At some point during Amy Winehouse's Grammy acceptance speech, I realized my jaw was agape. I looked over at my signif, and so was hers. Watching the rail thin, strange and sultry singer fight for coherency in front of millions was breathtaking. She spoke like there were pieces missing--like the embodiment of the last few moments of a game of Jenga. God bless her for holding it together.
The whole dramatic scene, along with her ubiquitous presence in the tabloids, makes me wonder how much of Winehouse's acclaim stems from her music. That's not to say I don't like her music--I like it a lot. Her voice is kind of delicious, and you have to admire how she's brought Motown and 50's jazz club sounds to a new audience. But five Grammys? Five Grammys to an artist whose singing was overshadowed by her bizarre attempts at dancing (if you didn't watch, it's probably best described as shuddering). Was she under the influence? Or maybe detoxing? And isn't that part of the appeal?
The United Nations, of all things, certainly thinks so. This past November, their Drugs and Crime Office Chief decried Winehouse for glamorizing drug use. "Rock stars, like Amy Winehouse, become popular by singing: 'I ain't going to rehab,' even though she badly needed and eventually sought treatment." Getting past the obvious "Doesn't the UN have better things to do?" question, I think they're right--in part. Winehouse's success does glamorize drug use, but it isn't all her fault. You need only look at the way the media covers Winehouse to see that we glamorize her drug use. And this is nothing new. The glamorization of drug-addled artists has been going on for a long, long time.
One old and famous example of drug-induced art is Samuel Taylor Coleridge's poem Kubla Khan. With the exception of Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner, it's probably his most anthologized work. Notably, it isn't very good. Kubla Khan is tangled and unrealized, and while it's strange, it's not particularly interesting. It isn't close to the standards of a writer whom Keats thought was too polished. If you think I'm being harsh, here's what Coleridge himself wrote about the poem:
The following fragment is here published as far as the author's own opinions are concerned, rather as a psychological curiosity, than on the grounds of any supposed poetic merits.
So why is it so celebrated? Put simply, drugs. Coleridge imagined Xanadu during an opium-induced dream. When he awoke, he wrote what he could remember down in iambic tetrameter (it's just what those guys did). Here's the start of it:
In Xanadu did Kubla Kahn
A stately pleasure-dome decree:
Where Alph, the sacred river, ran
Through caverns measureless to man
Down to a sunless sea.
So twice five miles of fertile ground
With walls and towers were girdled round:
And there were gardens bright with sinuous rills,
Where blossomed many an incense-bearing tree;
And here were forests ancient as the hills,
Enfolding sunny spots of greenery.
But oh! that deep romantic chasm which slanted
Down the green hill athwart a cedarn cover!
A savage place! as holy and enchanted
As e'er beneath a waning moon was haunted
By woman wailing for her demon-lover!
And from this chasm, with ceaseless turmoil seething,
As if this earth in fast thick pants were breathing,
A mighty fountain momently was forced:
Amid whose swift half-intermitted burst
Huge fragments vaulted like rebounding hail
While Coleridge was writing Kubla Khan, he was famously interrupted by a man from the nearby town of Porlock. He and the poet had to go handle some business. When Coleridge returned, he couldn't remember any more of the dream, depriving us of a Kubla Khan conclusion. This ill-timed man from Porlock has become something of a running joke among writers, reappearing in the work of Douglass Adams, Vladimir Nabokov, and even getting mentioned on Aaron Sorkin's Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip.
The man from Porlock might well have wandered in on Amy Winehouse during her Grammy speech. It would have been a fitting interruption to the same old, but still intriguing, story.
This is what happens when one refrains from pop media sources: the latest hits are unknown, lying in wait of discovery rather than being shoved down our throats by nauseous repetitive airplay.
Since our family feels that local broadcast radio and TV are essentially obsolete, we have removed ourselves from the pop market. Each of us has a personal computer and we seek and share our personal tastes and desires. Our family shares 100+ gigabytes of MP3 music which we enjoy when Internet radio becomes too repetitive and boring.
And before I bore you with the story of our lives, allow me to point out that by NOT BEING EXPOSED to Amy Whinehouse's music and performances that we may be considered more impartial than someone who is more up to date.
So I watched Amy Winehouse's Grammy performance of two songs that was posted here on Huffpost and was much impressed. Replayed for the family, we agreed that the woman was a freak but gifted with an awesome voice. Her quirky stage presence, like the quirky song 'I ain't going to rehab,' merely reinforced that she is driven from the inside by the goddess, rather than driven by the managers of the star-maker machinery.
Perhaps it is the incompatibility of these two forces that drives her to drugs and into rehab. We are sick to death of media Wendigos trafficking in the tripe of the soulless like Brittany Spears, or the desecration of promising talent such as Christina Aguilera.
Amy Winehouse is a true artist and a real star with a marvelous voice and massive lifelong potential. We hope that her record company and drug use does not clip her wings.
:)
( before you condemn my choice of the word 'freak' be aware that it is a badge of honor. Most of us are too similar and too vanilla to be touched by the goddess. )
glam·or·ous
Function: adjective
full of glamour : excitingly attractive
"Excitingly attractive"? Nope.
I respectfully suggest that you look up the words that you employ more often, so that you know what they mean and, thereby, appear less ignorant to those who actually are cognizant of their definitions.
Well, at least, now, you know.
Better luck, next time.
Then again, she certainly isn't the first self-destructive celebrity and sadly will not be the last.
Please stick with what you know, John: from you're comments, it seems music isn't one of them. Winehouse didn't win the awards for her Grammy performance or dancing, drug addiction, or resurrecting "Motown and 50's jazz club sound." And if you're going to take on this subject, please do some basic research: it'll confirm that she's been in rehab. That might shed some light on your detoxing question... (and making the detox crack about her dancing is a cheap shot. She's a musician/vocalist, not a dancer.). Also, Back to Black is inspired by the Shangri-Las (mentioned in the liner notes), who weren't with Motown.
The things you cite are not her real appeal, not to those who appreciate music, anyway. Before she was out of her teens, Winehouse had broken onto the scene in the UK and had established herself there for her precocious jazz vocal chops. Her TV performances back then (on YouTube...they're the ones of her sans tattoos) show her talent -- and tremendous potential.
I'm also baffled by the hippie references floated in the Comments... Winehouse is not a hippie, no more than the many addicted jazz greats were. Her musical influence has been jazz, blues, and (more recently) R&B – listen to her music and look at her.
[continued with Part 2]
I take issue with a few things about the Grammys, but not regarding Winehouse's awards. She's well-deserving of them. Back to Black is among the best pop albums in recent years, from song composition, arrangement, and production, to Amy's vocal performance. The rich, mature, and soulful timbre of her voice is due to luck & genetics, but her phrasing and overall delivery are skillful and brilliant. I hope we can see more musicians who can propel music with true genius, creativity, talent, and musicianship. She may not be a poster girl or engineered by commercial consumption, but she's real and deserving. Her addiction is a pity, but Winehouse is a person, not simply a personality; and the subject should be treated more sensitively, particularly when she is attempting to recover.
While she wasn't in top form for her Grammy performance, she won the awards for the work she did on Back to Black. I was glad to see her recovering and I celebrate her win. As a musician, fan, and fellow human-being, I hope she recovers and continues to make music for decades to come.
Now, poetry? Not my bailiwick... :-)
Fantastic points. "Back" was a solid album, but much of it, particularly the production is just that..product. She IS mainstream: reliant upon a sound that the masses are already 'comfortable' with. Much of what she embeds in her lyrics, even with her strong vocals, would've never reached the pinnacle of success were it not for the 'friendliness of familiarity' laid with the music. Remember Steeley Dan...?
"Tonight when I chase the dragon/ Water will turn to cherry wine/ And then silver will turn to gold...time out of mind"
"chasing the dragon" is slang for the method of which heroine is 'cooked' with a lighter under a spoon. As it reaches the proper temperature for ingestion ( in this method, by needle) the bubbles move in a shape-shifting, swirling motion: the point at which the 'dragon' is to be 'caught' for shooting up.
'Time Out Of Mind' was a very mellow-sounding crossover jazz tune.. and a massive radio-friendly hit in '80. Unless you knew the references being inferred, you were oblivious because the melody was so pleasing.
Winehouse's inferences carry a similar subtlety, but trust me: had she set those lyrics to something along a post-apocalyptic multi/layered grunge track, we would be talking about someone ELSE who captured the awarda this year, and Amy would be cellar-dwelling amongst all the other unknowns, even with that powerful voice.
She should chop-change direction; scare the hell out of the bandwagoners who are currently riding her gravy train.
Let see Winehouse go experimental a la Mars Volta. She could pull it. Question is: Will YOU still be down with her if she gets raw in that regard?
I want to no more hear Winehouse: The Product.
Let's get to Winehouse: The Fearless Artist.
As a songwriter/Musician-slash-label owner, I'd buy out that contract in a minute. But she needs to REALLY 'come with it'
..and scare the bejesus out of those bandwagoneers right BACK to their friendly neighborhood A/C radio stations whence they came. Because 'safe' sucks.
BTW, despite the commercial nature of the record (esp. compared to her previous ones) I do think Mark Ronson did a solid job arranging and producing. He married early 60s and jazz elements with contemporary sounds and produced something fresh and compelling. He also knew how to how to get something great from Winehouse vocally and how to showcase it.
Cheers.
But me I could listen to Amy all day.
I just love her voice its a change from screamimg yelling ,Touching themselves in strange places.You do not have took, all you have to do is listen..................I do.
that the press publishes of her. One of the pictures is her and Blake with blood all over
themselves. Another picture is Amy running the streets crying and with no top on. None of the pictures or stories I have seen or read have been glamorous.
I am afraid I must disagree with you on that point. She is a fabulous artist though.
A lot of the really good artists have tortured souls. Unfortunately they usually don't live very long.
So what if she's English. Bush proved the elections are meaningless anyway.
Now that's a ticket I could get behind.