ThomasQuinn wrote: It's too bad that she died. I was a little surprised that it happened so suddenly, but I can't say I didn't see this coming. However, I really can't understand the flood of ridiculous attempts at compliments - musicians comparing her voice to Billie Holiday's, with whom she had very little in common except a degree of "unpolishedness". Sure, she contributed to music - I didn't like her music, but that's really not very important - but the way they make it appear as if she was the most influential thing to happen in the world of music since the invention of polyphony is just ridiculous - and it makes a mockery out of her, which I don't really think she deserved.
I think it is sad that the person died, and I especially feel sorry for her parents, but I don't think it's right to overstate her contribution to music. I hope I don't offend anyone with this, but I sincerely doubt whether her name will still be known fifty years from now. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
I'm of the opinion that rarely can an artist be truly influential early in their career. You'd have to be doing something quite new, yet listenable, in order to impact the music world enough to have other artists follow you. It takes a lot of the right circumstances, most beyond the control of the artist, to be merely successful, let alone influential. And a big key to influencing others is time, which is a test not many can stand against. There are a lot of great artists and songs from over the years, but we only remember the good ones; flashes in the pan simply fall away.
I think it's far too early to call Winehouse influential. Popular? Yes. Talented? Sure, if her music appealed to you.
The real telling point, touched on by Quinn, is the strange apparent dichotomy of saying a band or artist is both "the next [so-and-so]" and "hugely influential." How can that work, exactly? If you sound like somebody else, how can you be influencing people with that sound (except maybe inspiring them to listen to whomever it is you sound like). The influence comes later. The Beatles started off as a rhythm and blues combo, with about 50% original material (heavily based on the music they liked) and 50% covers. Yeah, they sounded great in the early days, but their "influential" output wouldn't come until the Rubber Soul and Revolver era and it would more or less remain so until they broke up.
Back to Winehouse...
This is my ignorance of her output talking, but what exactly are her fans and critics saying was so groundbreaking? I got the gist that her addictions and rehab were the crux of her fame and infamy. Those are hardly new things to write songs about, even if they're deeply personal. Musicians writing about the ill-effects of drugs goes back decades, along with writing about the after-effects.
john bodega · Member since
"Zebonka12 is 'turd' and other comments aimed at me???"
Nope, it was aimed at someone else.
"If you don't like the post, don't commment on it!"
Classically stupid comment, this one.
lifetimefanofqueen · Member since
GOATHEAD1985 wrote:
If you don't like the post, don't commment on it!
==================== may i just say i cant remember how many times ive had to say that too lol
GratefulFan · Member since
Amy was credited for the resurgence of a genre, with a modern twist, and for the wave of female artists that followed in a similar vein. Somewhat Ironically, it was her absence due to substance abuse that opened the way in part for the other women to supply the demand she has created. I don't think there is any question that she's had an influence on the music industry, or any question that she will be remembered in 50 years.
I think how one view's her addictions or addiction in general depends in part on how capable you are of stepping outside your own direct experience. In appreciating what people who use anything compulsively - alcohol, drugs, sex, food, gambling, other - do to their bodies and lives and families I think you have to appreciate that it's not "a choice" in the commonly understood sense of the world. Almost nobody elects to destroy themselves and the people they love as a reasoned choice. There are personality structures that churn up a staggering amount of pain and self doubt and self hatred and the pressure to anesthetize that away one way or another is enormous. Addicts are weak, but I think it's often weakness against an overwhelming emotional deluge that can take more years to wrestle down cognitively than some addicts get. Perfectionism and it's attendant vulnerability to black and white thinking can lock addicts obsessively in all or nothing patterns of destructive behaviour that I imagine are experienced by the addict as something like centrifugal force, but mystify and frustrate loved ones who see 'stepping off' as wholly a matter of wanting to enough. Indeed so many of the glimpses of brilliance on the 'Back to Black' album were beautiful, visceral reflections of her obsessive love for her codependent boyfriend/husband Blake.
Her voice was as soulful as I've heard, capable of conveying deep measures of pain, regret, sensuality and beauty all at once in a handful of notes. That doesn't spring from an inner world defined by either ease or happiness, and I am a bit baffled as to just what perch people are judging her from. Her mother talked about her always having been a difficult and challenging child who couldn't seem to anticipate or avoid consequences even as a young girl. In general I think we all give ourselves too much credit for who we are as people. We're not much more than the sum of things that have happened *to* us, from a genetic lot at birth to a series of shaping events that we usually have little control over. If you think Amy Winehouse led a shitty and wasteful life then I think you should be glad you weren't Amy Winehouse.
People who don't hear greatness in her surely have different ears than I. To me she was a true musician whose voice was her irrevocable destiny, and I don't think she sought or anticipated the fame or infamy that came later. She was one of the few artists for whom deep talent and commercial success aligned and as we know from so many conflicted artists that came before her that is not always an easy path. Her gift was bigger and stronger than she was, and that is enormously sad. I'll always remember her performance at the 2007 Mercury Prize awards for the juxtaposition of her talent and her raw ordinariness and lack of ease as a human being. The difference in Amy Winehouse behind the microphone and away from it that day now seems heartbreaking and prescient.
And a stripped down version of Valerie that i think is my favourite. It was my not infrequent desire to hear this take that led to my lucky last run at her music the day before she died. One person said of Amy that where other artists needed 40,000 dollars worth of equipment to know how they wanted to sound, she knew how she wanted to sound standing on top of a piano.
http://youtu.be/Q6JRttxTBC8
Pingfah · Member since
lifetimefanofqueen wrote: GOATHEAD1985 wrote:
If you don't like the post, don't commment on it!
==================== may i just say i cant remember how many times ive had to say that too lol ___________________
And I'm sure anyone with a brain has dutifully ignored you.
Here's a better idea, if you don't want your dumbass posts to be replied to, don't write dumbass posts.
==================== may i just say i cant remember how many times ive had to say that too lol ___________________
And I'm sure anyone with a brain has dutifully ignored you.
Here's a better idea, if you don't want your dumbass posts to be replied to, don't write dumbass posts.
============================ when was the last time a wrote a dumb ass post? how bout this mate, DONT BE A CUNT! seriously the lot of u snap at people for fucking breathing, why dont the lot of you just LIGTEN UP! would it kill you to be kind to people and not post cunty comments at people?
dysan · Member since
I don't mind sharing here, but i met her a couple of time and told her mangement / hangers on that she should be taken care of. Of course, that idea was met with all sorts of name calling and abuse. My only sadness is that those same people will make money out of her demise. I wasn't a fan by any stretch, but she seemed like a nice person.
GOATHEAD1985 · Member since
lifetimefanofqueen: Cheers mate, least someone has got a brain!
Zebonkai12 and Pingfah:
Why get personal??? I havent put you pair down!!!
Please get over it, you pair sound like a sad bunch of cunts who rather than enjoy life would rather put me down for a small fuck up (this post on the wrong section) on this website.
By the way Im 26, but i suggest you two go back school (thats if you dickheads ever did went).
So please if you dont have anything constructive to say, don't say it, you pair over over opinionated, small minded, little pricks.
Thank You Very Much
lifetimefanofqueen · Member since
GOATHEAD1985 wrote: lifetimefanofqueen: Cheers mate, least someone has got a brain!
Zebonkai12 and Pingfah:
Why get personal??? I havent put you pair down!!!
Please get over it, you pair sound like a sad bunch of cunts who rather than enjoy life would rather put me down for a small fuck up (this post on the wrong section) on this website.
By the way Im 26, but i suggest you two go back school (thats if you dickheads ever did went).
So please if you dont have anything constructive to say, don't say it, you pair over over opinionated, small minded, little pricks.
Thank You Very Much
========================== no dude, im on your side !
catqueen · Member since
Thistleboy 1980 wrote: Zebonka12 wrote:
Oh, get real. If you can't appreciate the loss of one human life, who are you to lecture anyone on mass casualties? I probably shouldn't bother arguing with you; your post is that absurd that I have to wonder if you're just trolling. =============================================================================================
I know we're talking about this elsewhere, Zeb, but the thing is, he's right. The people killed in Norway, China etc over the last few days never asked to be taken away. That is a real tragedy. As for Winehouse, she knew what could happen, and wasted every chance she had. I bet if she had a near-death experience and was given a reprieve, she'd still be wasting herself away as we speak.
How do u know that? And one life cannot be worth less then another life. She had problems, we all do... We have all done something stupid in our lives, spectacularly stupid, why do we think we are so great that we can judge. The tragedy is not less that Amy Winehouse died then that any other person died. But there is also tragedy in the life of a young girl under massive pressure, who was driven to extremes, and not supported in a way that she could accept. And that isnt to diss staff in rehab centres or anything, but obviously help wasn't there. It isn't necessarily the 'fault' of anyone, or even anything that could be prevented, because we do not know what is in someone else, and we don't know how best to approach them, sometimes there just isn't a way to help someone. BUT that does not make it any less tragic that her life was tough, that she had the issues she had, or that she died.
Pingfah · Member since
GOATHEAD, I think I misunderstood your original post, I thought that you were calling her a waste of a human being (i.e.she didn't deserve to be born) and then trying to be funny by giving your respects, which would be an insulting thing to say about somebody.
I see that you meant it was a waste of her life, not that she was a waste of a person, sorry for the misunderstanding. I take no pleasure in the death of anybody.
And lifetimefanofqueen, I was only rude to you because I thought you were standing up for an opinon I had misconstrued as being insulting. Apologies to you as well.
Oh, get real. If you can't appreciate the loss of one human life, who are you to lecture anyone on mass casualties? I probably shouldn't bother arguing with you; your post is that absurd that I have to wonder if you're just trolling. =============================================================================================
I know we're talking about this elsewhere, Zeb, but the thing is, he's right. The people killed in Norway, China etc over the last few days never asked to be taken away. That is a real tragedy. As for Winehouse, she knew what could happen, and wasted every chance she had. I bet if she had a near-death experience and was given a reprieve, she'd still be wasting herself away as we speak.
How do u know that? And one life cannot be worth less then another life. She had problems, we all do... We have all done something stupid in our lives, spectacularly stupid, why do we think we are so great that we can judge. The tragedy is not less that Amy Winehouse died then that any other person died. But there is also tragedy in the life of a young girl under massive pressure, who was driven to extremes, and not supported in a way that she could accept. And that isnt to diss staff in rehab centres or anything, but obviously help wasn't there. It isn't necessarily the 'fault' of anyone, or even anything that could be prevented, because we do not know what is in someone else, and we don't know how best to approach them, sometimes there just isn't a way to help someone. BUT that does not make it any less tragic that her life was tough, that she had the issues she had, or that she died. =============================================================================================
I'm sorry, but I just can't help the way I feel, and I don't see how death of someone who blatantly showed no respect for her own body, pumping it full of shit she shouldn't be touching, is a "tragedy". She knew that one day it could happen, and it did. As for the people in Norway and China, that *really* is a tragedy. You can say that one human life is no more important than any other, or than one death is just as sad as another until you're blue in the face, but the fact is, and always will be, it is her own fault, and that is not tragic. A life taken away by someone else, or through an accident IS tragic.
GratefulFan · Member since
Thistleboy 1980 wrote:
I'm sorry, but I just can't help the way I feel, and I don't see how death of someone who blatantly showed no respect for her own body, pumping it full of shit she shouldn't be touching, is a "tragedy". She knew that one day it could happen, and it did. As for the people in Norway and China, that *really* is a tragedy. You can say that one human life is no more important than any other, or than one death is just as sad as another until you're blue in the face, but the fact is, and always will be, it is her own fault, and that is not tragic. A life taken away by someone else, or through an accident IS tragic.
How much self control did you have to exercise to prevent yourself from, say, going on a heroin binge last weekend? Yeah, me too. None. Not an ounce. You and I are not doing anything hard by being clean and sober. For the addict, it's somewhere between difficult and excruciating. I think we've all failed at things that are difficult, or at least had to take a few runs at them. If she ran out of time, that is tragic. If she effectively committed suicide, which would be my guess, that's even more tragic. Tough love and a necessarily hard line don't preclude empathy. To me, 'fault' is just all wrong here.
john bodega · Member since
"Why get personal??? I havent put you pair down!!!"
Hold on a fucking minute - you're responding to posts that were not aimed at you. Fucking get a clue already.
Thistle · Member since
GratefulFan wrote: Thistleboy 1980 wrote:
I'm sorry, but I just can't help the way I feel, and I don't see how death of someone who blatantly showed no respect for her own body, pumping it full of shit she shouldn't be touching, is a "tragedy". She knew that one day it could happen, and it did. As for the people in Norway and China, that *really* is a tragedy. You can say that one human life is no more important than any other, or than one death is just as sad as another until you're blue in the face, but the fact is, and always will be, it is her own fault, and that is not tragic. A life taken away by someone else, or through an accident IS tragic.
How much self control did you have to exercise to prevent yourself from, say, going on a heroin binge last weekend? Yeah, me too. None. Not an ounce. You and I are not doing anything hard by being clean and sober. For the addict, it's somewhere between difficult and excruciating. I think we've all failed at things that are difficult, or at least had to take a few runs at them. If she ran out of time, that is tragic. If she effectively committed suicide, which would be my guess, that's even more tragic. Tough love and a necessarily hard line don't preclude empathy. To me, 'fault' is just all wrong here. =============================================================================================
If it's not hard being clean and sober, why was she a junkie? Answer = because she was foolish enough to start it. If she hadn't started, there'd be nothing to be hooked to and she wouldn't be a junkie. As for suicide being a "tragedy" - HELL NO, it's just fucking selfish, and if that's what she did, it just further reiterates that she had no respect for (a) herself (b) her family and (c) her fans. I have said in another similar thread that I have lived with an addict, and also around them. I will now go into the fact that I have also lost friends to an addiction, and two family members to suicide. Did I mourn? No! They were just selfish bastards, and it's the "softly softly" pandering to them approach that lets them think they can do what they want.
