In her early career she recorded her demo tape and was a backup singer for Brenda K. Starr, but the pay was not enough, so she took several part-time jobs to help pay for expenses. She signed her first recording deal, when Brenda passed on the tape to Tommy Mottola, who was an executive at Columbia Records. Her first album, dubbed “Mariah Carey”, was an instant hit, partially due to a large promotional budget; the album reached top spot on the Billboard 200 charts and produced 4 hit singles, including “Vision of Love”. Her second album “Emotions” was critically unsuccessful, even though the same name single topped the US Hot 100 chart.
“Music Box” was the most successful album of Mariah’s career to date, reaching top spot in UK Singles Chart for the first time and yielding such number-one singles as “Without You”, “Hero”, and “Dreamlover”. Her holiday album “Merry Christmas” also became one of the best selling albums.
The success didn’t stop there, with her album “Butterfly” yielding “Honey” as a top ranked single in the United States. She also contributed to the soundtracks to the movies “Men in Black”, “How the Grinch Stole Christmas”, and “The Prince of Egypt” with a single “When You Believe” winning Oscar Award in the process, a track that she co-recorded with Whitney Houston.
In the late 90’s she altered her music style that now featured a modern beat, resembling that of R&B, when she sent two of her singles “Heartbreaker” and “Thank God I Found You” all the way to the top of the charts. The rise of younger talents however, such as Britney Spears, Christina Aguilera, Kelly Clarkson and others in the early 2000’s have took the industry by the storm, with pop radio stations favoring these new phenomena over maturing icons, such as Celine Dion or Mariah Carey. Despite her temporary slump, she came back strong releasing several successful albums, including “The Emancipation of Mimi”, and “E=MC²”. She topped the charts with her singles “We Belong Together” and “Touch My Body”, bringing her total number of top ranked singles to eighteen bypassing the King of Rock’n’Roll Elvis Presley. Her popularity has earned Mariah her own star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
