Despite glitches, diva delivers the treats
By Sean Daly, St. Petersburg Times, August 8, 2006

TAMPA - She has been a prodigy and a punchline, a pinup girl and a poster child for the pitfalls of celebrity excess. But throughout a 16-year career that has been just as curvy as that ample figure she likes to flaunt, Mariah Carey has always been able to rely on one true constant:

Her all-world pipes, a vocal gift that's downright superheroic in these prefab days of pseudo pop stars a la Paris Hilton and Lindsay Lohan.

That's a nice talent to have, and Carey sure knows it. Her show at the St. Pete Times Forum on Monday - just the second night on her current U.S. tour - suffered an array of bumps and clunks unbe-fitting a polished diva. The show started way late, the seven-piece backing band was far too loud and obtrusive, and her dance troupe often scuffed around like a gang of misfit mimes.

But thanks to an array of high-wire vocal derring-do, the 36-year-old Long Island native never lost an adoring crowd of 16,493 fans for too long.

After being the biggest-selling female artist of the '90s, Carey had rough start in the '00s. That is, until 2005, when her comeback album, The Emancipation of Mimi, sold 10-million copies on the way to besting rapper 50 Cent for the biggest-selling disc of last year.

Carey's glammed-out spectacle reflected that regained confidence and rebooted ego. On an epically scaled stage framed by a giant "M," Carey first appeared in black bikini and matching cape to sing 2005 hit It's Like That. For her next numbers, Heartbreaker and Dreamlover, she was criminally drowned out by her band including three background singers far too high in the mix - that is, until she battled back by uncorking some of those patented glass-shattering vocal acrobatics. Why, it was like Superman using his heat vision - um, in a bikini.

Rehearsal vibe or not, the show had a lot of sun spots. Carey, still in that black bikini, wiggled and posed in front of a giant flashing "MIMI" sign as she cooed out current smash Shake It Off. After she shed her bathing suit, she appeared in a perilously low-cut, leg-flashing yellow dress for smoldering come-ons Stay the Night and Fly Like a Bird. And in a likably self-effacing moment, Carey offered a gorgeous version of the Jackson 5's I'll Be There as an apology for a show she admitted was still "a work in progress."

Because one stage isn't enough to contain the power of Mariah - especially when she's dressed in a hiptastic ensemble of low-slung jeans, tight tube top and naughty pumps - the singer and a few of her mimes took to a checkerboard stage in the middle of the audience for a showstopping mini-set that included sweet club hit Fantasy and chummy sing-along Always Be My Baby.

The show lost momentum during the myriad costume breaks, when Carey would show a goofy video or have a DJ scratch out some hits. But Mimi would unfailingly get things going again, especially when she sang big-time ballad Hero in a cleavage-enhancing aqua dress that made her look like the Little Mermaid's stripper sister.

Of course, Mariah's hubba-hubba routine was downright Victorian compared to opening act Sean Paul, the Jamaican-born hitmaker whose dancehall reggae is all about dance-floor freakiness. In case you missed his subtle point, Paul flanked himself with clothing-averse dancers who crawled and writhed and gave each other piggyback rides (no, really). His band was loud, his beats were big and his verbal toasting was randy, as he grinded through such smashes as (When You Gonna) Give It Up to Me, Get Busy and Temperature.