The Remixes

About

The Remixes is the first remix album by American singer and songwriter Mariah Carey, released on June 25, 2003, by Columbia Records. It is primarily a collection of remixes of some of Carey's songs: disc one is compiled of club mixes, while disc two contains Carey's hip hop collaborations and remixes. Following the demise of her marriage with Sony Music CEO Tommy Mottola after the release of her sixth studio album Butterfly (1997), American singer Mariah Carey negotiated her exit from record label Columbia in exchange for the release of four albums: #1's (1998; her first greatest hits album), Rainbow (1999; her seventh studio album), Greatest Hits (2001; her second greatest hits album), and "The Remixes" (2003; her first remix album). By the time of the latter's release, Mottola had resigned from Sony Music and Carey was consequently more creatively involved in the album than Greatest Hits, for which she admitted not knowing of its impending release in 2001. In a 2003 interview with the Scripps Howard News Service, Carey summed up The Remixes' release as "a contractual Sony thing". However, Carey told The Hollywood Reporter she had always wanted to put out a remix album and reflected positively about its tracklist. "The Remixes" received a staggered release worldwide as a cassette and compact disc. Sony Music Japan International released the album in Japan on June 25, 2003, to correspond with Carey's Charmbracelet World Tour dates in that country. While a United States release was scheduled for the previous day, Columbia Records delayed the album multiple times to July 1, August 5, and September 2, before releasing it on October 14. Elsewhere, The Remixes was released on October 6 in the United Kingdom, October 14 in Taiwan, October 21 in Canada, October 24 in South Korea, and November 3 in Australia. "The Remixes" is a dance, pop and R&B album. Disc one features songs with disco, electronica, gospel, house, and techno influences, while disc two contains hip-hop collaborations with rappers. The album features Carey's duet with Busta Rhymes, I Know What You Want (2002), originally recorded for Rhymes' album "It Ain't Safe No More". It also includes two tracks previously only available in Japan: the So So Def Remix of "The One", a canceled single from Carey's Charmbracelet (2002) album; and the remix of "Miss You" featuring Jadakiss, which was originally recorded for "Charmbracelet" and samples "It's All About the Benjamins", which featured Jadakiss as part of The Lox alongside Diddy, Lil' Kim and The Notorious B.I.G. "The Remixes" sold 40,687 copies in its first week of release in the United States. Jim Farber of the New York Daily News described the sales as poor for Carey but understandable for a remix album. It debuted and peaked at number twenty-six on the Billboard 200 albums chart, lower than the number three peak of her previous album "Charmbracelet" but higher than her prior compilation album "Greatest Hits", which peaked at number fifty-two. The album spent a total of five weeks on the chart, the lowest of Carey's career at the time. It experienced greater success on the genre-specific Top Electronic Albums chart, where it spent two months at number one. As of November 2018, The Remixes has sold 289,000 copies in the country according to Nielsen Music. It was certified Gold by the Recording Industry Association of America in October 2019. As a double album over 100 minutes long, the album achieved Gold status after it sold 250,000 equivalent units instead of the standard 500,000 because its CDs are counted separately for certification purposes. Elsewhere, The Remixes peaked within the top forty of album charts in New Zealand, South Korea, and the United Kingdom.

via Last.fm

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