Critical Fatwa

Some grand faiths have their own adversaries (like, say, Pharaohs and Pharisees) to scourge the faithful. But for those of us who hold music on high, there is but one many-faced demon — named not Legion, but Record Company. As digital music leads us to the promised land, we must declare a fatwa eternal on those who are but leeches on the body of rock and those Judases who aid them. For daring to re-release a poor album with a few bonus tracks, we denounce you, Mariah Carey!

Re-releasing a relatively new album with a few bonus tracks isn’t new; 50 Cent did it a few months past. (And don’t think we didn’t notice.) But trying to get the members of Carey’s young fanbase foolish enough to actually buy her album again, instead of downloading the few decent singles … oh, the greed! Like a cancer patient sneaking a smoke, the record companies have proven themselves incapable of curtailing the sin that will kill them — and Carey has shown the fawning sycophancy that has left her a first-rate voice and third-rate artist. May she remarry her label head so that she can sing while his Rome burns.

It is written.