With the Daydream album and Fantasy single both peaking at top of both the Billboard (overall and genre) and ARIA (state and national) charts, Mariah Carey has secured herself as the biggest recording artist around the world.
HOBART (23 Oct 1995)- As predicted in last months' Archer Review, Mariah Carey's Fantasy single recently claimed the top spot on Australia's national chart (achieving gold accreditation in just three weeks), while maintaining its number one ranking on the Billboard overall US Hot 100 Singles chart for the fourth week in a row. Fantasy maintains a similar position on all subsidary charts, including Billboard's Hot R&B, Hot Dance, Single Club Play, overall Singles Sales, overall Maxi-Single Sales, Dance Maxi-Single Sales and R&B Singles Sales charts. The single has also peaked at the top spot on the US airplay charts.
In other countries, the Fantasy single's performance has been equally positive. In the UK, Fantasy peaked at number three, while it recently took the number one position in Tokyo. Fantasy is also performing well in less well-known European and Asian countries, and has securied a top ten or twenty position in even the most obscure parts of the world.
Following in the footsteps of Fantasy, the album from which it comes, Daydream, debuted at #1 on both the Billboard and ARIA album charts and still holds this position. In the US, Daydream sold almost a quarter million copies in its first week, and stunned ARIA by attaining its first platinum accreditation in its debut week (selling in excess of 100 000 copies).
Daydream's debut at number one in the US, the UK, Japan and Australia is another clear demonstration of Mariah's worldwide appeal. In Sweden, Daydream debuted at #6, and like Fantasy, has had similar success in other European and Asian countries.
Japan has so far been Daydream's biggest success story, as the album smashed the Japanese record for first week album sales by selling a staggering half million copies. This smashes the previous record, set by Bon Jovi's These Days, by an amazing 108 000 copy margin. The success in Japan has continued, with sales in Daydream's second week exceeding 328 000, which is still better than Mariah's homeland sales.
The recently released Fantasy remix single is likely to continue Fantasy's success in the coming weeks. It is not quite clear whether sales of both singles will be combined on the charts, or whether a separate entry for the Fantasy remixes will be installed. In either case, watching the progress of this, perhaps the better of the two discs on offer, will be interesting, and it is likely that more chart records will be broken.
The vocally stunning and emotionally poignant second single from Daydream, One Sweet Day, a duet with Boyz II Men, is set to replace Fantasy on the singles charts in the coming month. The teaming of two of the biggest contemporary recording artists around will without doubt lead to One Sweet Day smashing even more chart records than the multitudes Fantasy already has.
And yet the success will not stop here. Daydream has plenty more hit singles on offer, including Underneath the Stars, Open Arms, Always Be My Baby and Melt Away.
FANTASY SINGLE CHART (October Archer Chart Position: #1 after two months) Pos. Title Co-producer* Disc Index Points 1 The Boss Mix David Morales Fantasy (Remixes) 3 19.95 2 Def Club Mix David Morales Fantasy (Original) 5 19.75 3 MC Mix David Morales Fantasy (Remixes) 2 19.70 4 Sweet Dub Mix David Morales Fantasy (Remixes) 4 19.50 5 Radio Mix David Morales Fantasy (Remixes) 1 18.50 6 Album Version Dave Hall Fantasy (Original) 1 18.25 7 Bad Boy Mix Sean Combs Fantasy (Original) 4 15.00 8 Bad Boy Fantasy Sean Combs Fantasy (Original) 2 14.90 9 P.'s Club Mix Sean Combs Fantasy (Remixes) 5 14.85 10 Bad Boy c ODB Sean Combs Fantasy (Original) 3 14.84 DAYDREAM ALBUM CHART (October Archer Chart Position: #1 debut) Pos. Title Co-producer(s)* Index Points 1 Fantasy Dave Hall 1 19.95 2 Daydream Interlude David Morales 11 19.75 3 Always Be My Baby J. Dupri and M. Seal 5 19.70 4 Looking In Walter Afanasieff 12 19.65 5 Open Arms Walter Afanasieff 4 18.90 6 One Sweet Day Walter Afanasieff 3 18.55 7 Melt Away 9 18.50 8 Forever Walter Afanasieff 10 18.45 9 Underneath The Stars Walter Afanasieff 2 18.40 10 I Am Free Walter Afanasieff 6 18.35 *- All Daydream tracks were produced by Mariah Carey OVERALL ALBUMS CHART (Current rankings of albums from Mariah Carey) Pos. Title Publisher Year Tracks Length Points 1 Daydream Columbia 1995 12 46:43 19.85 2 Music Box Columbia 1993 11 47:27 19.80 3 Emotions Columbia 1991 10 47:02 19.61 4 MTV Unplugged EP Columbia 1992 7 28:48 19.60 5 Mariah Carey CBS 1990 11 46:42 19.50 OVERALL SINGLES CHART (Current rankings of singles from Mariah Carey) Pos. Title Album Year Points 1 Fantasy Daydream 1995 19.95 2 All I Want For Christmas Is You Merry Christmas 1994 19.94 3 Dreamlover Music Box 1993 19.90 4 Hero Music Box 1993 19.89 5 Vision Of Love Mariah Carey 1990 19.85 6 I Don't Wanna Cry Mariah Carey 1990 19.80 7 Miss You Most (At Christmas Time) Merry Christmas 1994 19.76 8 Emotions Emotions 1991 19.74 9 Without You Music Box 1994 19.73 10 Make It Happen Emotions 1991 19.72
(The Archer Chart is compiled based on music favoured by the Archer at the time of publication.)
Article by XSX4U@aol.com; Photographs by Dreamlover (Jason So)
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Articles copyright 1995 Kade "Archer" Hansson; e-mail: archer@kaserver5.org
Last updated: Thursday 21st November 1996