Why, if you were of a cynical bent, you’d swear it was a publicity stunt. Almost exactly three years after her well received debut Frank, Amy Winehouse suddenly reappears (with a certain other mouthy, press-friendly female singer from London getting the kind of publicity that she could only have dreamed of).
Cue tabloid stories of record company worry at Winehouse’s alleged excessive alcohol habits, and paparazzi photos showing a dramatic weight loss. Then along comes a single which begins; “they tried to make me go to rehab, I said no, no no”…

If indeed the conveniently timed newspaper stories are a PR stunt, it’s a shame as Back To Black needs no such media manipulation. Partly produced by man of the moment Mark Ronson (fresh from work with Lily Allen and Robbie Williams), it’s an amazingly confident second album which shows Winehouse moving on leaps and bounds from Frank.

Download mp3 album Back to Black

The main difference is the sound and feel of the album - whereas Frank was all jazzy smoky ballads, Back To Black goes for a more commercial, poppy, yet still retro sound. Rehab itself is a great example - horns parp and blaze, strings classily swing and smoulder while Winehouse’s extraordinary voice purrs and growls about old Ray Charles records being better for her than the Priory. It’s Motown rewritten for the 21st Century, and it’s quite brilliant.

The old school soul references keep up throughout the album. The title track deftly steals its introduction from Jimmy Mack before spiraling off into a much darker place while You Know I’m No Good has a classy Philadelphia soul feel and some wonderful horn work. Ronson’s influence is unmistakable - it’s a long time since a producer and artiste felt this right together.

Yet this is still Winehouse’s album all over. Her voice is still incredible - every so often, you get a shiver down the spine as you realise that she’s still only 23 with the voice of a woman two or three times her age - but her lyrics have matured now as well. Apparently written while she was nursing a broken heart, the spectre of failed relationships looms large, especially during the gently skanking Just Friends or the aching Love Is A Losing Game.

She can still swear like a trouper too. Me And Mr Jones could almost be an old soul hit from the late ’50s until you hear Winehouse purring the quite magnificent opening line of “what kind of fuckery is this? You made me miss the Slick Rick gig”. The exuberant Tears Dry Up On Their Own is another highlight, marrying a glorious rush of a chorus with Winehouse’s husky vocals and an another smooth production job, this time from co-producer Salaam Remi.

It’s staggering to think that Winehouse was compared to the likes of Katie Melua when she first appeared - it’s certainly hard to imagine Melua extolling the virtues of cannabis, let alone in quite the same way as Winehouse does in the closing Addicted (”it’s got me addicted, does more than any dick did”), or indeed conjuring up an album with half the passion, fire and good old-fashioned soul as Back To Black. It’s a superb comeback, and one of the best albums of the year.

- John Murphy

All album traks:

1 Rehab 3:35
2 You Know I’m No Good 4:17
3 Me and Mr Jones 2:33
4 Just Friends 3:13 
5 Back To Black 4:01
6 Love Is A Losing Game 2:35
7 Tears Dry On Their Own 3:06
8 Wake Up Alone 3:42 
9 Some Unholy War 2:23
10 He Can Only Hold Her 2:46
11 Addicted 2:45

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Much can be said about Amy Winehouse, one of the U.K.’s flagship vocalists during the 2000s. The British press and tabloids seemed to focus on her rowdy behavior and heavy consumption of alcohol, but fans and critics alike embraced her rugged charm, brash sense of humor, and distinctively soulful and jazzy vocals. Her platinum-selling breakthrough album, Frank (2003), elicited comparisons ranging from Billie Holiday and Sarah Vaughan to Macy Gray and Lauryn Hill. Interestingly enough, despite her strong cockney accent and vernacular, one can often hear aspects of each of those singers’ vocal repertoire in Winehouse’s own voice. Nonetheless, her allure has been her songwriting — almost always deeply personal, but best known for its profanity and brutal candor.

Born to a taxi-driving father and pharmacist mother, Winehouse grew up in the Southgate area of northern London.

See all Amy Winehouse albums 

Her upbringing was surrounded by jazz. Many of the uncles on her mother’s side were professional jazz musicians, and even her paternal grandmother was romantically involved with British jazz legend Ronnie Scott at one time. While at home, she listened to and absorbed her parents’ selection of greats: Dinah Washington, Ella Fitzgerald, and Frank Sinatra among others. However, in her teens, she was drawn to the rebellious spirit of TLC, Salt-N-Pepa, and other American R&B and hip-hop acts of the time.

At the age of 16, after she had been expelled from London’s Sylvia Young Theatre School, she caught her first break when pop singer Tyler James, a schoolmate and close friend, passed on her demo tape to his A&R, who was searching for a jazz vocalist. That opportunity led to her recording contract with Island Records. By the end of 2003, when she was 20 years old, Island had released her debut album, Frank. With contributions from hip-hop producer/keyboardist Salaam Remi, Winehouse’s amalgam of jazz, pop, soul, and hip-hop received rave reviews. The album was nominated for the 2004 Mercury Music Prize as well as two Brit awards, and its lead single, “Stronger Than Me,” won an Ivor Novello Award for Best Contemporary Song.

Following Winehouse’s debut, the accolades and inquiring interviews appeared concurrently in the press with her tempestuous public life. Several times she showed up to her club or TV performances too drunk to sing a whole set. In 2006, her management company finally suggested that she enter rehab for alcohol abuse, but instead, she dumped the company and transcribed the ordeal into the U.K. Top Ten hit “Rehab,” the lead single for her second, critically acclaimed album, Back to Black. Containing evocative productions from Salaam Remi and British DJ/multi-instrumentalist Mark Ronson, the album somewhat abandoned jazz, delving into the sounds of ’50s/’60s-era girl group harmonies, rock & roll, and soul. The fanfare over the release was so great that it started to spill over onto U.S. shores; several rappers and DJs made their own remixes of various songs — not to mention covers by Prince and the Arctic Monkeys.

One month after Winehouse won Best Female Artist at the Brit Awards in February 2007, Universal released Back to Black in the U.S. The LP charted higher than any other American debut by a British female recording artist before it, and it remained in the Top Ten for several months, selling a million copies by the end of that summer. Just as in the U.K., she became the talk of the town, landing on the covers of Rolling Stone and Spin magazines. Not long afterward, though, Winehouse canceled her North American tour. Early reports revealed that she was entering rehab for alcohol and drug addiction, but her new management denied the claims, stating it was due to severe exhaustion. Her erratic behavior kept her and her new husband, Blake Fielder-Civil, constantly in the tabloids and on and off stages on both sides of the Atlantic, but in late 2007 American fans were finally given a chance to hear Winehouse’s early work, with a slightly abbreviated (two songs removed and one added) version of Frank.

Cyril Cordor, All Music Guide…

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