It’s been almost two years since I went up to New York for Mari­ah’s Com­cast com­mer­cial shoot. Back then I was pret­ty opti­mistic about the direc­tion her career was head­ed. It’s been pret­ty amaz­ing to watch the bal­loon deflate.

I man­aged to get tick­ets to her recent Atlantic City show at the Bor­ga­ta. The seats were amaz­ing. The per­for­mance? Not so much. I think Helen summed it up best when she said her per­for­mance was more Atlantic City than it was Vegas, that it was more kitschy than cool. I’d say that was spot on.

After I read Jon Cara­man­i­ca’s ter­rif­ic review, I was look­ing for­ward to final­ly see­ing her per­form. Man, was I ever dis­ap­point­ed. It was a bru­tal com­bi­na­tion of bad sound, bad dancers, and an over­all lack of enthu­si­asm from Mari­ah, who seemed to just go through the motions. The back­up singers (and back­ing track) were so loud I often could­n’t tell when she was singing and I feared that might have been done inten­tion­al­ly. Over­all, it was just a lack­lus­ter per­for­mance by one of the few remain­ing super­stars in music.