As a live performer I had always found her difficult to watch, you were never quite sure what you were going to get and that unpredictability even at the height of her fame would always make me feel quite tense.
There is an added level of pathos which is impossible to escape. There was never another studio album and Amy Winehouse died in 2011 at the age of 27.īecause of what ended up happening to Amy it’s not as easy to listen to this album as it was when she was going strong. She had never contemplated anything like that level of success for her music and found the trappings of fame very difficult to cope with and the temptations that a healthy bank balance can bring too much to bear. Fame, was of course, a double-edged sword. Amy’s music and look soon ensured she was a household name everywhere.
In the US it did not reach the very summit but Amy became the first British woman to win 5 Grammys including “Record Of The Year”. The following week it dropped seven places but word of mouth was so strong that it wasn’t long before it was heading for the top spot which it achieved on its 11 th week on the chart.Īccording to a recent BBC 4 “Classic Albums” documentary it went on to sell 16 million copies worldwide and was a chart-topper in virtually every country in Europe. A lot of people did the same as its first week sales were enough for it to enter the UK album charts at number 3 (“Frank” had stalled at 13). I think I had seen the video of the lead single “Rehab” on what used to be a Saturday morning staple “The Chart Show” and all of this was enough to convince me to buy this album on the day it was released.
I’d read a couple of reviews which had seen it as a modern take on the 60s girl group pop of The Ronettes and The Shangri-Las. There was quite a buzz about this follow-up album before its release. I knew that it had a jazz vibe about it but wasn’t sure whether it was for me. I knew that her debut album “Frank” (2003) had been very well received but hadn’t really sought it out (I did later). Back To Black -Amy Winehouse (Island 2006)īefore the release of this album, I was aware of Amy Winehouse but, probably like most people hadn’t really listened to her a great deal.
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