She may have recently got engaged to her on/off lover Blake Fielder Civil but Camden’s most famous pub crawler Amy Winehouse shows no signs of slowing down.
Having picked up the Brit Award for Best British Female Artist and regained the top spot in the UK album charts with Back to Black earlier this year, she is now making waves stateside as part of the much hyped “British invasion” alongside Corinne Bailey Rae, Lily Allen and, er, Joss Stone. The world is indeed at her feet (or is that fuck me pumps?).
‘Back to Black’, the title track from Winehouse’s triple platinum selling sophomore album, gets its physical release on 30th April and comes with her previously unavailable cover of the Zutons’ ‘Valerie’ recorded during an appearance on Jo Whiley’s Live Lounge.
They say:
Digital Spy: “The best advert for beehive hairdos since Dusty Springfield.”
Manchester Evening News: “One of the best singles of the year.”
We say:
‘Back to Black’ is one of the most absorbing and heartbreaking pop songs you’ll hear all year with Winehouse in full post break up mode, left to lick her wounds after her lover calls an end to their affair and returns home to place his “same old safe bet”.
But rather than give in to her self destructive nature, she actually gains inspiration from the experience. This is captured in her bluesy, soulful vocals that send shivers down your spine and transcend the odd clunky lyric (“And life is like a pipe/And I’m a tiny penny rolling up the walls inside”).
Set to Mark Ronson’s moody Motown shuffle and ethereal strings, it’s the kind of vocal performance that makes all those premature comparisons to Aretha Franklin, Dusty Springfield and Etta James seem entirely rational. Extraordinary.
Like this? Try these:
Dusty Springfield – I Just Don’t Know What to Do with Myself
The Supremes – Where Did Our Love Go?
RELEASED
Out now
LABEL
Island
POSTED...
Mon 30 Apr 2007 at 5:48pm
