Top Songs of 1990: #6: "Vision of Love" by Mariah Carey

I love this song. It is by both Miss Mariah herself and Ben Marguilies. I've always said Mariah was my guilty pleasure. But you know what? I don't even think she's in the guilty pleasure category now. There are lots of things that I appreciate/love about Mariah. Here are just some.

1. The woman has staying power. Her first single was in 1990! It is now 2009. That is pretty unbelievable.
2. I had huge curly hair and was verrrry awkward when this song came out. And seeing someone on t.v. with kooky-doodly hair like mine was so re-assuring to me. I looked at the t.v. screen and thought, "someone with hair that is bananas like mine is famous!"
3. She is one of those artists that I don't even really like all of her music ("Rainbow" was pretty bad. Never allowed myself to see "Glitter"--I knew she was better than that!), but I appreciate what she does. She really had one career in the 90's where she was singing Whitney-esque power ballads. And then she turned herself into this R&B diva in the 00's.
4. I mean, the obvious is her voice which is just this gift. Say what you will, but I think it is a National Treasure. THERE I SAID IT. I love how it can get scratchy and kind of WILD when she belts. It's like this beast that she lets loose from a cage. People may disagree with me, but I think her voice alone, never mind the songs; has soul. I'd listen to her sing anything.
5. The woman is actually a songwriter. She is not some pop creation with a great voice. If you look at all of her albums--All of them!--she is writing or co-writing all of her songs.
6. She kind of has this throwback diva-ness to her. The word "diva" is thrown around a lot, but this woman can actually carry it off. I mean, she calls people "lamb" in interviews.
7. Hunter still makes fun of me because one time we were watching her sing on "Oprah" or maybe it was "The Rosie O'Donnell Show" and i mumured how I loved her style. This was BEFORE she went a little "hoochie", but Hunter still does not let me forget this. But even when she wears little to no clothes, color me crazy, but I do think she has style!

And those are just some of the reasons I love Mariah.

And man--her range is OUT OF CONTROL. I had to put the capo on my guitar so I could sing several octaves lower than she does. Forget about it. I'm not going to even TRY and sing the notes she does.