Mariah Carey returns to New Year’s Rockin’ Eve nine years after on-stage upset

By Laura Harding, Deputy Entertainment Editor

Mariah Carey returned to the stage of Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve nine years after a disastrous performance at the annual show.

The star, 56, performed her 2009 track Obsessed live from Las Vegas during the US broadcast, hosted by Ryan Seacrest and Rita Ora in Times Square in New York City.

She strutted on stage in a sparkly silver and pink minidress and silver boots for the rendition.

The show also featured performances by Chappell Roan, Post Malone, Demi Lovato, 50 Cent, Maren Morris, Chance the Rapper, New Kids on the Block and KPop Demon Hunters stars Ejae, Audrey Nuna and Rei Ami.

In 2016, Carey famously suffered technical difficulties during the New Year’s Rockin’ Eve broadcast.

Preparing to ring in 2017, the pop star stopped singing her song Emotions, paced the stage and told the audience to finish the lyrics for her.

At the end of her performance she abruptly walked off stage and signed off with: “It just don’t get any better.”

She later admitted she was “mortified” by the disastrous New Year’s Eve show and told Rolling Stone: “The New Year’s Eve situation – that couldn’t be helped.

“It’s just something where if I can’t explain it to the entire world, then they’re not going to understand it, because it’s not what they do. Just like I wouldn’t understand somebody who had a desk job and how to do that.”

She returned to the stage the following year to ring in 2018 and performed her classic hits Hero and Vision Of Love without a hitch.

Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve airs on ABC in the US and is best known to sitcom fans in the UK for featuring in an episode of Friends, when Monica and Ross perform a dance routine on the show.