Glitter (soundtrack) - Background and Development

Background and Development

Since her debut in 1990, Carey's career had been heavily calculated and controlled by her husband and head of her label Sony Music Entertainment, Tommy Mottola. For years, Carey's albums had consisted of slow and meaningful ballads, devoid of any guest appearances or hip-hop. In January 1995, as she recorded Daydream, Carey had already began taking more control over her musical style and genre influences. In 1993, Carey's previous release, Music Box became one of the best-selling albums of all time, with sales of over 32 million units. As a result, Carey was given more creative control on Daydream (1995), including being able to choose which song-writers and producers she wanted to collaborate with. She enrolled the production and rap-styles of Ol' Dirty Bastard, who was featured on the remix to her song "Fantasy". While he was hesitant at first, Carey's more commanding position on the album "paid off". It became an international chart topper, with critics calling their joint performance one of the pioneering songs of pop and R&B musical collaborations. During the recording and production of Carey's Butterfly in 1997, the couple separated, leaving Carey an extended amount of control over her yet unfinished album. Following their separation, she began working with younger hip-hop and R&B producers and song-writers, aside from her usual work with balladeers Walter Afanasieff and Kenneth Edmonds. While the album incorporated several different genres and components that were not present in Carey's previous releases, Butterfly maintained a steady balance of her classic ballads and newer R&B infused tracks. However, while Sony accepted Carey's new-found collaborations with writers and producers such as P. Diddy and Bone Thugs-n-Harmony, they still attempted to only allow the ballads to shine. After Carey's "Honey", the debut single from Butterfly, was released in September 1997, Sony halted the release of the succeeding R&B influenced tracks, only fully releasing a second worldwide single, "My All".

Following the release of Butterfly, Carey began working on a film and soundtrack project titled, All That Glitters. However, during that period, Columbia Records pressured Carey to release a compilation album, in time for the favorable holiday season in November. Consequently, Carey put All That Glitters on hold, and released Number 1's in November 1998. Following an additional studio album in 1999, titled Rainbow, in which she fully exerted creative control over the album and its sound, Carey then completed her contract with Columbia Records. With Rainbow, Carey pushed her music and image farther into hip-hop and R&B than she had ever attempted. Following its strong commercial success, Carey aimed to complete the film and album project for the summer of 2001. As the first record on her unprecedented $100 million five-album record deal with Virgin Records (EMI Records), Carey was given full conceptual and creative control over the project. She opted to record an album partly mixed with 1980s influenced disco and other similar genres, in order to go hand-in-hand with the film's setting. As the date grew near, the title was changed to simply Glitter. During early 2001, Carey ended her three year relationship with Latin singer Luis Miguel. Aside from the heavy publicized split, Carey had already been filming both Glitter and WiseGirls, as well as recording the soundtrack for the former film. Due to the pressure from the media, her heavy work schedule and the split from Miguel, Carey began posting a series of disturbing messages on her official website, and displayed erratic behavior on several live promotional outings.