I’m not sure what I can say about her that hasn’t been said already. She’s the hot belle du jour, and with good reason. Her stunning Back to Black is my favorite album of the year so far.
I think I first read about her in LA Weekly. I grabbed “You Know I’m No Good” off of iTunes not too long after that, then played it to death. This was a mistake for 2 reasons. First of all, “You Know” doesn’t quite fit, production-wise, with the rest of the songs on the album. I’d place its style as early-1970’s Euro-lounge, while the rest of the album hails emphatically from the 1960’s. As such, I got the wrong impression of the rest of the album, and I waited a month or so before buying it. Secondly, I overplayed “You Know” so badly that I got sick of it. It might be the best song on the album, but I generally skip it now.
My new favorite song on the album is “Tears Dry On Their Own,” which starts with orchestration lifted wholesale from Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell’s “Ain’t No Mountain High Enough”. Not that I mind. The song sounds great, and I like that producer Mark Ronson took a stab at the Motown sound. I’m also wildly impressed with “Love Is A Losing Game,” a gorgeous ballad that never gets boring, probably because it isn’t as slow as Ronson makes you think it is.
But all credit really must go to Ms. Winehouse, who sings the fuck out of these songs. It’s hard to picture any other singer of today or yesterday singing the opening lines of “Me & Mr. Jones” (“What kind of fuckery is this? / You made me miss the Slick Rick gig”). Yet she makes it sounds harsh, funny, and authentic all at once. Awesome.
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Great blog Brandon; this artist is my new favorite of all time and this is coming from someone who was born in the sixties. The whole album works for me on so many levels, the production is insane, Mark Ronson hired some bad ass real musicians and the music sounds thick and emotional, that old school orchestra shit, even it if it is "throwback" and some may consider it rehashing old shit, it is still so fresh and so clean. It takes a bad bitch to pull my heart away from Mary, Sade, Janis Joplin, Nikka Costa, Etta, on and on and and on... and all the rest of them bad ass bitches that step upto the plate to belt their guts out. I also heard a rumor that Lauryn Hill was supposed to get some of those tracks. My favorite track on the album right now is Unholy War, not the most obvious stand out track but poignant as hell, and just like on her first album Frank, she is no joke when it comes to those reggae influenced tracks like "just friends" you don't want to get me started on Amy, I could go on forever, it's been way too long since I felt this kind of excitement about an artist all around, she is dangerous, rebellious, raw and we are lucky if we get a third album out of her, most artist that shine this bright usually crash and burn, don't sleep on "love is a losing game", I heard Prince is doing a cover WHAT THE F--K!!!
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