Amy Winehouse Back To Black Analysis
It takes focus to hear Amy Winehouse’s voice, to appreciate the breath and hum that created “Back to Black,” her devastating second, and final album. After all, the lurid, sad craziness of her addiction, her honesty and openness in tackling the subjects, coupled with her charisma and vocal swagger, was her allure. Her story was her trouble.
Yet her death at age 27 resonates due to that ragged, beautiful voice and that most notorious record, “Back to Black.” In 2006, the notion that a singer could somehow resurrect and re-imagine soul music in a way that rang true for a new generation seemed not only improbable but also ill advised. Let alone that these songs be delivered by a lady Brit with a crooked beehive and Cleopatra eyeliner. But then you hear “Love Is a Losing Game,” the wrenching, perfect …show more content…
Upon first hearing her, how could you not be overcome with the notion that something so blessed, so rich, so emotive, could not only dwell within the tattooed bag of bones that entombed it but also support it? How could you not hope that it would outshine the lopsided beehive that signified her demons and somehow eke its way out of a consciousness obsessed with addiction?
Winehouse wrote “Back to Black” while she and her on-again-off-again, boyfriend-to-be-husband-to-be-ex-husband Blake Fielder-Civil were broken up, but each declaration of defeat, each self-loathing line is wrapped by producers Ronson and Remi in the comfort of hand claps and horn sections, backbeats and string swoops, of quiet piano dots that punctuate the lines, “Five-story fire as you came, love is a losing game.” Gospel-inspired backing vocals suggest salvation, even when Winehouse is singing about despair. The resulting tension drives the record.
No matter how beaten down Winehouse sounds on the album, the music is so buoyant and life-affirming that it tempers the message, makes one believe that magic can overpower their
Yet her death at age 27 resonates due to that ragged, beautiful voice and that most notorious record, “Back to Black.” In 2006, the notion that a singer could somehow resurrect and re-imagine soul music in a way that rang true for a new generation seemed not only improbable but also ill advised. Let alone that these songs be delivered by a lady Brit with a crooked beehive and Cleopatra eyeliner. But then you hear “Love Is a Losing Game,” the wrenching, perfect …show more content…
Upon first hearing her, how could you not be overcome with the notion that something so blessed, so rich, so emotive, could not only dwell within the tattooed bag of bones that entombed it but also support it? How could you not hope that it would outshine the lopsided beehive that signified her demons and somehow eke its way out of a consciousness obsessed with addiction?
Winehouse wrote “Back to Black” while she and her on-again-off-again, boyfriend-to-be-husband-to-be-ex-husband Blake Fielder-Civil were broken up, but each declaration of defeat, each self-loathing line is wrapped by producers Ronson and Remi in the comfort of hand claps and horn sections, backbeats and string swoops, of quiet piano dots that punctuate the lines, “Five-story fire as you came, love is a losing game.” Gospel-inspired backing vocals suggest salvation, even when Winehouse is singing about despair. The resulting tension drives the record.
No matter how beaten down Winehouse sounds on the album, the music is so buoyant and life-affirming that it tempers the message, makes one believe that magic can overpower their