in the top 5 of the singles charts even before I made it into a single. And honestly, I was actually planning to release another song from Arcane but ultimately, I made the decision to release ‘Drifting Away’ because I think it made sense at the time.

You said about planning to release another song from Arcane. But what song was it? (Looks at Mariah intently before smirking)
Well… (nervous laughter) I was gonna release ‘Numb’ as the album’s third single, alongside ‘Simmer Down’ actually. That was the original plan until my team and I saw the surprisingly overwhelmingly positive comments surrounding ‘Drifting Away’ itself. I know that ‘Numb’ wasn’t going to do well on the charts but it wasn’t my intention anyways because I had a killer music video for it, which unfortunately, might not see the light of day. Hopefully I’ll get to release it sooner or later though!

Moving on to the Drifting Away World Tour. With the stunning visuals and incredible stage pyrotechnics, the tour is the biggest tour of 2017, drawing in the most audience. How was it like to embark on this world tour?
If you had told me a year before that I would draw in the most audience with my tour, I would’ve laughed really hard at you (Laughs). But honestly, it’s a really honorable experience to be able to tour because I’ve promised the fans that I would visit every continent and I managed to keep my word this time around. In addition to that m it’s really amazing because I got to meet thousands of fans over the course of the entire tour. The experience alone was incredible because a lot of work went into the stage design, visual ideas and concepts. To see the entire tour burst into life was just phenomenal and I’m grateful to my entire team for being able to make this a reality.

There’s one thing that made me curious to be honest. Why did you make the decision to call it the Drifting Away World Tour?
Actually, I wanted to call the tour the ‘Arcane World Tour’ but I thought that sounded a little tacky because it didn’t represent what the tour is all about. Then I decided to look at the album tracks when I stumbled across ‘Drifting Away’. It fit the theme of the entire tour so I made the decision to call it that way. In addition to that, I want to give the viewers an experience that they won't forget. That they feel like they are drifting away in a dream when they are witnessing the show itself. That would make the audience remember the tour clearly.

It’s clear that after the Arcane era, you made the decision to go away for a bit so that you would focus on ‘Playing The Mind Game’, which is the forthcoming movie that you’re starring as the lead act in. How did you ended up with this major role?
Actually, I approached them personally on a movie that I wanted to make for the Arcane era, in a way to end the era on a high note.

Really? Wow that’s amazing!
Well, let’s just say that I totally revamped the movie script for the movie due to some challenges that I faced. Some songs from Arcane will be featured in the movie itself and but the theme of the movie will be drastically different from what I originally intend to do. But it’s fine actually because I came up with something different instead which still fits the theme of Arcane.

How would you describe the genre of the movie?
I would say that it’s mainly thriller because of the feeling you get when you watch the movie. I can’t reveal much regarding the movie for now because it’s still in an ongoing progress. But what I can reveal to you is that the movie is very intense. There are a lot of twists and turns in the movie that will definitely draw the audience in. Also, I already gave you a teaser through my brand new soundtrack single dedicated for the movie itself! (Laughs)

Speaking of the soundtrack single, I was just going into it so this is fitting! I am going to play the song for the first time on Beats One soon enough. We will discuss the song in detail when we’re done listening to the song. Would you like to introduce to the listeners the song?
Sure! I am Mariah Carey and you’re about to listen to the world premiere of my brand new soundtrack single Betrayed!

-BETRAYED PLAYS-

Wow, that was an amazing experience! Let's talk about it. Who did you worked with during the creation of this song?
I worked with Jeff Bhasker, whom I've never worked with before this actually! (Laughs) I met with Jeff at a private party a few months ago and we talked about creating something together. I was actually already forming the lyrics and melody of the song at the time, so I went into the recording studio with him to work on the production of he song.

The song is amazing at first listen and it surely makes me want to repeat it again and again. Could we talk about the beautiful vocal layering in the song?
Thank you so much! Honestly, it was really tricky when it came to the vocal layering of the song because there were so many different components I had to add in. Although people won’t really notice the differences, I do think it’s important that we as artists attempt to put in effort into what we do when it comes to all those vocal layerings.

That’s really awesome to hear to be honest! Will we expect a music video for ‘Betrayed’ soon enough? Cause I can already expect a beautiful music video coming through!
The music video will make its premiere on Good Morning America this coming week so stay tuned for that! (Laugh) I can't reveal the details regarding the music video because I really want it to be a surprise. But a hint would be that it's simplistic but effective because it is not only promoting the song, but also the movie as well.

Moving on, we have to talk about your most recent Beats Campaign. You just recently released brand new products in your venture with Beats. What did you think about the success for the Ecstasy Passion product line, which is prior to the new release?
It’s really surprising to see the success of the product line really. Hence, I negotiated with the team at Beats for a brand new product line which would include some Christmas Specialties, just in time for the Christmas season! Back to the topic of the success of the Ecstasy Passion products - It was really touching because I was personally involved in the design and the ideas for the product so to see the huge return for the product line… just made me happy. I think the team at Beats were really impressed as well. Hence, the reason to expanding our collaboration outside of just the headphones only.

Alright! Unfortunately, we have run out of time for this interview. Thank you for sitting down with me for this exclusive interview, Mariah!
Thanks for interviewing me too! It’s truly a pleasure!

-BETRAYED PLAYS AGAIN-