Many won’t acknowledge that the music world lost someone of value this past weekend. A lot of people will just play it off with jokes, because it was just another hopeless junkie, one hit wonder who ruined their life and was on a downward spiral to bring nothing more than death and destruction.
I can almost guarantee that the people who agree with that above are the ones who never took a full listen to Amy Winehouse’s “Back to Black” album, or even her debut album, “Frank.”
It left a bitter feeling in my gut when I opened my news page to see that Winehouse joined the 27 club. I’ll admit, I had been one of those people who followed Amy to see what mess she had gotten into for the week. In fact she had a section in my news feed, but the biggest part of me was hoping that she would get herself together, write some music about her overcoming her addictions, and demons, and move forward with tour dates, and onward with her life with a brighter outlook. She could have conquered the world of music.
It’s clear Amy was a perfectionist. She delayed her (hush-hush) new album release for nearly a year, and rumors are milling that she had nearly three albums worth of content, which never seemed to reach the limit of being acceptable in her own minds eye.
An ex-acquaintance introduced me to Amy Winehouse in 2005 as, “The girl with the horse face, and the powerful voice.” The acquaintance was right, and I never looked back, but I looked beyond just her one hit wonder “Rehab” and to what else she could bring to the table.
A lot of people probably won’t understand why I’m writing about Amy Winehouse, because many will think that I’m standing up for drug addiction, or troubled souls, but I’m not, I’m standing for the music, and what the music could have been.
Winehouse leaves behind no legacy to a biological offspring, but only to a God-daughter named Dionne Bromfield, who was on Winehouse’s independent record label. I’ve been following Dionne for the past two years in hopes she’ll catch on to the US crowd, and perhaps, it’s the death of a God-Mother than will boost the attention to the only legacy Amy has to offer besides her own music.
Artists like Adele are not just showing sympathetic favor when they state that Amy “paved the way for artists like us…” Winehouse brought a revival to R & B/ Soul and a love for reliving 60’s pop songs with a modern message to communicate to the era of today.
So make all the “She should have said, Yes, yes, yes, to Rehab” jokes you want about her, but the truth is, that we have lost the Janis Joplin to our generation, and the Katy Perry’s, and Lady Gagas will come and go, but in our old ages who’s posters will be littering the stores that will cater to our nostalgia?
And I bet you it’s not going to be Justin Beiber. ;-)
