So I am up right now during the small hours doing some opening line studies because I am thinking about entering the Houston Open next weekend. VH1 is on and I've just seen the video for Rehab by Amy Winehouse for the second time in about 90 minutes.
I have to admit something here. I am one of the few Americans so far who have had the privilege of seeing Amy Winehouse perform in person. I went to see her play to a jam packed gig at the Camden Crawl while I was in London in April. What caught my attention was hearing Rehab playing while I was in a Boots store buying my chocolate fix for the day at VLICA. Amazing how it is with certain songs that you will always remember where it was when you first heard a song. Well, it does seem bizarre and rather out of place that I would have first encountered Amy's work in a pharmacy store of all places. Still, Rehab was good enough for me to head on over to a record shop that night, nab a copy of Back to Black and listen to it about 42 times in a row. I then proceeded to drive my colleagues at VLICA nuts the next day by playing the album over and over again on my laptop.
Amy's stuff was all over the airwaves when I was in the Sceptered Isles. It strange, but I went to the UK for the first time in May 2002 on holiday. While watching the BBC one night, I watched a music show and was star struck by a then unknown woman named Norah Jones. She played a slow sounding wistful ballad called Don't Know Why. Norah had everyone in that audience in the palm of her hand that night and that included the show's host and the other artists. I couldn't believe that Norah wasn't a monster back home, but that trivial matter was settled by that summer.
The Brits have a way of digging up and giving an airing to really great stuff that often doesn't make it over here. I didn't know about The Jam until I was in my mid 20's, even though I came of age in the early 1980's and would have died and gone to heaven had I known of them.
But I digress. When I saw Amy play at the Crawl, I witnessed a small girl with a big whiskey soaked voice (and a nice rack and big bouffant hair do to match) get the crowd in a small pub to with sing along with songs. I fell in love with Amy on sight. Once again Britain came through for me on the cultural front.
Her website shows that Amy is supposed to play a series of shows here on our side of the pond. Too bad she isn't scheduled to show up in Houston (though she does have a habit of canceling shows) because I would love to see her again.
To me, Winehouse is what Scarlett Johansson would have been had she been a singer instead of an actress. She is one of those young women artists whom you get so scared about. You just don't know whether Amy will hang it up, crack under the pressure, burn out artistically, or careen off the rails on drink. All you can do is sit back, soak in the emotions from her songs, and hope she finds out what makes her happy. What a Star!