HEARTBREAKER
(Mariah Carey - Jay-Z - Shirley Elliston - Lincoln Chase -
Michael Walden - Jeffrey Cohen)
Produced by Mariah Carey, DJ Clue, Ken Ifill
[The Inside Story Behind "Heartbreaker"]


[Jay-Z]
Yeah
Aight
(We're gonna do it like this)
Let's go
Jigga

[Mariah]
(Gimme your love, gimme your love)
(Gimme your love, gimme your love)

[Jay-Z]
Aight
You gotta bounce to this like this
You almost kinda watching this
Aha, whooo
Escape

[Mariah]
Boy your love's so good
I don't wanna let go
And although I should
I can't leave you alone
Cause you're so disarming
I'm caught up in the midst of you
And I cannot resist at all
Boy if I do
The things you wanna to
The way I used to do
Could you love me baby
You leave me feelin used
Cause you go and break my heart

Heartbreaker you've got the best of me
But I just keep on comin' back incessantly
Oh why did you have to run your game on me
I should have known right from the start
You'd go and break my heart
(Gimme your love, gimme your love)
(Gimme your love, gimme your love)

It's a shame to be
So euphoric and weak
When you smile at me
And you tell me things
That you know persuade me
To relinquish my love to you
But I cannot resist
At all
Boy if I do
The things you wanna to
The way I used to do
Would you love me baby
You leave me feelin used
Cause you go and break my heart

Heartbreaker you've got the best of me
But I just keep on comin' back incessantly
Oh why did you have to run your game on me
I should have known right from the start
You'd go and break my heart

[Jay-Z]
She wanna shop with Jay
Play box with Jay
She wanna pillowfight in the middle
Of the night
She wanna drive my Benz
With five of her friends
She wanna creep past the block
Spyin' again
She wanna roll with Jay
Chase skeeos away
She wanna fight with lame chicks
Blow my day
She wanna expect the rest
Kick me to the curb
If she find one strand of hair
Longer than hers
She want love in the Jacuzzi
Rub up in the movies
Access to the old crib
Keys to the new crib
She wanna answer the phone
Tattoo her arm
That's when I gotta send her back to
Her mom
She called me heartbreaker
When we apart it makes her
Wanna piece of paper
Scribble down "I hate ya"
When she know she love Jay because
She love everything Jay say, Jay does
And uhh

[Mariah]
Heartbreaker you've got the best of me
But I just keep on comin' back incessantly
Oh why did you have to run your game on me
I should have known right from the start
You'd go and break my heart

(Gimme your love, gimme your love)
(Gimme your love, gimme your love)

Heartbreaker you've got the best of me
But I just keep on comin' back incessantly
Oh why did you have to run your game on me
I should have known right from the start
You'd go and break my heart

(Gimme your love, gimme your love)
(Gimme your love, gimme your love)

Heartbreaker you've got the best of me
But I just keep on comin' back incessantly
Oh why did you have to run your game on me
I should have known right from the start
You'd go and break my heart

(Gimme your love, gimme your love)
(Gimme your love, gimme your love)

Rainbow was Mariah Carey's final studio album of original material for Columbia, her label home since her debut in 1990. "In all honesty, it was like I have one more album here and I want to move on, because my personal life had changed. It was difficult for me to still be in the system, but it was a great outlet for me to be ablt to go into the studio and write a song like 'Petals,' which is one of my most personal songs and remains one of my favorites. I think [it has the most] honest lyrics I've ever written."

"'Petals' wasn't a single." The label led with "Heartbreaker," produced by Carey with a friend she met through mutual acquaintences, DJ Clue. "He came up with the Stacey Lattisaw 'Attack of the Name Game' loop because he felt it was very much in my vein, like those happy kind of records. And when he came up with the 'It Ain't No Fun,' the remix, that's when I knew it was over. That's when I said this is the hottest record I've ever done, in terms of a club record. That and 'Fantasy' with Ol' Dirty Bastard, because you can still go to clubs and hear them play that 'Heartbreaker' remix with Missy [Elliott] and [Da] Brat. I love collaborating with Clue." Carey is also effusive about her "Heartbreaker" partner, Jay-Z. "It's fun when you find people you can relate to and that you respect. Jay-Z is someone I so admire as a writer and as an artist. We could be sitting in the studio and he could freestyle a rhyme that would be incredible just off the top of his head. He doesn't need pen and paper. I equate that to a singer who can pick up the mike and riff and ad-lib over a song and take you to a totally new place."

Carey recounts her inspiration for the "Heartbreaker" lyrics: "It was from the standpoint of girls who keep going back to that same guy and they can't help themselves. They know they're going to get hurt. I've been one of those girls, so I know there's a lot of them out there."

Providing backing vocals on "Heartbreaker" was someone Carey had known for a long time. Trey Lorenz was the male voice on her remake of the Jackson 5's "I'll Be There." "He's an amazing writer and singer," says Carey. "He's so influenced by old school stuff, yet he's so current. He's known me since before my first album, and he's a great, loyal friend."

There's a party atmosphere on the original version of "Heartbreaker" on the Rainbow album. But there wasn't a big crowd in the studio. "It's me, Clue, and Jay-Z, and whatever other producer things Clue put in," says Carey. "Being a DJ, he has a lot of different ideas for making atmospheric stuff on mix tapes."

"Heartbreaker" was Carey's 14th number one on the Hot 100, a total run up in just over nine years. With "Heartbreaker," she sailed past Michael Jackson's 13 chart-toppers to claim third place among artists with the most number ones. Only the Beatles (with 20) and Elvis Presley (with 17) had more than Carey, and she wasn't finished with the pole position.