"You're Mine (Eternal)" is a song by American singer and songwriter Mariah Carey included on her fourteenth studio album, Me. I Am Mariah... The Elusive Chanteuse (2014). It premiered on February 12, 2014, as the third single from the album. It was written and produced by Carey with Rodney Jerkins. An R&B song, the lyrics revolve around the singer reminiscing about a past lover. Critical response to the song was positive: Carey's breathy vocal style and use of the whistle register at the climax earned praise from critics. It also drew several comparisons to one of Carey's previous singles, "We Belong Together" (2005).
In the United States, "You're Mine (Eternal)" reached number 88 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, but it experienced greater success on the Dance Club Songs chart, becoming her seventeenth number-one song. Elsewhere, it reached the top 20 in Hungary and on the UK R&B Chart and the top 30 in Spain.
Carey co-directed the music video with photographer Indrani, which depicted the singer as a mermaid swimming around the lakes at the El Yunque National Forest in Puerto Rico. R&B singer Trey Songz appears as a love interest in the video, and is featured on the official remix of the song, which received its own separate music video. Carey has performed the song at the BET Honors and during a performance at the Empire State Building.
Background and release
On December 31, 2013, Carey appeared on NBC's New Year's Eve with Carson Daly show to perform some songs. Before giving the audience some advice on love for 2014 and prior to singing "The Art of Letting Go" from Me. I Am Mariah... The Elusive Chanteuse, the singer announced that she would be releasing a new single on February 14, 2014, to coincide with Valentine's Day. On February 12, Carey released "You're Mine (Eternal)" as the album's third single. The single's artwork consists of Sweethearts, a brand of sugar candies.
In the United States, the song was released to contemporary, rhythmic, and urban adult contemporary radio stations around the country on February 18. An urban remix featuring vocals by American recording artist Trey Songz was also made available to download digitally on February 13. In an interview with MTV News, Carey praised Songz vocal ability, saying that most artists are not able to sing and rap while maintaining "a sound that's current yet also classic". Carey further released multiple dances remixes of "You're Mine (Eternal)", including the Jump Smokers Radio Remix, Jump Smokers Extended Remix, and Jermaine Dupri X Kurd Maverick Germany To Southside Remix. Additional remixes by Fedde le Grand, Gregor Salto and Funkin Matt, and Chus and Ceballos were released on March 15.
Composition
"You're Mine (Eternal)" is an R&B love song written and produced by Carey and Rodney Jerkins. The song is composed in the key of D major using common time and a moderately slow feel of 75 beats per minute. Carey employs a breathy vocal style as she sings the lyric "I can't seem to live without your love". Lyrically, Carey reminisces about a past lover, singing "I can't seem to live without your love/ Suffocating here by myself/ Dying for your touch". Instrumentation consists of hypnotic, "smooth, steady" piano beat, which slowly builds to a climax with Carey hitting a whistle note for a sustained period of time at the end of the song. Music Times writer Carolyn Menyes described the "up-and-down" melodic structure as "captivating", which causes the listener to be drawn "deep into Carey's musical abyss". The urban remix featuring Songz incorporates an enhanced pop feel compared to the original, with additional drums and Auto-Tune on Songz vocals. "You're Mine" garnered comparisons to one of Carey's previous singles "We Belong Together" (2005). While Christina Garibaldi of MTV News and Jamieson Cox of Time simply highlighted that they have similar melodic structures and vocals styles, Alexa Camp of Slant Magazine was critical of the likeness between the two songs, writing that she was disappointed to hear a "retread" of "We Belong Together" following the positively received "retro" first and second singles "#Beautiful" featuring Miguel and "The Art of Letting Go", respectively.