MovieChat Forums > Amy Winehouse Discussion > I never understood the hype

I never understood the hype

posted 5 years ago by Jinx (3722)
24 replies | jump to latest

Was she talented? Sure, but no more talented than jazz singers in the clubs I go to and she seemed like a trashy person, on her biography the people close to her spoke about how she'd like to build people up just so she could tear them down when she felt like it.

Back to the music though, if you ever listen to the live versions, it was so bad, her electric guitar playing was terrible and her singing . . .you couldn't understand a single. Word. She was singing. The keyboard music was always too loud. I don't understand how she became famous.

[–] SixOfTheRichest (61) 5 years ago

Touche!

I think more than anything, she is seen as a tragic figure and a victim. I don't really buy into that. Same with Kurt Cobain. They were self-destructive at their own hands. Grungy looks and sounds that don't really elevate anything in the music regarding skill and\or talent, just an image that people choose to connect with for representation.

[–] Jinx (3722) 5 years ago

Cobain’s writing was fantastic though, he was a poet. I didn’t like ‘grunge’ as a style but Nirvana was on another level, there was meaning in the words. It was ART.

Her’s were just . . . so bad, I mean even the ‘titles’ of her songs were bad, for example, her top two songs were : Love is a Losing Game and Tears Dry On Their Own. The lyrics are painfully juvenile.

[–] SixOfTheRichest (61) 5 years ago

I had a friend who had his own grunge style band and his lyrics were poetic. His music wasn't to my taste though and if I was to be honest, I though it was crap. Nirvana is the same to me. If one can't understand the lyric while it is being sung, I don't see the point of attempting to sing it. I am not into the groupie scene. Tortured souls looking for meaning in dark spaces.

[–] strntz (12225) 5 years ago

She was marketed brilliantly. Her sound was sort of a throwback to early 60s soul which was unusual for the 2000s, but not particularly noteworthy. Like Madonna before her, she was more hype than substance.

Madonna managed to avoid that fatal overdose during her "prime" though.

[–] ProductionNow (1072) 5 years ago

[deleted]

[–] SixOfTheRichest (61) 5 years ago

Madonna was pop sounding though, and designed for mainstream connection. She was a watershed, in that she knew how to market herself and her sex, make catchy sounds and was in a sense a brazen f<>k you to much of stiff convention. She was all girl and was going to make sure everyone knew it.

[–] ProductionNow (1072) 5 years ago

Madonna could also sing. That helps. (''catchy sounds''?)

[–] SixOfTheRichest (61) 5 years ago

Her tunes are still embedded today in the minds of many. She was a one of a kind.

I still watch Truth or Dare aka: In Bed With Madonna.

[–] ProductionNow (1072) 5 years ago

I think pop music takes a back-seat to the rockers because it's not considered "cool". Much creativity went into pop-music of the 60's-70's-80's, while I find the NON mainstream ''music'' to be noise (not edgy nor dangerous, but noise)

~~Scene: audition/ rock
Question: "so, who gave the best audition"?
Reply; "how can you tell"?

[–] SixOfTheRichest (61) 5 years ago

Cool, Trendy, all just buzz words really and taste is all subjective. I could listen to Winehouse, but couldn't care a hootin' holler about Cobain. I wouldn't go out of my way to listen to her though and even the sounds she emulates in comparison, I don't often seek out.

Madonna is more fun and proven to be more level-headed and shrewd. She is also still alive.

[–] ProductionNow (1072) 5 years ago

You're right: taste is subjective, yet it's probably human nature to not understand and be judgmental as to why others do not relate to sounds (and sights) that you do. I'd like to think that things are subjective to an extent, meaning that even if you do not relate, you can still identity the words & phases and rhyme & reason as to why others do. (whether it's the blues, or classical, or pop, or rock).

Madonna was stronger and more self-assured than to rely on substances or too intelligent to even try them in order to become addicted, assuming she has an addictive predisposition to substances.

[–] SixOfTheRichest (61) 5 years ago

Madonna could have had some experimental fun, but like you say, I think she was way too intelligent to let it ruin her. Madonna was controversial to an extent, but she wasn't dark like Winehouse. I'd say, her health and level of fitness was first and foremost important. She needed a clear head and a lot of this comes through in her film Truth or Dare. She was more about being uninhibited sexually and not about clouding her vision with mind altering substances. I really don't think she would have tolerated substance abuse, or even excessive drunkeness with her troupe.

[–] Quasimodo (16388) 5 years ago

The Stygianati moves in mysterious ways.

[–] BourbonKing (5777) 5 years ago

Her hype was that she didn't look like she sounded, which was that of a soulful black woman from the 40s, 50s, and 60s. Other than that, you can pull out hundreds of records or just go to Youtube and look up old soul music and you'll hear what inspired Amy's style of singing.

It's funny because a lot of young white girls with tattoos who tend bar in my town relate to Amy and her music, but when I play some old school R&B on the Jukebox which sounds exactly the same they wince at me. LOL

[–] Jinx (3722) 5 years ago

What a shame that they can’t appreciate that music, it shaped so much of our culture. Well, there’s no accounting for taste I suppose.

[–] BourbonKing (5777) 5 years ago

Agreed, and it's not just white youth but black, hispanic and asian youth as well. It's ironic considering the greater access to older media we have today yet so many younger people who claim to be more knowledgeable have never heard of songs or bands that predate their own birth year.

[–] Jinx (3722) 5 years ago

I guess I was like that when I was fairly young too if I’m being honest, so there is hope that they will grow out of it and appreciate good music. I hope it’s more of an ‘age’ thing than a ‘generational’ thing.

[–] BourbonKing (5777) 5 years ago

I hope so too, but maybe I'm being biased because I was digging into George Gershwin and Beethoven before I was even 12 years old so I may be an outlier. In high school however, I remember a lot of my classmates knowing a lot of classic rock from the 50s and 60s as well as contemporary artists. It just amazes me how today the music pallet for a lot of young people seems mentally segregated, unless of course those youth are musicians who can read and write music, but then again musicians like John Legend unwittingly sampled music bars from The Classics IV and got sued for it and lost. LOL

[–] LuckyLucius (342) 5 years ago

The first time I heard Amy Winehouse was when I was listening to the Music Choice channel on Direct TV and I heard the song Rehab and I liked the song and so I memorized it and sang along then I was shopping at the now no longer existing music store chain Wherehouse Music and I had originally planned to buy Amy's album at Walmart "I still buy clean versions of certain albums so I can sing along" but Wherehouse Music had Back In Black really cheap so I got it and was shocked at how well Amy Winehouse sang and so the next song I memorized was You Know I'm No Good and it was a good song. But I think ever since Amy's death they have tried to make her the new Janis Joplin and if you look at other singers that tried to sing soul music such as Joss Stone and Solange Knowles you will notice that they were more talented and popular than Amy was. But if you want to hear a singer that is slightly better than Amy Winehouse check Duffy out

[–] Jinx (3722) 5 years ago

Thanks for the suggestion. I’m glad you liked her music, she did sound a million times better on an album where they cleaned up the music and brought her voice up. Her live music is what turned me off since at the time I loved my local jazz club and they brought singers in from all over, Louisiana jazz singers are amazingly talented and so soulful.

[–] MovieElephant (349) 5 years ago

It's the hair, man.

[–] [deleted] 3 years ago

She was never, ever hyped for her music.

Literally, her claim to fame was looking and acting trashy (her ratty beehive, trashy tats and crackhead appearance) and being a public train wreck as in, "Oh, she's started losing her teeth," or, "OMG, you can see the coke residue on her lips," or, "Wow, did you just see that video where she was slurring her words at a concert and falling off her ass?"

That was it. I don't know where on earth this whole thing got started where people were acting as if she was a legend in her own time because of her music, but it's patently false. Amy Winehouse became famous for being tabloid fodder and nothing else. People were fascinated watching her deteriorate before their very eyes, and that is what made put her name on the map.

[–] filmgeek99 (656) 2 years ago

Couldn't agree more. After seeing the documentary made about her life, I thought I'd come out with a bit more respect and understanding for her as a person, but instead, the exact opposite happened. Yes, she was a troubled soul who was victim in some ways to manipulation and control, but she herself pretty much embodied the white trash lifestyle well before she even began using crack/heroin. And for all the talk of her supposedly being "witty" and "intelligent", I fail to see any actual examples of those traits in the entirety of the 2 hours I sat through.

She just came off as a typical party girl to me, one who made constant stupid jokes and who talked and dressed like a whore. Had if she been better civilized and well behaved, perhaps she wouldn't have gotten involved with men who got her hooked on hard drugs. Nice men tend to like nice girls, and Amy was not one of them.