When a young talented person dies, it always makes for the most arresting, gruesome spectacle. Away from the obvious sorrow of someone being taken too young, there’s a myriad of sideshows which compel like car-crashes.
What is most fascinating about the death of a young person is the reaction from those that didn’t know her at all. The response to the capsizing of a troubled mind is met with both over egged misery, needless anger, bad jokes and genuine sympathy.
And this weekend, when Amy Winehouse passed away, the gamut of emotions ran wildly, careering into each other in some kind of awkward grief Olympics.
Whether you’re a fan of pop music or not, it was clear to see that Winehouse wasn’t your average performer. In fact, she was one of the most influential popstars in a decade. While pop has flirted with the sound of ’60s pop for years, for the most part, it revealed itself in things like ‘Stop’ by The Spice Girls – fun, but ultimately tepid versions of the Motown sound.
However, when Amy Winehouse came alone, she reinterpreted it with a shot of hip hop and RnB, complete with that obvious love of jazz and blues which informed the ’60s soul sound. She wasn’t just someone a curio revivalist – it was clear she meant it… something you certainly couldn’t say about Duffy or Paloma Faith who enjoyed Winehouse’s inactivity thanks to personal problems.
Sadly, it was her personal problems that was most prevalent in our lives. Winehouse only released two LPs, leaving her often incredibly depressing antics to take precedent over the thing that made everyone sit up and take notice in the first place.
And it’s because of these personal issues, people seemed to take great glee at such an untimely death.
In amongst the usual stunned replies, there was a chorus of angry jeers which suggested that she almost deserved to die, mainly because she was in the awful grip of some terrible, terrible illness.
One common sentiment is that, should this have been the death of ‘just some smack head down the road’, no-one would care. While you could probably argue that if you wanted to, it simply isn’t true. The difference between ‘some junkie’ and Amy Winehouse, is that with the former, there’s a chance we’d simply never get to hear of it. The fact is though, that anyone who celebrates the death of a twentysomething, who died alone after battling a savage addiction, really ought to restock and question what it is they’re thrilled at losing.
That’s not to say we can’t joke. Events like this make people cope in different ways or, indeed, simply troll everyone else for a cheap laugh. We should know. We trade blows in the latter on a daily basis… and gallows humour won’t ever go away and nor should it.
That said, Winehouse’s passing is different. From each scab, brawl and drunken cock-up, we could all hoot because somewhere, there was this feeling that she was either being made to look more tragic by a press in need of column inches, or that she was actually going to turn this pain into more music and rid herself of this terrible demon.
However, as bystanders, we couldn’t connect with the illness. It was simply another macabre facet to a cartoon vision of what transpired to be an incredibly vulnerable young girl in too much pain to want to continue living.
And what is so sad is that Winehouse didn’t get to enjoy one of the things she helped to reignite. Pop music was in a sorry state of affairs for a while, and then, along came Amy with overtly commercial music that was actually okay for sneering musos to enjoy. She helped to kickstart the trend for great girlpop/girlgroups and the re-evaluation of pop in its purest form. Like many who lead the charge, she was always going to burn too bright to stick around for too long.
While it’s obvious that there are things going on in the world that are more momentous and strickeningly depressing, that’s not to say we can’t feel cut up about this particular tale. There’s a clawing sense of inevitability about the whole thing which never gets easier to handle.
Musicians who deal in pain often make the best music. However, we bury it under the choruses because we don’t want to think about the fact that one of the things that made them so special in the first instance may actually overwhelm them and take them away from us.
The sorrow and hurt in tracks like ‘Love Is A Losing Game’ and the confessional of ‘You Know I’m No Good’ wasn’t an act. That’s what made them connect. Like all great pop music, the implied strife and drama is what resonates in the listener… and when the bad news finally comes, there’s a strange sense of not having done anything to stop it. Elsewhere, voices hoot ‘Ha! She’s dead! Hahaha!’, not willing to recognise that they were probably weeping into their Corn Flakes when Elliot Smith or Kurt Cobain died.
So what have we lost? We’ve lost a woman who was a figure of fun to many or, indeed, a source of irritation for seemingly continuing to throw away the help that many offered. This is a common story. Addicts and their troubling behaviour are the mask of that dreadful sense of worthlessness that can blot out the sun and take away that last feeling of being of even vague value to a world that laughs every time you fall.
But really, the thing we’ve all lost is one of the most invigorating songwriters of a generation. She was trashy, dangerous and upsetting, but this was all coupled with an astonishing voice that was born of the things that ended up eating her whole, prompting onlookers to engage in a contest of grief and mockery of hurt.
And in those two things, we find the thing that really killed Amy Winehouse and it really is a terrible, terrible shame.
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Serena says
Totally agree with you here, I got so pissed off at people casually dismissing her as “just another addict” over the weekend. In fact, I took a lovely twisted pleasure in informing a particularly nobby work colleague that I was in fact a recovering alcoholic and so must be just as much of a scumbag as “wino”. That shut his big fat face up, although I really should have followed it up with a swift quick to the balls..but he obviously doesn’t have any!
Kat says
Really nice post, Mof — one of your best yet.
Thirteen says
A very touching article. I’m almost in tears now… It’s so, so sad that she lost that battle with her demons…
John Gillis says
Very well written Mof.
candice says
While it is sad someone died, addiction is not an illness and to claim otherwise is hugely disrespectful to those who suffer with real diseases, not in any way self inflicted. Taking drugs is a choice. Aids is not.
Da Shaykzz says
Impressive, Sir. I tip my hat to you.
Susi says
I think I love you. This article pretty much sums up how I feel about the whole thing.
I’m probably most sick of people arguing that one tragedy is worse than another, like it’s some horrifically morbid competition. Tragedies come in all sorts of sizes, a huge loss of life does not make one loss of life unimportant.
Cookie Monster says
The comparisons to Janis Joplin were all too easy before her death. Now add that both died at the age of twenty-seven years. I fear that forty years from now, Winehouse will not have had the impact that Joplin has after the same time. Joplin somehow managed to stay alive long enough to record more music. With the microscope of today’s media, the potency of yesterday’s drugs today, and a few new wonders of mad science to add to the self-destructive mix, Joplin may well have not made it to her twenty-second birthday.
We can deduce, then, that over the past four decades, society – and most especially the fame machine of music – has moved only further from fostering and protecting those who make music (understanding that they are sometimes fueled by the complex emotions that Mof covered) and toward maximizing on short-term profit, whatever the cost. The risk and profit margin profiles certainly favour using the cookie-cutter and songwriting factories to spit-out endless boy/girl bands, and solo entertainers. Occasionally they blow-up, a la Britney, but only after a great deal of money has been extracted whilst they were held under lock and key by their, and their friends and family’s, blind desire to achieve fame. Quite a different breed from Joplin and Winehouse.
Ah, well… who’s next, then? What’s the Pete Sodirty feller up to?
MG83 says
Agreed, a very well written article
Cookie Monster says
You are either a five year-old, or a rabid conservative. Since most rabid conservatives believe that AIDS is a choice (ignoring children of infected mothers), chances are you are a five year-old. In that case, bravo on your spelling, candice!
nancy says
Candice, what about a drug user who got HIV from sharing needles? Confusing, I know. Anyway, that article was one of the best and I enjoyed it! Well Done!
d says
Amy: Rest in the peace you never found here
May your family find comfort
SteC says
Excellent piece and couldn’t agree more. I’ve been shocked this week at the reaction, from those I considered sane, rational folk. Clearly not.
David says
Come on now, a minimally talented performer whose music will never be played after late 2011, lets not make her into something she never was, a great artist. Presently preparing myself for the canonization of Sister Amy into Rock and Roll Heaven. My only wish is that she was 28.
Huh, who knew? says
Who knew that Mof had a monkey that could write so well? Amazing really. You should let him out more Mof, he’s quite talented.
Marion says
So well said – I have no idea how people can be so heartless and unkind about someone who clearly suffered so much. I think I love you too…..
Cookie Monster says
Let your monkey read Mof’s monkey’s articles about music. Your monkey will be amazed (as monkeys are want to do to one another, along with aggressive sharing of fecal matter and circle-jerks).
Andrew says
Beautiful.
Si Sharp says
Wow Mof. What lovely words. I’ve already found myself in arguments about this having heard the “she was a junkie, she was asking for it” bollocks from idiots. I will be sure to remind them of their fearless principles when a close relative is diagnosed with lung cancer. (Obviously I won’t- that would make me a dick but you get the point).
Jennifer says
I love your tribute. I’ve read it several times, but I don’t know what “two things” you refer to in your final sentence. “Grief and mockery of hurt”? If that, I’m not sure what you mean. I’d like to know because, as I wrote above, I think your tribute excellent.