Ok, let’s set this straight immediately: I think this is a bad song. Not because it’s so admittedly insincere, all down to the “1964” version of the music video—I might even like that, in a way. All in all, not even because the whole arrangement and production are totally featureless (among the other things, I can hardly think of another pop hit with background vocals this dull). The main, foundational reason this song is irrevocably bad is that it is a melodic song with one melodic idea and that idea is weak (basically goose-stepping up and down some major seventh arpeggios), although who knows if, in the hands of Phil Spector, let alone Brian Wilson, it would have been the seed for more interesting things to happen—but my guess is that it would have just been discarded in the scrap-heap of stillborn sketches instead. Anyway, Walter Afanasieff is not Phil Spector, let alone Brian Wilson. And then quite early in the song Mariah Carey lets go and starts adding flourishes and variations which only slightly extend the range of the goose step without providing any significant extra information but, if anything, blurring a harmonic clarity that made some sense after all (eventually she even does something I’d dump her out of Harmony 101 for—singing the major sixth degree against the minor subdominant chord: the fact that Elton John does it too, even more blatantly, in “Circle of life” which I hate anyway is no excuse), and that’s basically it, and she doesn’t even show off with the absurd, mousy whistle-tones she’s capable of and, I have to admit, I somehow pervertedly dig (her terrible version of “O Holy Night”, a song I love because of Sufjan Steven’s beautiful rendition, has one or two towards the end and every now and then I play it on YouTube just for that). Even the middle eight is just formulary, not that I have anything against formulary pop music, but the melody meanders pointlessly and you couldn’t think of less exciting harmonic functions for a bridge than a descent of fifths from the dominant of the parallel tonic to the main dominant, going through a few ancillary and mostly minor chords—a sort of a plaintive version of the B of “I got rhythm”, which, come on, is not that interesting either, unless you have some serious bopper turning it inside out with tritones and stuff, and this is definitely not the case.
But there is one thing that stuck in my ear at that first listen, and has remained there ever since, and however abused I feel by it I can’t help humming it, and it’s probably not subtle but in its own way poignant (I was about to say brutal, and it might even be) and in all her oversinging Carey never over-ornaments it—I mean, never to the point of ruining it—and it’s an enharmonic twist that doesn’t really salvage the song from being a bad one, but makes me want to hear it periodically, especially in December. And the twist is “I just want you for my own”—D# on a B7, as strong and assertive and tense as the leading tone in a dominant chord, however secondary, can be—and then “More than you will ever know”—Eb on a C minor, the minor third of the minor subdominant, the very note defining the melancholic incarnation of the harmonic function in charge of everything sweet and soft in the major mode, the one Chopin uses when he wants us all to sigh, the one giving “In my life” its unmistakeably pensive taste. Of course D# and Eb are the same piano key but, although I might discuss this for hours with my friends into jazz or serialism (well, I guess I’m into both but that’s another story), they’re not the same note, not here, not when functions count, and this ambiguity is a miniature lesson in musical semiotics in how it fits the lyrics, in how “I want you” and “you don’t know a thing about it” mirror each other from the same pitch class. And it has something that makes me want to sit at the piano and play it like 10 times in a row because I like it so much, because it gives me the kind of kick of, I don’t know, unexpected ginger or chili in a chocolate cake, because I’ve always had a kink for enharmonic weirdnesses, such as when I was six or so and I used to beg my parents to let me watch the main titles of an obscure TV series (“Accadde a Zurigo” it was called) essentially because there was a diminished third in it although it was not something I could name back then. This one, Mariah Carey’s, is less in-your-face for sure, a relation of diminished second between two structurally corresponding notes, but I like it anyway, and I’m going to play it once again right now, the last one for tonight, I promise.
[As a bonus, I’ve been rummaging around for Christmas albums by major and not-so-major pop stars lately. Here are some of my findings: of course Phil Spector’s is the greatest, though the creepy feeling of hearing him wishing a merry Christmas to everybody over Stille Nacht while thinking he’s been in jail since more than ten years for murder just won’t go away. I love Sufjan Stevens’, as you already know. Bob Dylan’s is redeemed by his voice, still amazing in his 70s, but it’s cheesy and overproduced; the Beach Boys’ is just lame, which is sad given that Brian Wilson is the greatest of them all; Weezer’s is fun over the first two tracks, utterly annoying starting from the third one; Johnny Cash’s is True America, I guess, but I’m not; but if you want the possibly most surreal Christmas album track ever, check out Steve Lukather & Friends (his friends include Eddie Van Halen by the way) playing “Joy to the world”. Shall I say it’s good? Perhaps not, but…]
[And yes, I have some more Totally Unnecessary Musical Commentary looming around in my hard drive. I might as well upload them someday.]