Flashback Friday: Mariah Carey – Heartbreaker

What I’m about to say may be controversial. But I’ve always preferred “Heartbreaker” to “Honey”. Still do. But what’s truly controversial, is that these both happen to be songs in Mariah Carey’s discography which have been tainted by the men affiliated with them. P. Shitty as the producer of “Honey” and Brett Shatner as the director of the music video for “Heartbreaker”.

Yikes.

At least “Heartbreaker” has a remix with its own video directed by an unproblematic woman.

When “Heartbreaker” came around, Carey’s jig was up. By this point (and it took me long enough) I began to hear the formula of these types of songs from her. “Heartbreaker” very specifically sounds a lot like “Honey”. But “Dreamlover”, “Fantasy”—it’s the same formula. But the songs were so good each time, that you couldn’t really shit on Carey for it. So, all you could do was acknowledge it, shrug and shimmy to the hook whilst pressing your finger against your ear. And listening to “Heratbreaker” now is funny, because of current conversations around acts and producers these days having no creativity when it comes to sampling, but instead just taking the instrumental of an existing song and having somebody sing a different song over it. Because that’s basically what Carey and DJ Clue did for “Heartbreaker”. What is DJ Clue even credited for, other than shouting over the beat!?

Lemme just press my finger against my ear chile.

And “Heartbreaker” is also deceptively simple. It sounds pretty plain, in the best of ways. But there’s nothing remarkable about the song on the surface. But then it has words like relinquish in one verse and inccessantly in the chorus. Like… Who throws words like this so casually in a song and does so without it feeling clunky or fucking up the melody? And then there’s how it’s sung. You think Carey isn’t doing much vocally and to the ear, she really isn’t. Not compared to what we knew she could do by the time “Heartbreaker” had released. But try singing “Heartbreaker” yourself. I tried, and was winded before the pre-chorus hit. Singing this song takes an insane amount of breath control that I just do not have. So I just have to lip sync to the damn thing.

HENNYWAY.

As per ‘the songs of the formula’, the music video for “Heartbreaker” was used to push a sexier image of Carey. Even from as far back as “Dreamlover”, when she was very much still under the control of Darth Mottola of the Columbia Empire, you could still see her trying to push her personal agenda in small and subtle ways. But by the time “Heartbreaker” came around, Carey had broken free and become who she really are. Dancing around in a halter neck top with a strap of which was fighting for its life. But we also saw Carey push humour more and more with each of these videos, to show that it’s all just fun.

Outside of the Lambily, Carey wasn’t exactly known for humour in her music videos. But “Heartbreaker” put her humour front and centre, with Carey not only partaking in a genuinely funny fight scene, but a fight scene with somebody she also plays—Bianca. Carey’s dark haired alter ego. Carey would promote “Heartbreaker” and Rainbow by doing bits as Bianca, which didn’t always land. But everything of her in the “Heartbreaker” video did. Along with those kicks and punches.

It wouldn’t surprise me if Carey’s choice to have this video be directed by a movie director and have a couple of ‘acting moments’ was her making steps towards the Oscar denied Glitter. But we ain’t getting into that mess now.

It’s a shame to be so euphoric, but… Happy 25th anniversary “Heartbreaker”. You got the best of me.