Amy Winehouse dead?

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   IzzyMposted 11 years ago

   BBC report just in - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-14262237

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      platinumOwl4posted 11 years agoin reply to this

      What is truly sad is  that she became a drug/alcohol user at such an early age. Someone had to have notice that this young lady was troubled. Or where they so busy(with their own careers) as not to become concerned. I never met her and I probably would not have even if I lived in her area. However, If I had had an opportunity to speak with her I truly would have want the see if I could help or get her someone who could help her. I will not now nor would I ever make a negative statement about a person of whom I only am familiar with by way of  the circus media.

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   Greg Sageposted 11 years ago

   If it's for real, what a shame.  Can't say it would be a shock to anybody, though.
   
   She really is fantastically talented, and tragically flawed... a modern day Billie Holiday.

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   Uninvited Writerposted 11 years ago

   If true that is really really sad. I agree with Greg.

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   TamCorposted 11 years ago

   I just saw it on CNN.com....

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   AEvansposted 11 years ago

   How sad and so young. Life isn't that bad although sometimes we believe it is.

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   Ron Montgomeryposted 11 years ago

   This is really sad....
   
   Who is Amy Winehouse?

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   Sherlock221bposted 11 years ago

   What terrible news.  So many young stars have gone the same way, perhaps it is too much too young.

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   IzzyMposted 11 years ago

   I am really quite stunned as she is one of the singers whose songs I think are fantastic. Knew she had a history of drink and drugs, but most young pop stars do and seem to survive and grow out of it. It is very sad.

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   Greg Sageposted 11 years ago

   Yeah... but many don't.  For every Santana, there is a Hendrix.

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    Uninvited Writerposted 11 years ago

    Let's hope Lindsay Lohan is paying attention.

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    rebekahELLEposted 11 years ago

    how sad, another one at the age of 27?  drugs.. so sad.
    
    Kurt Kobain
    Janis Joplin
    Jimi Hendrix
    Jim Morrison
    ...

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       shazwellynposted 11 years agoin reply to this

       Yes, I remarked in a previous post about the 27 club.  My brother met her - he hangs out at the mod clubs in Camden - a real loss to the world.

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       Richieb799posted 11 years agoin reply to this

       I liked 3 in this list, not sure who Janis Joplin is though, don't stoned me for it though Those 3 I liked might of done drugs but were more in touch with reality than most people.

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          IzzyMposted 11 years agoin reply to this

          Richie, I don't think any of them were in touch with reality, but that isn't the point really. They were all great musicians who have gone down in history as dying through drug abuse. And a million more every day probably die through drug abuse the world over who were never musicians...or artists...or even grown up, half of them, but that's a whole other story.

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             Richieb799posted 11 years agoin reply to this

             Other people take drugs and don't die, Bob Marley smoked cannabis and didn't die from it but in my eyes he was in touch with reality, but I'm not saying I support drug use, I don't use drugs.
             
             I don't think Jim Morrisson, Jimi Hendrix and Kurt Cobain are most known for drug abuse, Jimi Hendrix  was voted world best guitar player in Rolling Stone

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          rebekahELLEposted 11 years agoin reply to this

          Janis was amazing. She  made you forget about what you were doing and listen.  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=caiBo_wT … re=related  She definitely has influenced some of the best bluesy rock/soul female and male singers..

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             IzzyMposted 11 years agoin reply to this

             Thanks for that link. I just nipped over to youtube and listened to it
             
             Janis Joplin was just a fraction before my time. In the 70s, I used to read New Musical Express magazine (NME) and as you say, every female artiste was influenced by Janis Joplin. She left an incredible legacy.

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                Uninvited Writerposted 11 years agoin reply to this

                Janis was great, i only discovered he after she died though. Lord won't you buy me a Mercedes Benz...

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             Gordon Hamiltonposted 11 years agoin reply to this

             Surely not Janis Joplin??? Never have been able to figure out which language she "Sang" in. Sorry - her inane drivel was irritating and indecipherable in my eyes, I'm afraid...

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    theherbivorehippiposted 11 years ago

    This is so sad. I was listening to her on my run this morning. Such a shame.

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    livelongerposted 11 years ago

    So sad. "Back to Black" was...is...one of my favorite songs. She was so tremendously talented.

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    lorlie6posted 11 years ago

    I heard this on NPR just now and my jaw literally dropped.

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    Hauntyposted 11 years ago

    This came as a shock to me when I saw it. R.I.P. Amy.

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    klarawieckposted 11 years ago

    I've been thinking about her for the past couple of days. She was a talented musician. She will be missed.

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    tlpoagueposted 11 years ago

    What a terrible and sad loss. I was just thinking about her the other day. What a shock...

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    carolpposted 11 years ago

    So sorry and still too young to die. She has a marvelous voice, sure it was not easy for her to go through this business. One has to be strong, fit and be conditioned. She had for sure so many insecurities and had to fight against all these stress of life with the help of drugs and alcohol to survive.

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    Greg Sageposted 11 years ago

    I always liked this one.  Good production, Great collaboration with her producer, and it playfully pokes fun people emulating her style.
    
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4HLY1NTe04M

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       earnestshubposted 11 years agoin reply to this

       Thank you so much Greg. It was fantastic!
       
       Sad, very sad she is gone. I wish young artists were guided through the quagmire of excesses and had the self love they seem so worthy of.
       
       Another young life lost for the lack of real love.

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    Uninvited Writerposted 11 years ago

    I have a few of her songs on my iPod, great writing music

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    mythbusterposted 11 years ago

    Truly saddened by this news, R.I.P. Amy W.

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    jagerfoodsposted 11 years ago

    Is this really suprising?

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       Uninvited Writerposted 11 years agoin reply to this

       Maybe not, but still a tragedy she couldn't straighten up.

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    cooldadposted 11 years ago

    I'm not trying to be sadistic here, but this shouldn't shock anyone.  Sad, another dead junkie.  I'm going to assume it's an OD.  She had the world at her feet, unlimited resources at her disposal and still couldn't figure life out. 
    
    I'm always amazed at how people get so wrapped up in celebrity and feel so bad when this happens to someone they've never met and only known via television and radio.

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    Uninvited Writerposted 11 years ago

    I feel bad because I will miss her music and what she could have given us in the future.
    
    Addiction is a terrible disease and not everyone can escape.

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       IzzyMposted 11 years agoin reply to this

       Ditto.
       I didn't know her personally, not had any wish to, but the loss of great musicians does affect us all.
       She had a brilliant voice and I'm just so sorry that with all her success, and money, no-one close to her could help her.

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    Greg Sageposted 11 years ago

    It has nothing to do with celebrity for me at all.  The reason she's not just "another dead junkie" is that she had amazing talent... and not just as a singer.  She was a truly talented songwriter, arranger, etc...  VERY few people in this world have the natural gift she did.
    
    Hendrix was certainly not just "another dead junkie" either... and I could care less whether or not he ever achieved any fame. 
    
    Amy (along with Ronson) is probably the single biggest influence in the neo-soul movement which has affected the careers of hundreds of artists and the musical tastes of millions of listeners.
    
    She was anything but "just another pop singer."

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       cooldadposted 11 years agoin reply to this

       I'm a huge Hendrix fan and unfortunately, he was just another dead junkie as well.  In order to establish herself as not just another junkie, Amy needed to last longer, she needed to get clean, but she couldn't.  That's sad.  All the talent in the world is worthless if you can't keep the needle out of your arm.

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    rebekahELLEposted 11 years ago

    
    +

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    Gordon Hamiltonposted 11 years ago

    I'm afraid I have to agree with a previous poster in that this is the first I have ever heard of her - still seems to be a terrible waste of life

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    Polly Cposted 11 years ago

    I will always think of Amy Winehouse as a hugely talented singer whose Back to Black album I listened to on my ipod whilst my youngest son was born by caesarean in 2008. One of the best artists to emerge from the UK for a generation - terribly sad that she (and of course others addicted to drugs) has died so young.

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    Dolores Monetposted 11 years ago

    I read where she was bi-polar - plenty of mentally ill people resort to drugs or booze. Her unique voice and delivery made her music great. It's a loss to the music world.
    
    I wonder if the Beatles were big into drugs. I remember reading the autobiography of John whats-his-name of the Mamas and Papas. The Beatles visited and were horrified by the drug taking there.

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       Greg Sageposted 11 years agoin reply to this

       If you wonder... then you must've stopped listening to them sometime around early 1967.

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          Dolores Monetposted 11 years agoin reply to this

          can you tell how that someone is a drug taker by listening to their music? i meant that in the grand scheme of rock druggies, i don't know if the Beatles ventured far beyond pot and LSD while some of those other folks were all about the booze and drugs - staggering around the stage, unable to perform being f-ed up all the time

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             Uninvited Writerposted 11 years agoin reply to this

             Ever heard Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds? Although John did say it was not about drugs.  All of Sgt Pepper seems drug induced to me

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                Dolores Monetposted 11 years agoin reply to this

                as an amusing aside - did you know that the ancient skeleton called Lucy was named after Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds? The people on the dig were sitting around the camp fire listening to that music and so....
                
                I thought Lennon said the song was from a picture that his son drew - when asked what is was, the song's title was his response

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             Greg Sageposted 11 years agoin reply to this

             Yes.  Of course you can.
             
             It's nearly impossible to miss the tectonic shift that happened in their music as a direct result of LSD.  There are many books and movies that talk about their legendary drug use, but anyone who's ever heard the White Album really wouldn't wonder about it to begin with.
             
             BEYOND LSD?  Not as far as I know... but I was under the impression that taking hundreds of hits of LSD qualified as drug use.
             
             As far as being incoherent and sloppy... theirs was more of a post-beatnik Ginsburg vibe.
             
             I'm not knocking them in any way, mind you... but they're nearly as well known post-1967 for the drugs as for the music.

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                Dolores Monetposted 11 years agoin reply to this

                hundreds?

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             IzzyMposted 11 years agoin reply to this

             For a long time if not forever, people who perform live on stage feel the need for a boost to get them through a gig. I don't know whether it is because they are of an artistic temperament, or because the world they inhabit once they become rich and famous is hoaching with drug addicts, but there has always been a huge amount of drug taking going on in the pop/rock industry.
             
             Growing up, the only people I 'knew' who took drugs were rock stars.
             
             Sadly, with the passing of years this spread to the community. Finally I moved away because I was frightened for my life while driving a taxi.

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    Richieb799posted 11 years ago

    sorry I deleted that post, I didn't want to get into an unnecessary debate about drugs. It is true, they died in a bad way, drugs like heroin must be terrible, I actually read something that Kurt Cobain admitted it was a problem but I personally blame the media and other factors that drove him to it.
    Also there are conspiracies about whether he could of used the gun that was found by him since it was too long for him to pull the trigger.(could of been murder)

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       IzzyMposted 11 years agoin reply to this

       I deleted my response too, after I realised you'd deleted your post!
       
       In the drugs world, the two worst are heroin and crack cocaine. Cannabis, E's, magic mushrooms etc don't hold a candle to the baddies.
       
       I learnt this through interest and not habit by the way, or by testing, but heroin drags you in and keeps you there, and it will kill you, mainly because suppliers mix it with other substances to make their supply last longer. Substances like brick dust for example.
       
       So you as the end user are used to getting your supply half-strength, through it being mixed with anything from talcum powder to brick dust.
       
       Then, when you are rich and famous, you can afford pure heroin, but your body isn't used to it.
       
       It cannot be a nice death.

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    Gordon Hamiltonposted 11 years ago

    Seems like the whole thread is about to go off topic - now, that would be a major surprise, wouldn't it! Just to reiterate, I think it is a major tragedy that the wee girl is dead (whoever she was) but the main message should be about her mistakes and the vile nature of drugs. I make no apologies for stating it hard and fast - you're a druggy, you're a loser. No ifs, no buts, no maybes.

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    Dolores Monetposted 11 years ago

    of course if she was bi-polar as I have heard, then what? still a loser?

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       Gordon Hamiltonposted 11 years agoin reply to this

       Isn't it amazing how many of these weird and wonderful conditions are manifesting themselves in modern times? Bi polar - my a**e! There is no such thing - unless you happen to be jumping between the Arctic and the Antarctic. They are manufactured conditions to excuse the weird behaviour of people in modern times. They don't exist. If people of the modern day would realise that life is not a bloody gift and can be a bit difficult at times, all these non-existent "maladies" would soon be stuck back precisely where they belong... (If I weren't a gentleman, I would tell you precisely where that is...)

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          IzzyMposted 11 years agoin reply to this

          Succinctly put! LOL
          
          Bi-polar is a new name that seems to cover any psychiatric condition, when most people don't actually have anything wrong with them.

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    Greg Sageposted 11 years ago

    Well, I've read at least a couple dozen books that touch on it, and seen references in several movies.
    
    Just last night, in fact.  Dewey Cox.  They introduced him to LSD in the movie.
    
    Pretty much any late-60's reference to them whether it be in a magazine, webpage, whatever... after Rubber Soul or so... it's hard to find references to them that aren't tied to their drug use in some way.
    
    Except for references to Yoko or the assassination.

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    IzzyMposted 11 years ago

    I should be going to bed - it is after 3am here - but I should await and answer the flack that is surely coming my way.

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       IzzyMposted 11 years agoin reply to this

       OK I have waited and there is none. Don't respond in the next 6 hours or so (8 hours maybe) and since I always wake up in bad mood I probably won't respond tomorrow either, so don't hold your breath waiting
       
       I am sorry Amy Winehouse and her talent have been lost to the world though.

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    Uninvited Writerposted 11 years ago

    "dead junkies" are still human. Giving up heroin is not like quitting smoking or going on a diet. None of us know what was going through her head, and what her demons were. Everyone's death that young is sad regardless of the circumstances. At least her music will go on.

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    BethanRoseposted 11 years ago

    It's so sad that she couldn't be helped. 27 years old and her whole life ahead of her. RIP Amy Winehouse ... You and your music will not be forgotten.

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    IzzyMposted 11 years ago

    Has anyone here heard her 15 year old god-daughter, Dionne Bromfield, sing?
    
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=puTxF8qNGQA&NR=1

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    Greg Sageposted 11 years ago

    Yeah.  She's good... attractive, talented... I'm sure she'll go far.
    
    The production on Yeah, Right (I think that's what it's called) is amazing.  It's like a fully updated version of classic Motown.  I've never been a huge fan of the packaging kids as pop stars thing, but there's some real musicality in the production fort that one.

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    IzzyMposted 11 years ago

    You mean this one? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xiXCpP-B7bU&ob=av2n
    I'm listening to it, and thinking it doesn't do her voice justice, but it's commercial enough.

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       Greg Sageposted 11 years agoin reply to this

       That won't play here, so dunno.
       
       This one:
       
       http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=85cyFeoAJ-E
       
       She's not bad.  She's not blowing my mind or anything, but she can sing.  Almost a shame putting Diggy in there... kind of cheapens it a bit.  Why not toss in Willow Smith while you're at it?
       
       The real star is the production.  Organic yet punchy and modern.  Sort of Smeezigtons (Bruno Mars) meets Motown in it's production aesthetic.
       
       ... which all comes back to the neo-soul movement.  It's had a huge impact.

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    cindyvineposted 11 years ago

    I think most of us expected Amy Winehouse to have a tragic end as her last few years were out of control.  I think her husband Blake something was the one that got her into drugs, a real bad seed.  However, it is still a shock and tragedy when it happens and my thoughts are with her family who must be very devastated at this time.  Baruch dayan ha'emet.

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       vox vocisposted 11 years agoin reply to this

       I certainly expected her to end this way and I'm sorry I was right. Really, such a great talent and such a waste of life I love her music and I'm sad to hear she's gone. R.I.P. Amy Winehouse

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    Mighty Momposted 11 years ago

    Sir, your intolerance is matched only by your ignorance.
    Since you also deny bipolar disease exists, I suppose it's understandable that you would have no curiosity or understanding of how it feels to try to quiet the committee in your head or keep your moods from cycling from panicked manic to blackest depression with absolutely no control.
    
    Am I condoning or glorifying substance abuse? Certainly not.
    But some people are hard-wired for self-destruction.
    Amy Winehouse is/was one of those tragic people.
    And she's hardly alone. Objectively speaking, some of the world's most amazing artists, writers, musicians and entertainers of all sorts (actors, playwrights, directors, producers, etc). battle(d) alcohol and/or drug addiction.
    It's an uphill battle to get clean off anything, and more people don't than do.
    But you go right on ahead thinking anyone who picks up is a loser.
    BTW, there are quite a few of us "losers" here on HP, if you bother to open your eyes and look around . MM

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    A Troubled Manposted 11 years ago

    Russell Brand, who is currently shooting the film "Rock Star" down in Ft. Lauderdale, tweeted this today:
    
    "When you love someone who suffers from the disease of addiction you await the phone call. There will be a phone call. The sincere hope is that the call will be from the addict themselves, telling you they’ve had enough, that they’re ready to stop, ready to try something new. Of course though, you fear the other call, the sad nocturnal chime from a friend or relative telling you it’s too late, she’s gone.
    Frustratingly it’s not a call you can ever make it must be received. It is impossible to intervene.
    
    I’ve known Amy Winehouse for years. When I first met her around Camden she was just some twit in a pink satin jacket shuffling round bars with mutual friends, most of whom were in cool Indie bands or peripheral Camden figures Withnail-ing their way through life on impotent charisma. Carl Barrat told me that “Winehouse” (which I usually called her and got a kick out of cos it’s kind of funny to call a girl by her surname) was a jazz singer, which struck me as a bizarrely anomalous in that crowd. To me with my limited musical knowledge this information placed Amy beyond an invisible boundary of relevance; “Jazz singer? She must be some kind of eccentric” I thought. I chatted to her anyway though, she was after all, a girl, and she was sweet and peculiar but most of all vulnerable.
    
    I was myself at that time barely out of rehab and was thirstily seeking less complicated women so I barely reflected on the now glaringly obvious fact that Winehouse and I shared an affliction, the disease of addiction. All addicts, regardless of the substance or their social status share a consistent and obvious symptom; they’re not quite present when you talk to them. They communicate to you through a barely discernible but un-ignorable veil. Whether a homeless smack head troubling you for 50p for a cup of tea or a coked-up, pinstriped exec foaming off about his “speedboat” there is a toxic aura that prevents connection. They have about them the air of elsewhere, that they’re looking through you to somewhere else they’d rather be. And of course they are. The priority of any addict is to anaesthetise the pain of living to ease the passage of the day with some purchased relief.
    From time to time I’d bump into Amy she had good banter so we could chat a bit and have a laugh, she was “a character” but that world was riddled with half cut, doped up chancers, I was one of them, even in early recovery I was kept afloat only by clinging to the bodies of strangers so Winehouse, but for her gentle quirks didn’t especially register.
    
    Then she became massively famous and I was pleased to see her acknowledged but mostly baffled because I’d not experienced her work and this not being the 1950’s I wondered how a “jazz singer” had achieved such cultural prominence. I wasn’t curious enough to do anything so extreme as listen to her music or go to one of her gigs, I was becoming famous myself at the time and that was an all consuming experience. It was only by chance that I attended a Paul Weller gig at the Roundhouse that I ever saw her live.
    I arrived late and as I made my way to the audience through the plastic smiles and plastic cups I heard the rolling, wondrous resonance of a female vocal. Entering the space I saw Amy on stage with Weller and his band; and then the awe. The awe that envelops when witnessing a genius. From her oddly dainty presence that voice, a voice that seemed not to come from her but from somewhere beyond even Billie and Ella, from the font of all greatness. A voice that was filled with such power and pain that it was at once entirely human yet laced with the divine. My ears, my mouth, my heart and mind all instantly opened. Winehouse. Winehouse? Winehouse! That twerp, all eyeliner and lager dithering up Chalk Farm Road under a back-combed barnet, the lips that I’d only seen clenching a fishwife fag and dribbling curses now a portal for this holy sound. So now I knew. She wasn’t just some hapless wannabe, yet another pissed up nit who was never gonna make it, nor was she even a ten-a-penny-chanteuse enjoying her fifteen minutes. She was a ****ing genius.
    
    Shallow fool that I am I now regarded her in a different light, the light that blazed down from heaven when she sang. That lit her up now and a new phase in our friendship began. She came on a few of my TV and radio shows, I still saw her about but now attended to her with a little more interest. Publicly though, Amy increasingly became defined by her addiction. Our media though is more interested in tragedy than talent, so the ink began to defect from praising her gift to chronicling her downfall. The destructive personal relationships, the blood soaked ballet slippers, the aborted shows, that youtube madness with the baby mice. In the public perception this ephemeral tittle-tattle replaced her timeless talent. This and her manner in our occasional meetings brought home to me the severity of her condition. Addiction is a serious disease; it will end with jail, mental institutions or death. I was 27 years old when through the friendship and help of Chip Somers of the treatment centre, Focus12 I found recovery, through Focus I was introduced to support fellowships for alcoholics and drug addicts which are very easy to find and open to anybody with a desire to stop drinking and without which I would not be alive.
    
    Now Amy Winehouse is dead, like many others whose unnecessary deaths have been retrospectively romanticised, at 27 years old. Whether this tragedy was preventable or not is now irrelevant. It is not preventable today. We have lost a beautiful and talented woman to this disease. Not all addicts have Amy’s incredible talent. Or Kurt’s or Jimi’s or Janis’s, some people just get the affliction. All we can do is adapt the way we view this condition, not as a crime or a romantic affectation but as a disease that will kill. We need to review the way society treats addicts, not as criminals but as sick people in need of care. We need to look at the way our government funds rehabilitation. It is cheaper to rehabilitate an addict than to send them to prison, so criminalisation doesn’t even make economic sense. Not all of us know someone with the incredible talent that Amy had but we all know drunks and junkies and they all need help and the help is out there. All they have to do is pick up the phone and make the call. Or not. Either way, there will be a phone call."

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    Uninvited Writerposted 11 years ago

    Excellent.

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    rebekahELLEposted 11 years ago

    Thanks for the great post A Troubled Man.
    
    

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    IzzyMposted 11 years ago

    That is bloody brilliant, but how did he get all those words into a tweet?

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    IzzyMposted 11 years ago

    On a more serious note, if there is anything good to say about a person, it will be said after they are dead. While they are living, if they are famous, they are villified in the Press. All I ever read about Amy Winehouse was she was a junkie, or an alky, but a good singer at the same time. On the day of her death, all the BBC could say, and it was true, that she was infamous for turning up on a European tour and being too out off her face to perform, to the annoyance of fans. Now, a day later, we are seeing glimpses of the person behind the headlines, less harsh - because we don't speak ill of the dead. What a shame that we speak ill of the living!

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    knolyourselfposted 11 years ago

    Another superstar dead at age 27. Wonder how many that makes?

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