You Know I’m No Good

Wow. So, at what point does Amy Winehouse consider herself as hitting bottom?

In case you haven’t heard, Amy was arrested yesterday for “perverting the course of justice.” I don’t think that’s a legal term we use in the US, but as near as I can tell, it has something to do with alleged efforts to “fix” a trial, specifically that of a case against her husband, Blake Fielder-Civil.

As most of you know, this is far from Ms. Winehouse’s first encounter with the law. The linked story in the previous paragraph runs down some of her previous brushes with authority, if you’re interested.

I’ve got a couple of thoughts on all of this. First, she’s far from the only musician with an (alleged) drinking/drugging problem. I don’t know if this focus on her is due to the fact that she’s British and the tabloids there are somewhat more salacious than they are here (Then again, our media do have a small attraction to Britney Spears.) I know we focus a lot on the downfall of celebrities, and nothing is so fun to watch as a living train wreck, but I don’t get the media’s obsession with Amy Winehouse.

Amy is such an incredibly talented singer, it brings to mind another singer who had a turbulent personal life: Billie Holiday. She drank, she did hard drugs, she married and cheated on her husband with her drug dealer, and, finally, she died from cirrhosis of the liver at the age of 44. Today, Billie Holiday is considered one of greatest female jazz singers ever.

Amy, meanwhile, sits on six Grammy nominations, including Album of the Year, Song of the Year, and Best Female Pop Performance. Karen Heller, writing in The Philadelphia Inquirer, summarized Amy this way: “She's only 24 with six Grammy nods, crashing headfirst into success and despair, with a codependent husband in jail, exhibitionist parents with questionable judgment, and the paparazzi documenting her emotional and physical distress. Meanwhile, a haute designer [Karl Lagerfeld] appropriates her disheveled style and eating issues to market to the elite while proclaiming her the new Bardot.”

I don’t know – I just hope maybe she can get it together. One way or another.

Tonight’s post is a few of the songs from Amy’s July 25 appearance at the iTunes Festival in London. This show took place in the midst of a run of several festival appearances by Amy this summer. Reportedly, this show went well and her performance was great.

Addicted.mp3
Back to Black.mp3
Love is a Losing Game.mp3
You Know I’m No Good.mp3
Me and Mr. Jones.mp3
Rehab.mp3

Labels: Amy Winehouse, current events, live music

posted by aikin @ 9:34 PM