RIP Amy Winehouse - 1983-2011

The title says it all.  Amy Winehouse is dead.  We'd been out shopping today and when I came home I done the usual - checked my emails, checked my Ebay, checked Facebook.  After about 10 minutes on Facebook I noticed two people had put 'RIP Amy Winehouse'.  I thought it was odd.  A bit strange in fact.  Surely they couldn't really be saying she was dead.  I then checked the online news and there were some posts saying 'the body of a female had been found in the home of Amy Winehouse'.  Okay, so there's still hope.  They weren't saying it was her.  I then put on Sky News which of course was dominated with the news that it was true, Amy Winehouse had been found dead at her home. 

Amy was 27.  The news said her death was 'unexplained'.  Of course it is purely co-incidental that Kurt Cobain died at the age of 27.  Janis Joplin died at the age of 27.  Jimmy Hedrix died at the age of 27.  The news of those deaths didn't bother me.  Okay so I really was only a baby when Jimmy and Janis died.  I wasn't really into Nirvana at all so Kurt didn't seem to matter.  But Amy ....  I phoned my mum to tell her and as I told her I felt goosebumps on my arms.  It was weird.  I had never met Amy Winehouse and never expected to although we had been to Camden Town many times and often wondered if we would just casually bump into her.  I must admit I did often look out for her !

I once told my friend that I liked Amy Winehouse.  My friend just replied 'hmm, you seem to like the fuck-ups'.  Okay so poor Amy was a bit of a fuck-up.  I'd not really heard of her until around 2007 when she appeared on the Brits and sang Rehab.  I really liked the song and it sounded a bit like a 60's song, though I'm not sure why.  She also won a Brit that night for Best British Female Artist.  Watching her then and not knowing much about her, she appeared quite normal.  In March HE bought me the Back to Black album.   I think my favourite song on the whole album is Tears Dry on Their Own.  Later that year they released the 'Deluxe' edition of the Back to Black album - basically the same album but with an extra disc with some cover versions on it, including Monkey Man - one of my favourites to hear her sing.  I bought this album again.  Normally I go to our local library and borrow CD's a few months after they come out and just copy them.  I hardly ever buy albums new from the shop but I did in this case. 

I believe Amy Winehouse was very talented.  I have 'Frank', her first album too.  Listening to the albums you could tell she had a very good voice but maybe didn't use it to its full potential.  She didn't seem to care about her talent though.  I guess this was good in a way as she wasn't one of these big-headed stars who know they are good, and who know that other people know they are good too.  On the other hand, what a waste.  She did go back to rehab just recently and lots of people were hoping this would sort her out.  Maybe it's bad to say but perhaps there really was no hope.  I guess if she had wanted to escape all her problems then she could have done.  Perhaps she didn't want to.  We will never know.  All I know is that a good talent has gone to waste. 

RIP Amy.