By Jae-Ha Kim
Chicago Sun-Times
December 11, 2002
Step aside, divas. Mariah Carey is back. Big time. The figures are still being tallied, but it’s a strong bet that her new disc, “Charmbracelet,” will be the top debut on the next Billboard album chart. Estimates of first-week sales range from 200,000 to 270,000–about double what Carey managed with last year’s much-maligned soundtrack to her movie flop “Glitter.”
You could say she has rebounded with grace. After a very public emotional breakdown last year, Carey was dropped by Virgin Records. Island Def Jam Music Group snapped her up, and “Charmbracelet” was her first release on the new label.
“Mariah did way better than we expected,” says Darren Hallowell, product manager at Tower Records on North Clark. “It was weird ’cause no one knew how she’d do. But at our midnight sale [last week], a lot of people showed up to buy her record. And in one week, she has outsold Jennifer Lopez’s [two-week-old] album. Mariah isn’t selling as well as she did at her peak, but she’s doing really well. A lot of people seem to like that she’s returning back to her basics.”
Carey showed off her amazing vocal range last week on visits to “The Oprah Winfrey Show,” “Dateline” and MTV.
“Mariah is the standout artistically,” says Erik Bradley, music director of pop music station WBBM-FM (96.3). “She’s skewing a little older now because she has been around a long time. But her record label is being very strategic and methodical in their marketing efforts. It’s just starting to kick in. I was talking to this 23-year-old woman the other day and she said, ‘[Mariah’s] back!’ ”
She’s not without competition, though. Britney Spears may be out of the picture for now, but Jennifer Lopez is proving herself a force on the album charts. Soundscan reports that Lopez–whose film “Maid in Manhattan” opens Friday–sold 314,125 copies of “This Is Me … Then” in its first week of release, by far her strongest debut to date.
“The thing Jennifer has going for her is that she’s all over the place,” said B-96 program director Todd Cavanah. “She’s very in sync with every aspect of her career. She’s on the cover of every magazine. She’s got movies. And her label is doing a great job marketing her. Plus, she has a younger appeal than Mariah or Whitney [Houston].”
As for Houston, whose new “Just Whitney” arrived in stores Tuesday after a publicity push that included a bizarre, widely seen interview with Diane Sawyer, few expect her to factor into the diva sales contest.
“Whitney’s album is a horrible piece of work,” Bradley says.
Cavanah adds, “Put a fork in her. She’s done.”
First-week sales comparison
2002 “THIS IS ME… THEN” 314,125
2002 “J. TO THA L-O: THE REMIXES” 156,000
2001 “J. LO” 272,000
1999 “ON THE SIX” 112,000
MARIAH CAREY
2002 “CHARMBRACELET” Figures out today
2001 “GLITTER” 116,000
2001 “GREATEST HITS” 54,500
1999 “RAINBOW” 320,000
