British singer-songwriter Amy Winehouse was a
phenomenon: a Jewish girl from a London suburb with a retro beehive, a
devil-may-care attitude and a voice that channeled Aretha Franklin and
Ruth Brown. Music industry figures on both sides of the Atlantic hung
their hopes on her, and her breakout album, “Back to Black,” did not
disappoint, selling millions of copies.
Less than a decade after her emergence as an original
talent, she was more likely to be mentioned in the company of pop
music’s tragedies — namely artists like Kurt Cobain, Janis Joplin, Jim
Morrison and Jimi Hendrix, whose self-destructive habits led to their
deaths at the age of 27.
Winehouse, a five-time Grammy winner, was found dead in her London home Saturday. Like Cobain and the others, she was 27, too.
The cause of death was not immediately known, but she
had sought treatment, as recently as last month, for health problems
that have been reported to include drug and alcohol abuse and
early-stage emphysema.
“We are all heartbroken and saddened beyond words,” her publicist, Tracey Miller, said Saturday in confirming Winehouse’s death.
Outside her home in the Camden district of London,
scores of fans gathered, some bearing flowers and other scrawling
emotional messages on the sidewalk. Tributes flowed on Twitter and other
media from celebrities ranging from actress Demi Moore to the Rolling
Stones’ Ronnie Wood, who said he planned to dedicate Saturday’s reunion
performance of his band The Faces to Winehouse.
Her death was not a surprise to many followers of her
career. In recent years her musical achievements were overshadowed by
reports of run-ins with the police, missed or aborted shows and
struggles with addictions. She appeared gaunt and ill-kempt in photos.
In early June she had been in a London clinic known for treating
psychiatric, drug and alcohol problems. A few weeks ago, after a
disastrous performance in Belgrade, she canceled a 12-city European
tour.
Called a soul revivalist by critics, Winehouse became
an international star with “Back to Black,” released in the U.K. in the
fall of 2006 and in the United States in March 2007. With 2.7 million
albums sold in the U.S., it eventually hit No. 2 on the Billboard album
chart and went double platinum.
Driven by the success of “Back to Black,” recording
companies scoured Britain for young female soul singers, and over the
next five years Winehouse’s influence would become apparent in the work
of Duffy, Estelle, Leona Lewis, Lily Allen and others. Singer Adele, who
has the best-selling album of 2011, is the most prominent British soul
singer to acknowledge Winehouse’s influence.
Neil Portnow, president and CEO of The Recording
Academy, which awards the Grammys, said Winehouse’s “rich, soulful and
unique voice reflected her honest songwriting and earned her a devoted
fan following, critical acclaim, and the genuine respect and admiration
of her musical peers.”
Winehouse was born in a London suburb on Sept. 14,
1983. Her father, a cab driver, and her mother, a pharmacist, broke up
when Winehouse was 9. She remained especially close to her father, who
loved jazz. She grew up listening to Julie London, Dean Martin, Frank
Sinatra as well as Thelonius Monk.
Her interest in music led her to enroll at London’s
famous Sylvia Young Theatre School but she was expelled after two years
for piercing her nose. She moved to an all-girls school where she
learned to play piano. Although she was immersed in jazz she gradually
developed other tastes. She was fond of the artists TLC and Salt-N-Pepa.
She also was infatuated with old ’60s girl bands, particularly the
Shangri-Las.
In 2002, when a friend promoted her talent to his
manager, she landed at the Brilliant 19 management agency. The next
year, she signed a contract at Island Records. She was 20.
In 2003 Island released her first album, “Frank,”
inspired by her love of Sinatra. But she displayed an independence that
went beyond Sinatra, combining jazz, R&B and hip-hop. Writing in The
Times of London, Dan Cairns described her voice as “one of the most
extraordinary to be heard in pop music for years. A cracked, racked husk
that will one moment coo at the object of her affection, the next emit a
caustic rasp at the target of her scorn.”
She hit a slump, broke up with her boyfriend, and
admitted that she had writer’s block. In 2006, her beloved grandmother
died, reportedly the only family member who could tame her wilder
impulses. It was a fateful loss for Winehouse, her father later
suggested. Her problems with drink and drugs escalated to the point that
her managers urged her to enter treatment. Her answer was the song
“Rehab,” named song and record of the year at the 2008 Grammy Awards and
featured on “Back to Black.” Its insistent refrain: “They tried to make
me go to rehab, I said “no, no, no”.
Stardom apparently held little allure for Winehouse.
To her managers’ dismay, she disparaged the machinery of celebrity, once
sniping, “I don’t care about all that pop stuff and I couldn’t go to
the Smash Hits poll winners’ party without bringing a gun.” She showed
up drunk in public so often that British tabloids nicknamed her “Amy
Wino.”
She canceled appearances and some of her gaffes
became viral videos, such as when she was taped singing racist lyrics to
a children’s song. She later apologized.
The signs of impending disaster seemed all too
obvious to those around her. Earlier this month, after she recorded a
song with Tony Bennett for a new album of duets, he expressed concern
about her to a London newspaper. “Of all the contemporary artists I
know,” Bennett told The Guardian, “she has the most natural jazz voice,
but I’m worried about her and I’m praying for her. She’d help everyone
by sobering up and cleaning up her spirituality.”
In June, she went on stage in Belgrade for the first
stop on her European tour. Apparently drunk, she mumbled, meandered and
fell on stage, and struggled to remember the words to her songs. The
crowd pelted her with paper cups and booed.
A brief marriage ended in divorce in 2009. Her survivors include her parents and a brother.
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BACK TO BLACK
Although Amy Winehouse’s debut “Frank” was released
in 2003, her breakout came in 2007 with her acclaimed sophomore — and
final — effort, “Back to Black.”
—Released in the United States on March 17, 2007.
—Peak Billboard magazine position: No. 2 on March 1, 2008
—Total U.S. sales: 2,296,000
—Seven singles were released from the album, including: “Rehab,” “You Know I’m No Good,” and “Love Is a Losing Game.”
—Winehouse and the album won five Grammys in 2008,
including Best New Artist, Best Pop Vocal Album, and Record of the Year
and Song of the Year (for “Rehab”). Producer Mark Ronson earned the
Grammy for Producer of the Year, Non-Classical.
—Randall Roberts
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(c) 2011, Los Angeles Times.
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