60 Songs That Explain the '90s - “Back to Black”—Amy Winehouse

Episode Date: October 9, 2024

Join Rob in celebrating Amy Winehouse, and missing her voice like the rest of us. Along the way, Rob discusses the biopic ‘Back to Black’ and ‘Amy’ before taking some time to cherish Amy Winehouse’s iconic song and album ‘Back to Black.’ Later, Rob is joined by writer Julianne Escobedo Shepherd to discuss her memories of interviewing Amy Winehouse and more. Host: Rob Harvilla Guest: Julianne Escobedo Shepherd Producers: Jonathan Kermah and Justin Sayles Additional Production Support: Olivia Crerie Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

A restaurant's best dishes tell stories. Their flavors embed themselves in our memory like song lyrics or lines from a movie. So much so that a little slice of a restaurant's story can become part of our own. I'm Danny Chow and this is ShiftMeal, a new video podcast from The Ringer where we're sharing a bite and chopping it up with chefs and restaurant people during their off hours. All episodes of Shift Meal are out now on Ringer food. I just missed her voice. you know it's presumptuous it's obnoxious of me to just say i miss her let's calm down i didn't know her at all i miss her it sounds weird when i say that let's not be weird but i do miss her voice terribly though

of course i can go listen to her voice whenever i want i can listen to her records again and her records are perfect or i can go watch the movie they made about her and the movie ain't perfect okay but the movie is absolutely perfect when everybody else just takes ten steps back and shuts up and submits to the majestic, eternal, ecstatic, devastating power of her voice. So first we watch international soul music legend Sharon Jones as she crosses a busy street in Jamaica Queens. That's it. She crosses the street. But because she is an international soul music legend. Somehow Sharon Jones turns the act of crossing the street into an event, into an art form, into a performance, into a whirlwind of charisma. They're making a movie about her, so she's got a camera

following her. And Sharon is very concerned that the person holding the camera is going to get hit by a car. Sharon points at the camera and goes, watch herself. And then she goes, wait. And then a car drives by. And she goes, all right, you better run. And then they all cross the street. It's riveting. Seriously. And then we watch international soul music legend Sharon Jones as she climbs the steps up to a church. And this is a different sort of riveting event. It's nearly unbearable to watch because she takes two steps up and she groans like, oh, and she stops and she exhales. She goes, whew, and she takes a moment to steal herself to take just the last five small steps up to the church. Sharon Jones didn't get famous until her early 40s and in the this moment she's in her late 50s. And by her own account, she is 4 foot 11 and a quarter inches tall. And yet, I have personally watched this woman stop across various stages like she was Godzilla, like she was Godzilla plus one billion, like she was James Brown reincarnate.

People sometimes call her the female James Brown. She likes that. But now, here, a half hour into the 2015 documentary Missington. Sharon Jones, exclamation point. They don't let just any movie put an exclamation point. The title, you have to submit an official exclamation point request to some sort of cinematic governing body. You have to earn that exclamation point. Now we are watching as she struggles to climb just a few steps.

This movie was directed by two-time Oscar winner Barbara Cople, and it celebrates Sharon Jones and her long-running Brooklyn soul band, Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings. But this film also chronicles in remarkably grueling detail Sharon's battle with stage two pancreatic cancer. This movie is super heavy. Dude, this movie is a tough hang. I thought I was prepared to watch this, but it turns out I was not. Sharon gets her head shaved on camera. She breaks down in tears with a tiny pile of her braids in her hands within five minutes.

The buzz of the clippers, man. And I'm sitting there like, I don't know if. if I can watch this. And now here, again, watching her struggle visibly to climb just a few stairs up to the church, I think I really don't know if I can watch this. But then, just in time, Sharon makes it into church. And in church, they hand international soul music legend Sharon Jones a microphone, and they get out of the way. It's unbelievable. She does this all the time. She does this whenever her anyone anywhere hands her a microphone. So it should not be at all surprising or unbelievable, but it's still unbelievable. Her happiness, her freedom is exquisitely audible in her voice,

but so is the struggle, so is the fight, so is the tremendous effort it takes her to ascend. She sings, his eye is on the sparrow. She sings the century old gospel hymn, his eye is on the sparrow. The word sings feels insufficient here, but any other verb feels, Dorky and Overwrought. I'm a professional rock critic. Dude, I use dorky and overwrought words like majestic, eternal, ecstatic, and devastating. And sometimes I use all four of those words in a row. And so you know I got like 10,000 dorky and overwrought synonyms for sings.

She belts, bellows, blairs, booms, rumbles, thunders, moans, croons, yelps, wails, shrieks, catarwalls. Here's an idea, though. How about I just shut up? She never sounds like she's showing off vocally. That's the other thing. Every flourish is absolutely necessary. She was born in Augusta, Georgia. That's James Brown's hometown, too. She loves James Brown. His song, Say it Loud. I'm black and I'm proud, especially. When she was a little kid, her family moved to Brooklyn, to Bed Stye, she sang with gospel bands, funk bands, wedding bands. She sang in a wedding band called Good. And Plenty. That's a great name for a wedding band. She tried to get a record deal but couldn't, but she kept trying. She did tons of studio work. She'd sing back up for anybody. Meanwhile, she worked as a prison guard. Just like Rick Ross, she worked as a prison guard at Rikers Island. She also worked as an armed guard at Wells Fargo Bank. The New York Times says one time she went to the recording studio straight from Wells Fargo, still wearing her uniform, including her gun. This is all prehistory. This is all her superhero origin story before she met the Dap Kings. This all enhances her credibility if you require your soul singers to have credibility. If you think that great soul singers have to be a little older, or at least be old souls. All of this life experience is audible in Sharon Jones's voice here, but then again, maybe none of that is audible because none of it matters. Prehistory doesn't matter.

Credibility doesn't matter. You hear her voice and you know. That's all. You hear her voice and you know you'll love it forever and miss it when it's gone. Maybe you can understand now why I get so dorky and overwrought and start bonking words like majestic, eternal, ecstatic and devastating together like action figures. I thought I told me to shut up. I love this part here where she sings, thank God eight times in ten seconds. This is the moment where I start thinking that maybe this movie that I thought I couldn't watch it all. was actually the best movie I've ever seen in my life. And then she hands the microphone back,

and that somehow makes her voice even louder. And then she screams, what I live for a couple times, and now I'm the one crying. And then the church band kicks in big time, and Sharon Jones dances with female James Brown type exuberance, with abandon, with 10,000 other dorky rock critic words.

We watched her struggle to climb up the church steps, like five minutes ago, but now she's transformed. It's so tempting to think that she's somehow cured, that she healed herself. Miraculous. That's another real biblical type word that I sometimes use as a dorky rock critic word. But Sharon Jones in church feels miraculous in the biblical sense. This movie Miss Sharon Jones comes out in 2015. We watch her go through surgery and chemotherapy.

We watch her survive. And at the end of the movie, she's back. on stage with the Dap Kings, promoting another perfect new album called Give the People What They Want. The movie ends triumphantly. The movie ends with Sharon Jones doing what she lives for. Sharon Jones died on November 18th, 2016 of pancreatic cancer. She was 60 years old. That's all I have to say about that. I promise myself I would not make all of this two maudlin. Forget it. You cannot make me go forward in time from the triumphant end of this movie.

I refuse. We're going backward. The whole premise of this show is that I get to luxuriate in the past whenever I want. This is my favorite Sharon Jones and the Dap King song. It's called My Man is a Mean Man. I love the half-buried little guitar riff on this song. 2007, South by Southwest,

the annual Balkers Gigantic Music Festival where thousands of rock critics nationwide convinced their respective newspapers and magazines and websites and whatnot to fly them out to Austin, Texas, to watch bands all day

and drink lone stars and eat 12 plates of brisket and then go write daily South by Southwest recaps that literally nobody reads. It's a sham. I wrote recaps of this shit from roughly 2005 to 2011, and they were all shams. I can say this now because it's over. No publication

is flying a rock critic anywhere at this point to write anything, but in 2007, you still had thousands of rock critics, hold up in their respective Austin hotel rooms, typing words like miraculous and catterwalls and riveting into their respective CMSs as part of their cute little daily Southby recaps that all collectively got zero page views. Excuse me. Got a little heated there.

I got sidetracked. I was playing you my favorite song by Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings, which is called My Man is a Mean Man. Seriously, dig the ascending guitar line here as Sharon Jones does the thing she lives for, which is kicking ass. I love that guitar part.

I love this song. My Man is a Mean Man is from the second Sharon Jones and the Dap King's album called Naturally. Came out in 2005. So I spend South by Southwest 2007 just following Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings around. I am transfixed. Sharon's thing is she pulls people up on stage to dance with her.

And because this is South by Southwest, these people tend to be gawky, swagless rock critic type knuckleheads like myself. And for logistical reasons, because the stages she's performing on are generally very high. And she is under five feet tall. Sharon tends to pick taller gawky, swagless rock critic type dudes who are extra like myself. And these guys get pulled on stage, right? And I can still close my eyes now and see the look in their eyes as they start dancing with Sharon Jones. They all have the same look on their face.

The singular mixture of overconfidence and no confidence whatsoever. Like they're thinking right now, I am the coolest person alive. But they're also thinking, I have never looked more ridiculous in my sense. entire life and may the Lord smite me where I stand. I love that look. I love the look of an awkwardly dancing man becoming immortal and dying inside simultaneously, cringing in ecstasy. I find this situation relatable and it really enhances the chorus. A couple weeks later, I will call up Sharon Jones and interview her for the Village Voice where I was working at the time. And on the phone, now will feel extremely cool and also impossibly dorky. And we will talk about those tall, gawky,

swagless rock critic type dudes. We'll talk about how people in Europe have started calling her the queen of funk. She likes that. And we'll also talk about James Brown, about carrying on the legacy of James Brown. Sharon says, quote, I've taken on that responsibility. Everyone comes up to me and says, I haven't seen a show like this since the 70s, since the Apollo. It takes. It takes me back to the old days. That's great. I like that. And I'm like, what about the dorks you dance with? And Sharon says, I think it's just being raw. You get on that stage and feed off that energy. I'll dance like that person dances with me. I got to continue to put that out there. Let people see what a show was like back in the day. I tell them, I don't need all that smoke. We don't have digital things on

there enhancing my voice. Just real raw. And quote. When you're a soul singer or a jazz singer for that matter, your whole job is to recreate back in the day. The old days are always looming. Ideally, the singer is a physical manifestation of the old days. Or really, the singer is a violent mid-air collision between the old days and the present day. The singer's job is to synthesize rawness into timelessness. Everything was better back then. everything sounded better back then, but then can still be now.

When will then be now? Soon. This skill, this ability to make now sound like then, makes the singer immortal. But this skill also leaves the singer unstuck in time. This timelessness can leave the singer more vulnerable. Or at least, you can make you forget how vulnerable, how frail, how human the singer really is. Anyway, I spent all of South by Southwest 2007 eating brisket and writing incendiary recaps. Literally nobody read and watching Sharon Jones kickass.

Was there anything else I should have been doing? Oh crap. I could have seen Amy Winehouse acoustic at South by Southwest 2007. What the hell, man. I refuse to believe this actually happened. I cannot process the idea of Amy Winehouse amidst all the dorks, including me. There is no way that the Amy Winehouse sang Love is a Losing Game for like a hundred people at the Bourbon Rocks Pub in Austin, Texas, probably while I was elsewhere within a half mile radius farting around watching Peter Bjorn. and John or kid's sister or Matt and Kim. Oh Rob, what are you doing?

What? On acoustic guitar here, we got Frank Stribling, better known by his stage name Binky Griptight, also known as the longtime guitarist for Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings. That's his stage name, Binky Gryptite. Binky with a Y, G-R-I-P-T-E. You play guitar for Sharon Jones and Amy You Want House. You can name yourself whatever you want. That's the deal. Talking to Guitar World in early 2024, Binky says, quote, Amy would do these small promotional spots where it was just her and a guitar. It ended up just being her and me. I'd be standing beside her with a guitar and no one else. And that's when I got to see how cool she was and the power

coming out of this tiny person. She didn't need anything to be huge. And the experience changed my perception of acoustic guitars forever. End quote. I am very angry that I missed Amy Winehouse doing shows at South by Southwest. I am not convinced this actually happened. Is this a deep fake?

Amy Winehouse did not play the fader fort. Get out of town. You know that viral Twitter prompt that's like, what are the craziest two people or things to coexist at the same time in history? And someone's like Rosa Parks could watched Shrek and Shrek 2 in the theater. That guy's amazement at Rosa Parks watching Shrek 2. That's me not believing that Amy Winehouse played the Fader Ford. No way they coexisted. Even though Amy Winehouse and the Fader Fort very obviously happened at the exact same

time. No, they didn't. Amy Winehouse was not interviewed backstage at the Fader Fort. Yeah, I've never been to us It's amazing It's so cold It's so cold Cold, it's really cool Yeah That's in like the first

35 seconds I can't watch Any more of this interview Occasionally my research abilities Are impaired By my lifelong struggle With secondhand embarrassment I'm sorry

I have a sensitive disposition That's rude of me to play That excerpt And I apologize I totally would have Made that mistake Amy Winehouse Famously is a very thick

accent. I miss her voice. Even though I can listen to her records, which are perfect, whenever I want, and even though they've made a few notably imperfect movies about her, I promise myself I would not make all of this too maudlin,

and it will amaze you the lengths I will go to keep this from getting too maudlin. But I do miss her voice terribly. Judging by all the movies they keep making about her, it seems like everyone does. My name is Rob Harvilla. This is the second

episode of 60 songs that explain the 90s, colon the 2000s, and this week we are discussing Back to Black by Amy Winehouse from her 2006 album, also called Back to Black. This is Amy singing Back to Black at South by Southwest 2007.

This probably really happened. If it's all the same to you, I'm going to pretend that I was there and that she never left. I go back How far will I go exactly To keep the Amy Winehouse episode From getting too maudlin and overwrought

What manner of pointless digression Might I employ To keep this show on the rails Or to keep this show off of Certain overwrought type rails Look out My top three weirdest personal South by Southwest memories

real quick. Here we go. Number three, I once bought an eight catfish sold out of a stranger's hotel room. I have no further context for this. I don't know when exactly. I don't know where exactly. I don't know who and I certainly don't know why. How was the catfish, you ask? I lived, bitch. That's all I can say. Sorry. Number two, my Buddy Garrett once required emergency surgery in downtown Austin during South by Southwest because he got a piece of chicken fried steak stuck in his esophagus. He was apparently not the first person to have this particular experience in this particular place. I vaguely remember Garrett saying he was wheeled into an ER operating room specifically designated for this purpose for chicken fried steak removal. and Garrett was back on the street within hours. That night we both went to see like LCD sound system or something, presumably.

And finally, number one, weirdest thing I ever saw at South by Southwest. My buddy Garrett also has diabetes. He's fine, which used to require daily insulin shots, right? Which he'd give himself. He'd just poke his side or whatever. But so my other friend Ted is in town. And Garrett and Ted have never met before. And I really want them to get along.

I want them to be friends. And I worry that they aren't vibing fully. but then suddenly they're like super-vibing because we're walking down the street and Garrett says, hold on, I've got to give myself his insulin shot. And Ted says, can I give you the shot? And Garrett says, yeah, man. And then I watch as Ted gives Garrett his insulin shot on the street. Both of them bathed in golden light with the Austin sun setting behind them and timeless indie rock music pouring out of every bar and parking lot surrounding us.

soundtracked by the fiery furnaces and whatnot. It was beautiful. The phrase dudes rock was not in cultural vogue at this time, and yet this is peak dudes rock for me. It was like a painting from Norman Rockwell's indie slees era. It was like the last scene in a Western. Just a gorgeous testament to the power of male friendship. I do genuinely miss her voice terribly.

And you have a guitar, it's not so much like, I know I look good. When you walk out, I now look good. It's more that you feel power. This is Amy Winehouse in 2004 in a promotional video for Fender Guitars. She's got her Fender Stratocaster. It's red or reddish orange. I think the official Fender name for this color is Fiesta Red. Sure.

Amy also played a light blue, a Daphne blue version of this strat. And that guitar sold at auction in 2021 for $153,600. Amy is 20 or 21 years old at this moment. This is pre-Beehive Amy Winehouse. Her hair's down. She ain't got the iconic beehive hairdo yet. She doesn't even really have the iconic thick eyeliner yet. She is pre-iconic.

It's quite striking. She somehow looks both more and less like herself than usual. That sort of visual dismal. that only the most sainted and canonized and forcibly iconic rock stars can achieve. But the guitar is the most striking visual here. Amy playing her guitar, Amy cradling her guitar, Amy describing how much she loves her guitar. I guess it must be akin to having a dick, because I've never had a dick, obviously.

It must be like that. When I go on stage and I've got a guitar, I feel like no one can touch me. So to me, the guitar represents like my music that's inside me, but in external, you know what I mean, the external. So I guess that's why it's like having a dick. It's like myself but out, I guess. It's like myself but out is a tremendously astute observation about how rock stars generally regard their guitars. First of all, second of all, not every episode of this show will feature copious dick talk. I do want to assure you of that

or warn you of that, depending. The Mr. Brightside episode last week had a lot of gratuitous dick action, but in general, there will be less of this sort of thing going forward. FYI, she said it this time. Amy, I didn't say it.

This video starts with Amy Winehouse singing while playing guitar, and mercifully, that shuts me right up every time. Lord, he was a young. Holy moly this is Amy singing her song I heard love is blind every line Amy Winehouse sings just pick one word just luxuriated the way she phrases one word just now the word was infidelity obviously okay now try it with the word mind

Or maybe more accurately, it's two words there. It's my mind. The emotional skyscraper leap of my mind. Okay, this time it's way simpler. It's is, but crucially, is with two syllables. What do you not need me to tell you about Amy Winehouse? Do you require any biographical information at this point? I don't know that you do.

This woman is the subject of an Oscar-winning documentary. That movie is simply called Amy. Came out in 2015. She is, in fact, the subject of documentaries, plural. Not all of them Oscar-worthy, but nonetheless. She is also the subject of a high-profile and somewhat accursed biopic, also called Back to Black, starring one of the actresses from one of the many newer HBO shows. I really ought to get around to watching.

This movie Back to Black was released in May 2024, and many people suspect that this movie was designed to launder the reputations of the people who looked bad in the Oscar-winning documentary, namely Amy's father, Mitch Winehouse, and her ex-husband, Blake Civil Fielder. But I'm going to try and avoid all that shit for the most part. And anyway, this biopic received a great many, very intensely irate one-star, reviews on letterboxed.

These people are pissed. Wow. Movie people frighten me. Amy Winehouse is born in Southgate in North London in 1983 and she is a phenomenal guitar player. There you go. There's your biographical information.

In no particular order, Amy Winehouse is a phenomenal singer, guitar player, and songwriter. Her debut album called Frank came out in 2003 and Amy co-wrote most of the songs on this record, and she wrote I Heard Love is Blind on her own. I couldn't resist him. His eyes were like yours.

His hair was exactly the shade of brown. This is the studio. This is the Frank version of I Heard Love is Blind. And it's notable that this song already sounds like a 1930s jazz standard. Except I'm not aware of any 1930s jazz standard with any line. as funny as it was dark and I was lying down. Not as tough. I couldn't tell.

It was dark and I was lying down. Yes, on her debut album, released one month after she turned 20 years old, Amy Winehouse graced us with the funniest and most romantic song about having sex with someone else ever performed by anybody. Frank, the album, is called Frank because it is refreshingly blunt and uncouth, but Frank is also called Frank to remind you of another refreshingly blunt and iconic jazz singer named Frank.

This song is called In the Box, and yes, she means that Frank. In a 2004 interview, Amy talks about the breakup that inspired this song. And she says, quote, when I say Frank's in there and I don't care, that is literally a Frank Sinatra CD. He bought me it for Christmas. Now, he was putting all his stuff in a box, like his t-shirt that I used to sleep in. He bought me Frank Sinatra's In The Wee Small Hours, Ironically, because it's one of the classic heartbreak albums of all time. Frank as a title for the album is a good word. It is Frank.

Don't know. Maybe with more time I would have come up with a better title. End quote. The interviewer says, well, if you have to name your album after someone who better than Frank Sinatra and Amy says, I don't agree. There's a whole mess of people better than Sinatra. Sinatra had an emotional connection with music. That was his thing. He had the tone and his voice. But singers, I know a hundred singers that piss on Frank and musicians. And just as a person, he was an arsehole, but he had an emotional connection to songs that touched everyone.

women, men, soldiers. Sorry, I'll have to write down a lyric or I'll go mad. And she stops talking to rummage in her purse for a notebook so she can write down some song lyrics she just thought of. Do I personally enjoy the image of 100 singers pissing on Frank Sinatra? No. Not exactly. That's quite uncouth as images go. But it is pretty funny.

And it helps put Amy Winehouse's debut album in conversation with the debut albums of other famous jazz singers like, okay, fine, Frank Sinatra's. A cigarette that bears a lipstick traces. An airline ticket to romantic places. From his debut studio album, The Voice of Frank Sinatra, released in 1940. That's Frank singing, These Foolish Things, Parentheses, remind me of you. The Amy Winehouse song, Take the Box,

is part of one of my favorite subgenres of jazz songs. Sad lists of things. Sad lists of romantic type things. I like my jazz singers best when they just describe various objects and then cry about them. And still my heart has winged. These foolish things remind me of you. Frank Sinatra, great gowns, beautiful gowns. So who are the 100 singers who piss on Frank, metaphorically, according to Amy Winehouse?

Why don't we start with Sarah Vaughan? Sarah's word right here is midnight. Holding hands at midnight, Neat the starry sky, it's nice word. If you can get it, and you can get it if you try. From her 1950 self-titled debut album, that is Sarah Vaughn with Nice Work if you can get it. There's a song on Amy Winehouse's debut album. It's called October song, where Amy sings about singing the Sarah Vaughn song,

The Lullaby of Birdland to Amy's beloved pet canary, Ava. True story. Amy's word here is Starlight. Ava is a lucky bird. What strikes me about this song and about the first Amy Winehouse record as a whole is that the vocals say Sarah Vaughn, but the drums say Lauren Hill. Right? This is a jazz album. Amy Winehouse is a jazz singer, but the drums, the bluntness, the frankness, the swagger.

That all pulls us toward hip-hop. Toward the 21st century. Frank is an album that will remind you of Ella Fitzgerald, of Billy Holley. of Tony Bennett. Amy worships these singers. And Amy is, even here, already worthy of being compared to those singers and counted among those singers, among the greats. But Amy is singing over, for example, a track that samples Nas sampling the incredible bongo band. The word here is do. This song is called In My Bed. Many of the songs on Frank are about this uneven power. dynamic, about the eternal clash between traditional ideas of masculinity and femininity, about a man who

can't do various things that Amy can do. The first single, Amy's debut single, is called Stronger Than Me, about a man who should be stronger than her, but he is not. In my bed keeps that same energy, but now it's a monster drum loop instead of jazz guitar. The word here is alone. Amy is surrounded on this album by various fallible men clinging to various outdated notions. She sounds like the idealized past and she sounds like our best case scenario future. This song in My Bed was produced by Salam Remy, who produced the 2002 Nass song Made You Look, which samples the incredible bongo band.

I don't mean to sound pedantic. I'm just trying to be super accurate because rap Twitter people scare me. also. Salam is perhaps the highest profile producer on Frank, which also features production work from Commissioner Gordon, Jimmy Hogarth, Matt Rowe, and Amy herself. It is Salam Remy in the 2015 documentary Amy, who says, quote, what I allowed her to do was to really just put her wit into her songs. When I heard her sing in front of me, I could tell she was really like a jazz singer. She had the stylings of a 65-year-old jazz singer who knew the ropes up and down. It was like, okay, if this is what you are when you are 18, then what are you going to be when

you're 25? End quote. And here immediately is the central tension of Amy Winehouse musically, the perils of her being an old soul. Amy is the oldest and most soulful old soul of her generation. and possibly any other generation. And that makes her instantly iconic, but that also leaves her unstuck in time. That leaves her vulnerable. Specifically, it leaves her vulnerable to the immense, to the impossible pressure of chuckleheads like me,

describing her as sounding like both the idealized past and the best case scenario future. All right, look, maybe you've picked up on this. I don't really want to talk about like 85% of what we generally talk about when we talk about Amy Winehouse in my experience. So let's find out how quickly right now I can blow through the full timeline and dispense with all the stuff. I probably need to mention, but I definitely don't want to talk about. Feel free to time me on this.

Okay. Amy Winehouse dies of alcohol poisoning on July 23rd, 2011. She was 27. She is one of the singular musical tragedies of her generation or any other generation. And because she dies at 27, she is further morbidly canonized as a member of the 27 Club of iconic musicians, artists, celebrities who died at that age. Robert Johnson, Brian Jones, Jimmy Hendricks, Janice Joplin, Jim Morrison, Kirk Cobain. Amy is prominently featured in a whole other documentary from 2018 about the 27 Club called 27 Gone Too Soon. You go watch that if you want.

And so the operatic tragedy of Amy Winehouse's life and death constantly threatens to drown out the world historical greatness of Amy Winehouse's music. The Oscar-winning documentary called Amy, directed by Asif Capadia, and released in 2015. It starts out with a home movie of Amy Winehouse in 1998 at 14 years old, singing Happy Birthday. And the beauty and the tragedy of this movie is that it knows that, that this is the best moment in the movie because everybody else takes 10 steps back and shuts up.

The word here is two. Five years after this moment, Amy puts out her debut album, Frank, and gets kind of famous. Three years after that, in 2006, Amy puts out her second and last album, back to black, and she gets super famous

and the inherent toxicity of super fame, the paparazzi and the tabloids and what have you, Super fame only exacerbates her personal struggles with substances and with her oft-vilified husband, and soon to be ex-husband, Blake Civil Fielder, who appears as a disembodied voice in this documentary and sounds like this. The day we got married, we went out on a boat around Miami, smoked a cigar, and it was like a real achievement. An amazing thing that me and her had actually done. We'd actually gone and got married.

And we did it exactly how we wanted to. When this movie, Amy, came out in 2015, I wrote about it for the website Deadspin, where I was working at the time. And I wrote that Blake's disembodied voice in this movie is the scariest thing about this movie. I wrote that it sounds like they lowered a microphone directly into his grave. And then I wrote that he sounds like the Grim Reaper recapping True Detective. and then I wrote that he sounds like Leonard Cohen betting money on the Knicks. That is overly glib given the circumstances and yet I stand by my characterization of Blake's voice. Glib but accurate.

I think that by imagery there improves a little as it goes along. I will say that. Let's just say that this documentary does not paint an especially flattering portrait of Blake, nor is it especially flattering to Amy's parents and in particular Amy's father, Mitch Winehouse. In between the Frank album and the Back to Black album, everyone

wanted Amy to go to rehab, but Mitch told Amy she didn't have to go to rehab. And so she doesn't go to rehab right then. And Amy's then manager, Nick, thinks she really, really should have gone to rehab right then, and therefore he's still pretty angry at Mitch about this.

And Mitch himself is very angry that this documentary mischaracterizes that whole situation. And so the 2024 biopic Back to Black portrays the fictional Mitch Winehouse in a much warmer and more flattering and supportive light. And even though the real Mitch Winehouse isn't officially involved with this new movie, many of those frightening, irate one-star reviews on Letterboxed dismissed this biopic as a shadowy attempt

by certain people in Amy's life to whitewash the hard truths. of the documentary. Sheesh. I hope you're not actually timing me here. See, I'm getting bogged down. This biopic, Back to Black, isn't the worst movie you'll ever see in your life.

But it is, unavoidably, quite on the nose in a dorky and overwrought sort of way. As when movie Amy sasses her future manager, Nick, for working for the same management company that handles the Spice Girls. Do you know what girl power means to me, Nick?

Sarah Bourne Dinah Washington Lauren Hill That's real girl power mate I understand What do you understand You need to know this now I ain't no fucking spice girl

Yeah, we got it. That's Marissa Bella starring as Amy Winehouse and Marissa does not lip sync in this movie and I sincerely respect it. I'll leave it at that. Marissa also stars in that HBO show industry, which I will get to eventually. Let me catch up on Bridgerton first. There is one scene in Back to Black that really struck me that builds on the musical story that the Amy documentary tells so effectively. It's the scene where movie Amy is informed by, her sheepish manager Nick that the label doesn't want her to play guitar on stage anymore. So there's a feeling that the guitar is getting in the way of your performance. So we want to hand the guitar duties to Dale and allow you to concentrate on the singing so that the audience can connect with you more. What the fuck does that mean? The scene goes on. Movie Amy yells at everyone and stalks off and ends up at a bar where she meets movie Blake. there you go. The power of cinema. Somehow

Heartbreak feels good in a place like this. But this is useful for me as a new way of hearing Amy Winehouse and a new way to visualize the difference between her first album and her second album. On Frank, Amy's got her guitar. And the guitar, of course, is her, it's herself but out. Yes? The word there was turkey, obviously. That's Amy playing her big sing. stronger than me in 2003 on the TV show later with Jules Holland. Amy, I believe, is playing the Daphne Blue Fender Stratocaster. That will later sell at auction for $153,600. But so now I hear the album back to black as the album where they took Amy's guitar away from her, at least on stage.

The word here is when. Yes, I've been black But when I come back No, no, no And it breaks my heart Just a little bit How much context, How much iconography

Floods into my head When I hear this song now, right? Everything solidifies, everything hardens. Rehab, the song, Amy's Blockbuster Breakout song And the lead single from her second and last album, 2006 is Back to Black. Rehab now is,

so monumental and beloved and iconic that I struggle to hear it in a new way, to view it in a new light, to rehumanize the musical icon who is singing it. I'm trying to fight through the myth to get back to the person, the really tremendous wit of this person. The words here are 70 days. Because the whole tragic narrative of Amy Winehouse is spelled out in this song. right it was meta even before most of us thought we knew most of the details i ain't got the time and if my daddy thinks i'm fine rehab is the song that makes her so super famous that nobody can help her anymore it's the proverbial breakout hit song as albatross it's the beginning of the end but seriously i'm desperate to stop talking about all that and i will focus exclusively on the

exquisite vocal phrasing of Amy Winehouse from here on out if that's what it takes to shut me up. I got no idea. Amy is credited with playing guitar on four songs on Back to Black. And no she loses her guitar on stage, she gains another big shot producer here. In addition to Salam Remi, now she's got Mark Ronson, the super retro and very British and disconcertingly handsome Mark Ronson in her corner as well. And Mark Ronson, in turn, brings in a new backing band, the Dap Kings. They help Sharon Jones recreate back in the day, and now they can help Amy Winehouse, who wasn't even alive back in the day, do the same.

And even if the idea of being an old soul is a trap, is a prison of sorts, back to black is nonetheless the best case scenario, old soul record. It sounded like nothing else happening in 2006. It sounded timeless on impact. Amy sounded iconic on impact. Fixate on the way she sings Tangeray now and fixate on the way she sings the word with later. That's You Know I'm No Good.

Even a couple months ago, I would have bet you a great deal of money that rehab was the most streamed Amy Winehouse song on Spotify, but that is very much not the case. And you know I'm No Good is way closer to rehab than I. of thought. How about that? What's the key word in the song Love is a Losing Game? It's probably oh, right? Yeah, it's O. If this is the only way we can listen to Amy Winehouse without getting buried in tragic context, so be it. You know my favorite song on this record? Now and Forever,

I bet you can guess. The Day. Tears dry on their own. That's my favorite Amy Winehouse song. And also, coincidentally, I think, it's the most retro-sounding song to me. In a large part, of course, because it interpolates Ain't No Mountain High Enough by Marvin Gay and Tammy Terrell. But also because, as always, Amy sounds like the oldest old soul in the history of old souls, even when, lyrically, Amy's frankness is defiantly modern. Fixate on the way she sings fuckery now. And fixate on the way she sings the words, Slick Rick G. later. Me and Mr.

me and Mr. Jones, this one's really growing on me right now. This one's shooting up the charts in my household. The phrasing of, you don't mean dick to me, especially. Which brings us, the word dick brings us, and no, not every episode of this show will be like this, which brings us to, somewhat to my surprise, by far the most streamed Amy Winehouse song. It is possible that there are other blockbuster iconic enduring pop songs that include the phrase kept his dick wet, but I doubt it. You go look that up if you don't believe me. If you believe there are other giant hit songs that employ this phrase. Back to Black, the song is about how Amy's

true love, Blake, dumped her brusquely to return to his ex-girlfriend briefly. Blake will be back in Amy's life, perhaps unfortunately. Soon. One thing I will concede about Amy the documentary is that Amy and Blake are very possibly the two most in love human beings I have ever seen in a movie in my life. I will say that. It's quite unnerving to watch, but they are very clearly, very intensely in love. make of that what you will.

I suppose we will all be making of that what we will for the rest of our lives. But there's no denying the pathos with which she sings the words, My Guy. I think, though, that the single most devastating line in this song might be, I love you much. The way the first chorus stumbles directly into the second verse, and she could sing, I love you so much, but she doesn't. because she loves him too much to articulate it in any other way than I Love You Much.

I Love You Much. Oh man, that is very devastating in a very subtle way. Whereas you love Blow and I Love Puff is devastating in a ridiculously explicit way. I'm not touching that one, actually. Both Amy Winehouse albums, both Frank and Back to Black end with a song about how much she loves Wee. Look it up. Otherwise, I'm not touching that one. What makes Back to Black the song, the song now, as Amy Winehouse goes? Back to Black has over a billion plays on Spotify, almost twice as many as rehab. That isn't the only metric that matters, obviously, but it's still weird. This doesn't require any overwrought rock critic type theory, but let me supply one anyway. Back to Black is the Amy Winehouse song where she truly connects both triumphantly and tragically with her old soulness, with the back in the day that she evoked so brilliantly. The bridge to Back to Black is a black mirror image of Be My Baby by the Ronnettes from

1963, one of the most famous and most joyful pop songs in history with one of the most famous opening drum beats in recorded history. Be My Baby, pretty good song. I'm not afraid to say it. The bridge to Back to Black recasts Be My Baby as a funeral march. And what's most chilling is that the bridge to Back to Black is just Amy Winehouse singing the word black repeatedly, slowly, softly, with no vigor to it, no jazzy spin. What makes the bridge and the song as a whole work is how effectively it convinces you that she's receding into the mist, that she's burning out and face. away simultaneously. There is a clip in the Amy documentary of Amy in the studio recording this part of the song. The camera slowly pulls back from her as she sings. It's a little overwrought, but only a little. It's as terrifying in its own way as the sound of Blake's voice. And what's more terrifying is that maybe this is Amy Winehouse at the absolute peak of her powers, that her musical highs and her personal lows are diametrically opposed. And in this,

inseparable. As despondent as she sounds, in her own twisted way, she sings because she's happy. She sings because she's free. I have painted myself into a corner where this is ending on a super overwrought downer note and I'm not happy about it. Give me a second to recalibrate here. Even Amy in the documentary knows what a downer note this is. Oh, it's a bit upsetting at the end, isn't it? Yeah, it is. Okay, I got it. I can do this really fast. You know the famous Amy Winehouse Grammy acceptance speech in 2008 when she wins record of the year for rehab and Tony Bennett says her name and she's genuinely shocked. And she's on her own separate soundstage in London because she couldn't fly to Los Angeles for the Grammy ceremony for reasons I don't feel like getting into. But then she gives the acceptance speech that includes the infamously romantic line for my Blake, My Blake incarcerated, a line that is not in this scene in the new biopic, by the way. What's the deal of that?

Hey? Anyway, the funniest thing in the world to me is the raw footage of Amy, watching as Tony Bennett and Natalie Cole, the presenters, are reading off all the nominees for record of the year, and this happens. It comes around. Justin Timberlake. His album's called what goes around comes around. The incredulous.

of Amy Winehouse, apparently hearing the name of the Justin Timberlake song, What Goes Around Comes Around for the first time. That is the funniest thing in the world to me. And when I miss her voice, which is always, I miss that part of her voice too. We are honored to speak once again with Julianne Escobito Shepard, long-time writer and editor for any place you can think of, including Pitchfork, Flaming Hydra, Harper's Bazaar, The Fader and Jezebel. She is working on her first book called Vakera.

Julian, it's great to talk to you again. It is great to be here. Thank you for having me once again. Of course. One of the shows I most regret not seeing myself over my whole career was Amy Winehouse at Joe's Pub, a tiny little club in New York, and I think 2007. It was her first headlining show in America. And it turns out you interviewed her right before.

for this show. Like, what struck you most about her and talking to her right at that moment? What really struck me, honestly, was that she was so nervous to talk to me over the phone. And she was stuttering, which is a notorious thing about her,

I think early on especially, that she was incredibly nervous and stuttering. and, you know, I basically had to talk her down and just, you know, basically told her that we were just chilling. I was asking her the easiest questions in the world because I was working for MTV at the time. So we were just like, I know. So, and, you know, once I talked her down, she was extremely talkative. And when she realized that we were just talking about music, then she actually opened up and we talked. about her love life, which was interesting, but I think what was really, yeah, I think what was so striking was how nervous she was.

I have never had another interview where the artist was so stressed out. And she wasn't even quite that big yet, you know? Like she was just kind of becoming this star in the U.S. but she was playing Joe's Pub. I mean, how many people does that see, like $350, maybe, maybe $200? Yeah. Yeah. It's tiny.

It's exclusive. Yes. It's a supper club. That's right. Yeah, I was trying to situate, like, this is after Frank, after her first album. So she's gotten a lot of attention. She's done a lot of press, I have to imagine. And so I was curious, like, this isn't the point where rehab blows up, and she's a tabloid fixture.

Yeah. This is before all that even. So is she nervous just talking to another person? Is she nervous about, you know, headlining in the States? Is she nervous about, you know, just the sense she has of how big she's about to get? No, I think she was just nervous to talk to another person. I don't think she had that sense yet. Let's see, she said, when I'm nervous, I can't talk sometimes.

And she was just nervous at me. being interviewed. It was so, you know, and I was asking her basic stuff. This was definitely before, it must have been 2006, actually, because I think I left MTV before 2007. But yeah, I think it was just talking to a new person. Like, she was incredibly shy. And, you know, I was just asking her, like, why did you shift away from jazz? You know, like, hard hitting MTV. TV type questions. I know. And it was really touching, actually.

And I've remembered that interview, obviously, not just because it was Amy Winehouse, but because it was such a unique interview that I've ever had in my life. And I felt like we kind of vibed, actually, towards the end. I think by the end, she realized that I was just like another gal about town. And then she was telling me about her love life, which obviously. eventually is what blew up everything. I mean, I still hear people talk about the Joe's Pub show, and they talk about how, like, Jay-Z is backstage talking to her.

Like, do you think she understood it all in that moment how big she was going to get and, like, the degree to which everyone already wanted a piece of her? Yeah, actually, I do think she was probably, she probably anticipated that, like, particularly in New York, you know, if Jay-Z's backstage, that means you have, like, 1,000 record suits there. And she probably knew that there was an incredible amount of pressure on horror. But I don't know, she knew that she would blow up. I think she knew maybe that she was expected to blow up.

And this was like a real test, I think, of like how she would fare to a U.S. audience, I think. I mean, I've seen so many videos of her live. Do you think this is the kind of deal where she's uncertain, you know, she's nervous offstage, but she totally transforms when she's on stage. Like, suddenly she's a super confident rock star, or does she not change at all? And, like, that vulnerability is part of what makes her such a great live performer. I mean, I think there's attention there. You know, it always depended on, like, how she was doing. But I regrettably did not go to that show.

I do not know why it is like the regret of my life because obviously I just had to take the stupid F train down like five stops. It's a terrible train. Yeah. I know. I do understand it in retrospect. It is a really bad train. I actually think I couldn't get list.

And it was sold out. Jay Z took your spot on the list for the Joe's motion. Jay Z. Yeah. And it was sold out. So I did the interview. But yeah, I think if I recall. all right and please check me on this, that she actually like really proved herself and that was

like her really big breakout moment, right? So I think it is really like, you know, as a person, she obviously had some like shyness and confidence issues, but that was her craft. So put the mic in front of her and she's like, like you said, like a superhero. Yeah. I feel like everyone immediately started talking about her in the context of Billy Holiday, Sarah Vaughn, Ella Fitzgerald, whoever, like, she did not feel like a person living in the mid-2000s at all. Was there anything happening musically in 2005, 2006, 2007? That lays the groundwork for Amy Winehouse? Or did she truly just come out of nowhere? I mean, as far as pop music goes, she kind of came out of nowhere. I think, like, she, you know, there's Lauren Hill who was like, you know, but that was years before.

So, yeah, I mean, at that time it was like, you remember, it was like a lot of like, kind of like flossy club pop music. And then suddenly here's this like throwback like Belter who loves the Shangri-Laws and loves hip-hop and is collaborating with like, Salam Rummy and it's like, whoa, it really was kind of out of nowhere, right? Am I right? Yeah. No, I totally did. I mean, and I think she played into it to some extent or her, you know, her team played into it. The idea of her is this antiquated, you know, old soul type figure, you know, who's just the total op. She's not a fucking spice girl, as she keeps saying in the movie, right? Right. Yeah. Oh, God. I was going to ask you, you said like, I tried to watch the new movie, the biopic.

Like, do you remember the scene where you stopped watching the new Amy Winehouse biopic where you're like, yeah, I can't do this? So I got actually like about 40 minutes in, which I think is pretty good. That's, that's solid. You gave it a solid, solid chance. That's like one third, maybe one fourth. Yeah. I was like, yeah, I gave it a go. I thought, like, what's her name?

The chick from industry was doing a decent job at singing or whatever. But, like, yeah, so I went back and checked, and where I turned it off was when she's at, like, a funeral and her mom turns to her and is, like, all got Longcansa. And it's supposed to be this moment where it's, like, this just, like, tragic moment where Amy Winehouse is. mom has lung cancer. But the way that she said it, it wasn't even camp. Like, I would have stuck with it. It was camp. It was just so bloodless that I just, I couldn't do it anymore.

What about you? I think her Nana. Her grandma, yes. Yeah. I watched the whole thing because I am a professional. You don't have to. You were not required to. I mean, as you say, I had never thought of myself as like a hardliner about lip syncing

in biopics like this. It doesn't really matter to me generally, but I did appreciate that she tried it. Right? Like she can't sing like Amy Winehouse, but I thought it was like poignant that she tried as hard as she tried. You know, but the movie is just so dorky. I think you're right in saying like it's not even camp.

It's like something uglier beyond camp. And it's hard for me to watch that movie and not think about it in relationship to the documentary and think about like, this is just people behind the scenes in Amy's family, her father especially, like still trying to maneuver themselves within this story. And it's just the fact that her father in this new movie is portrayed as this super kind and attentive and supportive person, you know, which is the opposite, honestly, of how he was portrayed in the documentary. Like, it's hard for me to not just read all of it as a political maneuvering kind of thing. It just, I can't ever get into the movie because that's always

taking me out of it. Yeah, for sure. There's something very, I don't know exactly the word to use, but it's very clear that he is milking her memory for money and like his own, yeah, his own rehab, image rehab. And it is really, it's really sad because I don't know if we'll ever get the full story because of that, you know? Right, right. But I mean, maybe that's part of the appeal of her music that she's just like unknowable. Yeah. I always try not to. I mean, it's just, I always try not to imagine like what someone's career would have been had they lived.

But it's all this talk about how Amy, like she was going to join a supergroup with Mo's death and Questlove. Like she wanted to branch out and cross genres and evolve. Like what sense did you get of her range? just off those two albums. Like, what do you think she was capable of? Well, the movie taught me that she loved was good at rapping. That's right. I was going to say, she's rapping Lauren Hill within 10 minutes, you know, so there you go.

Yeah. I mean, I think she left hip hop. She was mentioning, she was talking about hip hop. And I think that would have been a really. interesting prospect to bring more of like the Questlove, Mosov. I think she could have done anything. I know that I don't imagine her doing the like Vegas circuit.

Like I don't think she would have gone for like the sort of treakly power ballad or anything. The good question, actually, a real question I have is like how she would have like navigated the rise of EDM. Oh, wow. Yeah. That's some vivid imagery. I'm so sorry. Amy Winehouse at the Electric Daisy Carnival.

You know, that's kind of beautiful and kind of terrifying at the same time. Seven Nation Army, dude. It could have happened. She could have made it. happen. Holy shit. Okay.

Sorry. No, that's, that gives me a lot to think about now. That's, that's quite a hypothetical. Does it surprise you? Sorry, major laser collab. Like, okay. That's too far. That's too far.

Sorry. Let's leave. Let's leave major laser. LMFAO maybe, but I draw the line at major laser. Okay. Does it surprise you at all that Back to Black has emerged as the biggest and most enduring Amy Winehouse song? At the time, I thought it would be rehab forever. Yeah.

Yes and no. I was surprised when you told me that. And I think partly it was because, like, if you did not live through this era, you do not know how often rehab played over every. every, every radio station over, like, constantly, like, just rehab was in the air that we breathe. Yes. But in going back and revisiting the song, I can really see it because there's just, you know, rehab was like the fun, like, kind of like, that was the radio banger. That was the jaunty one, yeah. The jaunty one, and it was like cheeky and like, but this was, this is so powerful.

And also I think one thing that she was doing was that, you know, the sort of like her fearlessness to be a little bit vulgar. I think she pulled that from hip hop. And also you didn't hear singers like her talking about like spitting lyrics like, you know, you just want to get your dinner. wet. And I think the frankness really translates to this era and also just the way that she sings the obvious emotion and pain behind it is, I think it resonates with the TikTok generation, probably. I mean, overall, what do people get wrong about Amy Winehouse now? Like the way we remember her, the way we depict and describe her. Like, how does that differ from the Amy Winehouse, you actually remember?

It's hard because the tabloid depiction of her, I think, even still resonates. It still ripples through the decades. Decades. God, Jesus. Yeah. Oof. It's still, even though there's been a reevaluation and critical assessment of tabloid culture in the mid-2000s, I think that. that still endures.

Yeah, I think that still endures. And it's toxic and it's misogynist and it's tragic. But the way I remember her is simply just being this like master vocalist and lyricist who unfortunately perpetuated the influence of the ballet slipper. that's my biggest beef that's in the movie I don't think you got to that part of the movie but the belly slippers in the movie yeah oh god

okay well yeah has any singer pop star come along since who's even close to Amy Winehouse's essence you know like I watch Adele right and I love Adele you know and she's like bantering in Vegas you know and she's so fun

you know and there's some cross over there, but like not a ton of it. Like, is there anybody since Amy Winehouse who's reminded you at all of Amy Winehouse? Or is she one of one, ultimately? I mean, honestly, I think she is one of one. I cannot think of anyone who has the same sort of mystique in the same way. I mean, maybe you could make an argument that like one of her. contemporaries would be like, you know, Rihanna, maybe, but there's, there's, that's, that's

interesting. That's very interesting. There's a lot there. Fives and attitude a little bit, but yeah, exactly. Swagger, right. Yeah, yeah, but like, I don't think so. I mean, do you think so? Do you think does there anyone? Like, no. I mean, honestly, no. And it's always easy to say that and I always try and avoid saying like there will never be another blank, you know, just because it just sounds corny in my head. But I agree with you that this is a situation where there's like the vocal power on one hand and there's just the aura on the other. And I just think it's impossible to emulate either one of those, let alone both of those at the same time. You know, there's a few people who get close in the vibe sense and maybe in the vocal sense, you know, but not nearly close enough

and both simultaneously. I think that might be it. You don't have to finish the movie. I authorize you to not watch the rest of the movie. I know you already weren't going to, but I'm just saying it's okay that you're not going to. I mean, I feel like I should just because I'm paying for peacock, and I'm like, you got to get it.

From an economic standpoint, yes, to get your $9.99's worth, go ahead and go ahead and make it up to the ballet slipper. guess. Yeah. I'm sorry you have to do that though. Thanks so much, Julianne. This has been great. Thank you so much. Thanks so much to our guest this week, Julianne Esquibito Shepard. Thanks as always to our producers Jonathan Kerma and Justin Sales. Thanks to Olivia Kriri for additional production help. Thanks to Julianna Ress for fact-checking and thanks very much to you for listening. And now, why don't you go listen to Back to Black? by Amy Winehouse.

We'll see you next week.