Writing and Recording
By November 2004, Carey had already recorded several songs for her newly titled tenth studio effort, The Emancipation of Mimi. During a meeting with Island Records head L.A. Reid, he suggested Carey try and compose a few more strong singles, in order to assure the project stay afloat commercially. He told her how she had written some of her best work with Jermaine Dupri, and recommended she travel to Atlanta for a brief studio rendezvous. In an interview with MTV, she recalled how the process came about: "L.A. was like, 'You and Jermaine Dupri make magic together, why aren't you in the studio with him? I said, 'I love Jermaine, is he free? I know he's doing a million things, Usher and this and that'. But Jermaine said, 'Come on down'." During the course of her two day trip in Atlanta, the duo wrote and produced the album's eventual third and fourth singles, "Shake It Off" and "Get Your Number". At that point, Carey and her management at Island decided to re-think the album's first single, originally having been "Say Somethin'", Carey's collaboration with Snoop Dogg and Pharrell Williams. She recalled how since hearing her demo of "Shake It Off", she knew "It was my favorite song", and decided to substitute it as the album's primary release.
During one of Carey's later meetings with Reid, she decided to fly back to Atlanta, in hopes of possibly creating another batch of strong material. Following a second trip there, Carey and Dupri helmed the final two songs to be added to the album's roster, "We Belong Together" and "It's Like That". According to Carey, "We said, OK, we love 'Shake It Off,'. We don't know how we're going to top that, but let's just try'. It turned out that 'It's Like That' was the right fire-starter, and 'We Belong Together' was the bigger record." After hearing the last two songs they composed, Carey and her management unanimously agreed to releasing "It's Like That" as the album's lead single, however assuring that her favorite, "Shake It Off", would see an eventual release early on in the project. She described her sentiments regarding her trip to Atlanta: "I am so grateful I went to Atlanta. And I have to say, we wrote some of my favorite songs on the album. I'm so proud of Jermaine – he's so focused, and he knew what had to be done. You can never write off talent."
Read more about this topic: Get Your Number
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