Moments before the ball dropped in Times Square, Mariah Carey was set to perform in front of thousands of people in New York and likely millions watching on television. Many fans waited in freezing temperatures for hours just to get a glimpse of the singer, but I assume they were all disappointed when she actually began her performance.

As most fans know, Carey is infamous for lip-syncing at live shows, and this New Year’s performance only proved that it’s true. The artist blamed her on-stage fit on “technical difficulties” and continued to blame everyone but herself for the sticky situation, but the tapes indicate that it is hard to argue that she wasn’t faking her talent. However, you sometimes feel bad for Carey because she has a long history of embarrassing herself in front of crowds. In fact, last year’s Christmas Spectacular at Rockefeller Center included a sick Mariah Carey with a hoarse voice, which prompted a multitude of memes and tweets making fun of her singing. This incident may be the reason she decided to utilize lip-syncing this time!

In interviews about the event, Carey’s management team came to her defense and combated any claims that hurt the singer’s reputation. According to Entertainment Weekly, “right when it goes live, she can’t hear anything. The ears are dead.” On this account, her representatives are explaining that Carey was unable to sing because she couldn’t hear the music she needed to sing along. In addition, many of her managers believe that this mishap was actually planned to get more public talk. Her team gives a brief account of their conversation with the producer of the show: “You would prefer to air a show with technical glitches so you can have a viral moment rather than protect the integrity of your show and Dick Clark Productions?”

Unfortunately, it is difficult to choose which side is being truthful with such muddled information. I guess it’s up to us to determine fact from fiction in this Mariah Carey scandal.