Mariah Carey‘s Emancipation of Mimi will celebrate a milestone anniversary this weekend, marking 20 years since its April 12, 2005, release. The musician kicked off the party early last year with an expansive Las Vegas residency in celebration of the album. But now she’s keeping it going with The Emancipation of Mimi (20th Anniversary Edition) and an additional digital deluxe edition, both set for release on May 30
“I’m really happy to celebrate ‘Mimi’s Emancipation’ with this special anniversary re-release,” Carey shared in a statement. “While working on this edition, I got to relive all the memories from this pivotal moment in my personal and professional life. This album has some of my biggest hits to date, as well as some personal favorites that are very special to me. Forgotten gems, unreleased bonus tracks and different remixes with incredible collaborators – all of these and more are now available in one place for the first time ever!”
The physical version of the anniversary edition will include a 45-track 5LP box set including recent live performances of Emancipation of Mimi tracks, a cappella renditions, instrumentals, and unreleased cuts, including “When I Feel It,” which was leaked online in 2005 but never released due to sample clearance hiccups. It will appear on Side J along with the Esentrik remix of “It’s Like That,” the Kaytranada remix of “Don’t Forget About Us,”— which is out now — and the medley of “Don’t Forget About Us” and “We Belong Together” that Carey performed at the American Music Awards in 2024.
“When you sit down and go through the whole Emancipation of Mimi as an album, and go, ‘Some of these songs were a little bit more that way or a little bit more this way,’ it’s just really interesting,” Carey told Rolling Stone last year as she prepared to kick off her Las Vegas residency. “I love the album so much that it’s hard to pick it apart and go, ‘Oh, I like this part less than I like that part.’ It really is one unit.”
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The more time she spends with the album over the years, Carey said, the more she loves it. “Certain songs that I really didn’t get a chance to perform very much — like ‘I Wish You Knew,’ ‘Your Girl,’ and ‘Circles’ — we kind of made medleys out of a lot of these songs,” she said. “That album just ended up being my favorite body of work that I’ve done.”
An a capella version of “Circles” will be featured on the anniversary release, as well as an a capella version of “Shake It Off” and an instrumental for “We Belong Together.” Carey launched an official website for the release that pays homage to her early 2000s fan site, a nod to the fans who have been with her for decades. “There’s just something about that time period and about everything that went into my work, my music, and my life at that time that really is the essence of who I am,” she said.
