Mariah Carey delays album, 'Today' show appearance: What's going on here?

If you marked down any Mariah Carey-related events on your calendar for this month, you’d better hope you used erasable ink. Not only has the release of her upcoming album, Memoirs of an Imperfect Angel, been repeatedly pushed back — from Aug. 25 to Sept. 15, then again to Sept. 29 — but the diva recently postponed several promotional events, including planned appearances on NBC’s Today show, on VH1’s Storytellers, and at the Hollywood Walk of Fame. What gives?

“Mariah is working tirelessly on finishing up her album, doing promo for her film Precious and launching a new perfume with Elizabeth Arden,” a rep for Carey’s label told the Music Mix. “Release dates change all the time…It’s really nothing unusual.” The label rep also pointed to a post on the singer’s official site announcing that “we have shifted all of our TV and promo appearances to coincide with the new release date.” Fair enough, I suppose, though that strikes me as slightly circular reasoning. (The promo events were postponed because of the album release delay, which happened because…?) “It’s no big deal,” added another Carey publicist when contacted by the Music Mix, echoing comments made in a recent interview with People. “Everyone seems to think that it’s a big deal, but it’s not. She just wants to fine-tune some things [on the album].”

It’s certainly true that release dates often get changed without prior notice in the music industry. And maybe Carey’s label is just waiting for a single that’s bigger than the decent mid-level hit that “Obsessed” is shaping up to be so far. So what do you think? Why does Carey keep postponing things? And, if you’re a Mariah fan, are you content to keep waiting for Memoirs of an Imperfect Angel, or will you start to get impatient at some point?