Mariah the Scientist, like many of us, is still trying to make sense of love — and everything that comes with it. Since her major-label debut, MASTER, she’s been turning heartbreak into a catalog of beautifully specific warnings. Early album cuts like “Beetlejuice” and “Not a Love Song” introduced her as one of R&B’s most promising new voices, while RY RY World brought her one step closer to a breakthrough.
With To Be Eaten Alive, Mariah pulled back the curtain completely. Across her first three albums, she’s built something rare — a world where women (and men) can fall apart without feeling ashamed. Her songs hurt, plainly and repeatedly, but they always come with purpose. REVOLT looked back at Mariah the Scientist’s 13 best songs in no particular order. See our favorites below.
1. Spread Thin
To the man who broke Mariah’s heart, shame on you, but also, thank you for inspiring “Spread Thin.” The biggest highlight from The Intermission lays bare the exhaustion of being emotionally pulled in every direction by a partner who refuses to be honest, considerate, or fully committed. Countless R&B artists have explored these emotions, but rarely with the clarity and depth Mariah brings here.
2. Always n Forever featuring Lil Baby
Maybe the best part of “Always n Forever” is the way Mariah talks about love to a generation that’s either afraid of it or convinced it doesn’t exist. It’s essentially a love song rooted in loyalty and commitment, as she sings, “Broken hearts were made for two.” Lil Baby complements the track surprisingly well, especially considering how easily rap and R&B collaborations tend to veer off-course.
3. From A Woman
“From A Woman” serves as a sort of indirect collaboration with Young Thug, who dropped “From A Man” on the very same day (though we'll get to their actual duet later). Mariah offers the female perspective, in which she addresses the Atlanta rapper directly: “Won't call you Slime 'cause it don't fit / I see you as more than this.” Between the magic that London on da Track made with the instrumental and Mariah portraying the dream woman everyone wishes they could come home to in the video, “From A Woman” is a companion single done right.
4. Burning Blue
On “Burning Blue,” Mariah’s heart is cold as ice, until she meets someone who can finally thaw it, metaphorically speaking. Thanks to its momentum on TikTok, her viral "Jimmy Kimmel Live!" performance, and the strength of the production alone, this is a song everyone should know her for. It's exactly what we needed for her HEARTS SOLD SEPARATELY era.
5. 2 You
“2 You” is Mariah’s open letter to the man foolish enough to let her slip away. As much as she holds on to the memories, she knows it’s time to let them go, or “lay it in a grave,” as she puts it over Camper’s haunting production. Most romances end in tragedy, and here, Mariah reminds us there’s no shame in walking away from something that no longer serves us.
6. Beetlejuice
Miss Mariah poured her whole heart into “Beetlejuice,” a breakup ballad named after the horror-comedy classic. While she doesn’t name names (you can probably guess who, though) she reflects on listening to Frank Ocean’s Blonde with an ex, then the moment she realized someone else had taken her place. Mariah is so open about her fear of abandonment that she goes as far as to say she'd prefer death to being left behind. “He gon' drive me insane / He gon' be the one to / Take me to my grave,” she closes out the song.
7. Note To Self
Mariah opened her major-label debut with the stinging lyrics, “I need help / I've always been / S-E-L-F D-E-S-T-R-U-C-T-I-V-E / Can't you tell?” The nearly two-minute track sees her wrestling with the meaning of love and its existence, especially when everyone keeps telling her to look inward. Ultimately, she spells out her worst habit: seeking validation through someone else instead of herself.
8. Different Pages
“Different Pages,” much like the title suggests, finds Mariah coming to terms with being out of sync with her partner. Deep down, she knows that one honest conversation — and “maybe just a little motivation” — might’ve saved the relationship.
9. Walked In featuring Young Thug
The third track on RY RY World, “Walked In,” finds Mariah’s storytelling at a fever pitch as she sings about walking into a club at 2 a.m., locking eyes with a man — presumably her beau, Young Thug, who features on the track — and wanting to skip the small talk entirely. It’s the perfect first collaboration, if you ask us.
10. Reminders
“Reminders” is another painfully short track in Mariah’s discography, one that sounds like it belongs to a different era entirely. On the surface, it captures a relationship that seems picture-perfect, but deep down, it’s falling apart behind closed doors.
11. RIP
“RIP” opens with a certain energy, but that quickly unravels the moment Mariah sings the chorus, “And I dream to be a fool / That way you wouldn't know that I knew what you do.” It’s a painfully accurate reflection of how we bend over backwards to give our partners the world, when all they really want is Mars.
12. 77 Degrees featuring 21 Savage
How many Mariah the Scientist songs open with her setting the atmosphere? Evidently, quite a few. On “77 Degrees,” she wears nothing on her sleeves — at least emotionally — just a flood of thoughts about feeling deprived of real intimacy. “Having motion, give it up for love and devotion,” she sings. “I thought it was me that you wanted.”
13. All For Me
Mariah has the face, the body, the vocals, and somehow, she's still not enough for a man who gave it up for someone who “isn’t half of me.” Confusion, betrayal, and yearning spill out as she questions if there's someone else in the picture.