Listen to Mariah Carey's "Runway" featuring Japanese rapper KOHH

Japan not only received the Skrillex produced "Runway" as a bonus track, but they got a version of the song which features KOHH; who Hikaru Utada fans will know of from the Fantôme album standout "Boukyaku".

"Runway" was originally tagged as an iTunes exclusive, but is also available on the Spotify Japan release of Mariah Carey's 15th studio album Caution. Yes bitch. FIFTEENTH ALBUM.

One of the issues that I had with pretty much every guest featuring rapper on Caution was that they didn't get enough bars, there was no back and forth between Mariah or her geust featuring rappers, and that she didn't flavour her guests' bars with any harmonies or ad-libs as she used to back in the day. Whilst we aren't treated to the latter here, KOHH takes up A LOT of space on this song. I was expecting him to get a few bars towards the end of it, but he ends up with the second verse all to himself.

I'mma be relying on any of my Japanese followers to give a proper translation and full context. But it sounds like KOHH's verse is about flossing. I caught the words 'pool', 'Dom Peringnon' and 'VVS chain'. So he's taken the term runway and made that shit fashion by the sounds of things. But I could be pulling his words out of context.

KOHH is an interesting addition to the song and I do wonder how he got shortlisted for this gig and what Mariah thinks of his verse. Does she even know him? I wonder if Miming Mimi even approved it or if it was an executive decision made between Epic records US and Japan. Putting a Japanese artist on one of her songs is a good look for the Japanese market, but none of this feels like it had much of Mariah's input or involvement.

I prefer the original version purely because it feels almost as though Mariah is singing the song to herself, so it makes sense for her to own the whole thing. Plus, KOHH doesn't really add anything to the song at all. In fact, I think he makes it worse. He just doesn't fit the song.

Side bar thought. I would have loved to have gotten a Japanese exclusive version of "The distance" which featured Japanese rapper Aklo instead of Ty Dolla $ign.

If you've not listened to Caution already, then your ass should. It's a great album and one of Mariah's best.