Amy Amy Amy

[luka]

whats the difference between winehouse and febuary? at least febuary makes it to 28.

 

[mistersloane]

And it seems to me, she lived her life
Like a candle and a spoon

 

[mistersloane]

My favourite Amy story was from a 'friend' who knew her because of 'business dealings' and that she had one of those home making candy floss machines in her house and she was there, alternately making candy floss and hoovering (the floor, with a vacuum cleaner) when she turns round to him and goes 'WHO THE FUCK ARE YOU? GET OUT OF MY HOUSE!' and he goes, erm, Amy, I'm ...... and we just did .... and she goes 'Oh yeah, right, sorry, want some candyfloss?' and then ten minutes later turns round and goes 'WHO THE FUCK ARE YOU? GET OUT OF MY HOUSE?' etc.

I love the candyfloss and vacuum image.

 

[benjybars]

she once bought me a tequila in The Good Mixer

tru stories.

 

[rwtt]

presumably you're joking, but i don't really see the comparison

sorry, i have literally no idea what i meant, i was blitzed. i think i saw some kind of eugenics angle in what you were saying but you should disregard it completely as the incoherent brainfart of a stoned drunkard.

 

[crackerjack]

Great cover. I might even buy it tomorrow in tribute.

Hmm, never can get photos to work here...

http://www.nme.com/magazine

 

[gumdrops]

saw the docu on ch4 last night which altho i knew blake was the inspiration for back to black just made me think a) he was a complete cunt b) she must have been seriously fucked in the head to have fallen that hard and to basically do whatever he told her to do (like take all the drugs he said she should try). really fucking tragic. but also fucking irritating in a way. i wanted someone to have slapped her and told her to fix herself up, not just have her parents on a stupid radio 2 phone in. i do love her however, and think she was an incredible songwriter/singer/personality but back to blacks 60s ULTRA retroisms always bugged me a bit - it was a bit kitsch. also awful to see how her look/body changed after the first album where she looked so much better.

 

[IdleRich]

"back to blacks 60s ULTRA retroisms always bugged me a bit - it was a bit kitsch"

Yeah, this is kinda how I felt I think - the songs were always pleasant enough but struck me far more as pastiche than something that I could really fall in love with. Not that that makes her death any less tragic obviously and maybe it's not something that I need to be writing about here.

 

[baboon2004]

saw the docu on ch4 last night which altho i knew blake was the inspiration for back to black just made me think a) he was a complete cunt b) she must have been seriously fucked in the head to have fallen that hard and to basically do whatever he told her to do (like take all the drugs he said she should try). really fucking tragic. but also fucking irritating in a way. i wanted someone to have slapped her and told her to fix herself up, not just have her parents on a stupid radio 2 phone in. i do love her however, and think she was an incredible songwriter/singer/personality but back to blacks 60s ULTRA retroisms always bugged me a bit - it was a bit kitsch. also awful to see how her look/body changed after the first album where she looked so much better.

Missed the docu, must watch it on 4ondemand. Agree with pretty much all of that - first album is seriously underrated imo, incredible for a 19/20 year old.

and yes, the slapping thing - absolutely. not sure it would have worked, but she obv had so much going for her, that i think it might've. then again, maybe I don't understand addiction well enough from a personal level.

 

[gumdrops]

what i wonder is how much of her pain was really there to begin with or did she love billie holiday and that generation of tragic heroines so much she wanted to destroy herself in order to simulate some of that suffering she thought would bring her closer to their greatness, and maybe once she started, she couldnt stop, and ended up living it for real, destroying herself cos she couldnt help it anymore, she became like the hard living figures she idolised to her own detriment. even more tragic if so, but without wanting to sound cruel, also pathetic, sad as that is. impossible to know of course. and i sympathise with addicts (and from personal exp, i know its near fucking impossible to make an alcoholic quit if they dont want to), i dont think we should kick them when theyre down, i suppose im still unsure how she slipped so rapidly, and from the looks of it, so readily. or was she always just that susceptible to someone as manipulative as her husband.

 

[IdleRich]

I read a thing with Will Self where he said he idolised William Burroughs to the extent that he became a junky and then realised that he hadn't written anything - kind of mix up of cause and effect there I think.

 

[pattycakes_]

wait, so she took drugs to emulate her idols?

don't have a tv so probably won't get to see the doc.

 

[Esp]

what i wonder is how much of her pain was really there to begin with or did she love billie holiday and that generation of tragic heroines so much she wanted to destroy herself in order to simulate some of that suffering she thought would bring her closer to their greatness, and maybe once she started, she couldnt stop, and ended up living it for real, destroying herself cos she couldnt help it anymore, she became like the hard living figures she idolised to her own detriment. even more tragic if so, but without wanting to sound cruel, also pathetic, sad as that is. impossible to know of course. and i sympathise with addicts (and from personal exp, i know its near fucking impossible to make an alcoholic quit if they dont want to), i dont think we should kick them when theyre down, i suppose im still unsure how she slipped so rapidly, and from the looks of it, so readily. or was she always just that susceptible to someone as manipulative as her husband.

I've often wondered this as well. She seemed really studied in the late 50s/early 60s great jazz singers and the common themes with people like Billie Holiday, Nina Simone and Dinah Washington were drug problems and/or deeply troubled lives outside of music. Obviously this does not negate the extent of her addiction in the end but I always thought that she maybe chased trouble after Frank because she believed that it would ultimately improve her music.

 

[crackerjack]

what i wonder is how much of her pain was really there to begin with or did she love billie holiday and that generation of tragic heroines so much she wanted to destroy herself in order to simulate some of that suffering she thought would bring her closer to their greatness

I've known people who did get hooked on drugs cos, you know, that's what Coltrane and Burroughs did and blah blah, but I don't think that's the case with her. The handful of people I know who've met her mostly reported that she was much shyer than you'd expect from her public image. I'd guess her retreat into smack etc was a way of dealing with fame, and her dependency on that useless cunt husband a way of bolstering low self-esteem. Though obviously that's pure conjecture on my part.

I don't know whether that's better or worse than that hackneyed drugs –––> great art cliché.

edit: (though it would also explain the weight loss/tit job)

 

[CrowleyHead]

This is a lot of effort for someone who deserved death.

Mediocre singer fucking around playing at being a jazz singer. White people masturbating to 'golden age' nostalgia without getting the real idea across.

Like Lily Allen turned out, I'm sure anything she'd done without Ronson (Save those Ska Covers) would've been utter shit and nobody'd care.

 

[pattycakes_]

not sure she deserved death, definitely played too close to the tracks, but deserved is a bit harsh.

agreed on the rest though.

 

[IdleRich]

"This is a lot of effort for someone who deserved death."

For being a mediocre jazz singer?

 

[Mr. Tea]

For being a mediocre jazz singer?

Flashbacks to the sheer hilarity of two guys plotting to murder Joss Stone with swords...

(not that it would have been 'funny' exactly if they'd succeeded, but just the sheer unlikeliness of it - I mean, I know people who are 'into music' don't like her, but is she *that* bad?)

 

[CrowleyHead]

For being a mediocre jazz singer?

Oh please. Like mediocre jazz musicians ever have anything bad happen to them. If anything, they live off their mediocrity for all eternity.

I don't know, there's WAAAAAY too much love here for someone undeserving of accolades. People are putting her up on this pedestal due to tragedy of her psychosis, not due to her wasted talent. Most of that album was Ronson, and the rest of the career was nearly all trite shit.

Her idol was Lauryn Hill. That should say EVERYTHING about how badly this was going to work.

 

[luka]

lauryn hill a lot bettr looking. the tragedy of lauryn hill is great voice/terrible phrasing.