{"id":806917,"date":"2020-04-29T11:45:28","date_gmt":"2020-04-29T17:45:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rollingstone.com\/?p=991334"},"modified":"2020-04-29T11:45:28","modified_gmt":"2020-04-29T17:45:28","slug":"how-a-connecticut-teen-propelled-a-12-year-old-mariah-carey-album-back-to-the-top-of-the-charts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/music-news\/how-a-connecticut-teen-propelled-a-12-year-old-mariah-carey-album-back-to-the-top-of-the-charts\/","title":{"rendered":"How a Connecticut Teen Propelled a 12-Year-Old Mariah Carey Album Back to the Top of the Charts"},"content":{"rendered":"

Some artists surround themselves with managers and consultants, and strategize for months on how to get their album to the top of the charts. Mariah Carey<\/a> hit Number One while she was sleeping.<\/p>\n

On Monday, Carey\u2019s eleventh studio album, E=MC2,<\/em> shot to the top of the iTunes album chart,<\/a> after a fan-generated hashtag calling for #JusticeforEMC2 began trending on Twitter overnight. The album, released in 2008, slowly re-entered the iTunes 200, ascending the list and peaking at the top spot by the time Carey woke up Monday morning.<\/p>\n

The achievement came more than a year after a similar hashtag got Carey\u2019s Glitter<\/em> soundtrack<\/a> to the top of the iTunes chart in 2018, 17 years after the album\u2019s initial release<\/a>. The #JusticeforGlitter campaign was so effective that the singer even added a couple of songs off the album to her \u201cCaution World Tour\u201d that year.<\/p>\n

Just how E=MC2<\/em> conquered the charts (again) is a testament to the power of a dedicated fan base and the rapid speed at which trends are formed these days on social media.<\/p>\n

\"mariah<\/a><\/p>\n

The album was first released by Island Records on April 15th, 2008<\/a>, debuting at Number One on the Billboard<\/em> charts. While it spawned the hit single \u201cTouch My Body\u201d (which gave Carey her 18th Number One hit on the Billboard<\/em> Hot 100 and helped her surpass Elvis Presley as the solo artist with the most Number One singles in history), the album\u2019s latest anniversary had passed without much fanfare or acknowledgement from either the label or Carey herself. But Carey\u2019s \u201cLambily\u201d (the name for the singer\u2019s fandom) had other ideas.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

According to a spokesperson from Twitter, conversation around the album and the use of the #JusticeforEMC2 hashtag started to take off early Sunday, before peaking late on Monday night. A little digging reveals that the hashtag was first used by 17-year-old David Gutierrez, under his Twitter handle, \u201cunocompetitor.<\/a>\u201d Gutierrez, who\u2019s currently self-isolating at home in Connecticut, says it was a spur of the moment thing, brought on by a mix of his love for the album, and a little quarantine boredom.<\/p>\n

\u201cI saw that the album was discounted<\/a> (iTunes priced it at $4.99 compared to $9.99 for most new releases) and it was slowly gaining momentum on the iTunes chart, so I, along with a few other fans, thought, \u2018Maybe we should get it to Number One,’\u201d Gutierrez tells Rolling Stone<\/em>. \u201cIt happened before with Glitter;<\/em> why not make it happen again?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re not able to do much due to this quarantine,\u201d the teenager adds, \u201cso why not kill some time listening to a good body of work?\u201d<\/p>\n

Twitter says the #JusticeforEMC2 hashtag had amassed more than 8,000 mentions before Carey first tweeted about it on Monday<\/a>. On Tuesday, the singer mentioned the improbable feat again, performing a snippet of \u201cLast Kiss,\u201d one of the ballads off the album (we reached out to Carey for comment but have yet to hear back).<\/p>\n

\n

Woke up yesterday to find out that E=MC2 is somehow the #1 album on iTunes!! On its 12th anniversary no less \ud83d\ude03 Lambily, you are the friggin’ BEST! I hope you enjoy this impromptu version of Last Kiss \u2764\ufe0f\u2764\ufe0f\u2764\ufe0f #JusticeForEMC2<\/a> #eternally12<\/a> https:\/\/t.co\/Z5FasE8DaV<\/a> pic.twitter.com\/AhfuE1kI7y<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 Mariah Carey (@MariahCarey) April 28, 2020<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Twitter says there have now been almost 25,000 mentions of the hashtag and counting. Carey\u2019s last tweet, meantime, has generated 15,000 likes as of this writing. Four songs from the album \u2014 \u201cFor the Record,\u201d \u201cMigrate,\u201d \u201cI Wish You Well,\u201d and \u201cThanx 4 Nothin\u2019\u201d also trended worldwide over the weekend. E=MC2<\/em> topped the iTunes charts for two straight days and is still in the top three<\/a> as of this writing.<\/p>\n

As for why this 12-year-old album deserves \u201cjustice,\u201d Gutierrez says he\u2019s never seen or heard Carey refer to E=MC2<\/em> in her interviews, and the album\u2019s recent anniversary date went by without any posts or mentions from the diva. \u201cI don\u2019t think Mariah understands how much us \u2018Lambs\u2019 cherish her bodies of work,\u201d he says. \u201cHopefully, #JusticeForEMC2 got her attention.\u201d<\/p>\n

For what it\u2019s worth, Gutierrez says he is actually a new fan of Carey\u2019s, having only recently delved into her catalog. \u201cI\u2019ve been hearing Mariah\u2019s classics on the radio since I was a kid,\u201d he says, \u201cbut I didn\u2019t become a fan until around the Caution<\/em> era, maybe a little later than that. It was such a good album,\u201d he says of Carey\u2019s 2018 release<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cOutside of being an amazing singer, she\u2019s a phenomenal songwriter, and I think that\u2019s one of the many reasons why I love her so much,\u201d he says. \u201cHer voice alone is enough to give you goosebumps, but when you dissect the lyrics of some of her songs, they touch the soul, and you can\u2019t help but to get emotional. She\u2019s the epitome of art, and I\u2019m so happy to be able to say I\u2019m a Lamb.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n

Popular on Rolling Stone <\/h3>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

via:: Rolling Stone<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Some artists surround themselves with managers and consultants, and strategize for months on how to get their album to the top of the charts. Mariah Carey hit Number One while she was sleeping. On Monday, Carey\u2019s eleventh studio album, E=MC2, shot to the top of the iTunes album chart, after a fan-generated hashtag calling for […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[98],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-806917","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-music-news"},"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-07-12 15:25:58","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSMT The Mountain","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/806917","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=806917"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/806917\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=806917"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=806917"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=806917"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}