Amy Has Created A Legacy, say Winehouse fans

Merely ten days after her tragic death last weekend, Amy Winehouse is immortalised with a return to the top of the charts, while her Camden Square home has become a shrine to the soul sensation.

Winehouse’s groundbreaking Back to Black this week sees a return to the no.1 album chart position more than four years since it held that spot in 2007. According to HMV, so phenomenal was last week’s demand for the late singer’s Grammy-winning CD, the music stockist had completely sold out by Thursday.

Meanwhile, a week-and-a-half after her passing, more and more fans continue to gather outside the singer’s North London home, Camden, leaving heartfelt floral displays, and various other tributes for Winehouse.

Fans from her local area of Camden, to as far afield as Canada, have been coming to pay their final respects.

“I was at my aunt’s house. My aunt turned on the TV to BBC News and across the screen it said that Amy Winehouse was dead”, Alicia Baird, a Canadian fan visiting London, tells how she learnt the bad news.

“I was shocked… Even though I didn’t know where her home was exactly, I just thought I’ll go down to Camden, and ask the locals where she lives so at least I’ll know for myself it’s true”.

Alicia reveals becoming a fan in 2007 after seeing promotional content of Back to Black on Perez Hilton’s website. Instantly she was taken by Winehouse’s signature sound.

“Being from Toronto, Canada, we don’t really get a lot of British artists that we hear about, so it was good that I got to hear it on Perez. I loved her music, her voice and sound. I actually got the opportunity to see her in Toronto but I missed the opportunity, figuring I could see her another time. Now it’s like: ‘That’s not going to happen again’“, she whisks her head regretfully.

Another fan at Camden Square expresses sentimentality of when she too was seduced by Amy Winehouse’s soulful sound via Back to Black.

“Back to Black was the album that first established my connection with Amy. It’s one of those albums you can play to anyone. I played it to family who never knew anything about her and instantly they thought she was a genius”.

Fortunately for Evi J though, she did meet the songstress, not at concert; but bumping into her in the local Camden area.

“She was with her dad. I had a small chat with her… I said ‘I think you’re amazing and don’t let anyone tell you differently; just keep doing your music’. She was really lovely and said ‘thank you babe!’. I just thought you could see the child in her eyes the whole time, despite the public image”.

Alas, it was this ‘public image’ that afforded Amy Winehouse an undesirably turbulent reputation, whilst an insatiable media capitalised on the singer’s litany of drug affairs. Fans who gather at Camden Square ten days on though, resent even the possibility that Winehouse should be remembered for this.

“I hope that people do not glamorise the drink and drugs”, one Columbian fan visiting the square mutters.

“We all as human beings have our own demons and everyone has their own ways to fight them”, Georgina Kosky continues. “Some people succeed; some people do not succeed, and I don’t think we’re entitled to criticise her way of life because we were not in her shoes to know why she did what she did”.

Inevitably, the question of ‘who is to blame’ has gathered momentum since Amy Winehouse’s death.

“It seems as though she had a lot of support”, Evi J argues. “It looks like she couldn’t get herself out her rut. That’s how it seems to me, but who’s to know?”

Evi poses a very good question. The final interviewee I question at Camden Square though, thinks he may have inkling.

“I’m not surprised by her death; I’m more shocked by her sudden death”, Paul Mwaniki reflects solemnly. ”I personally feel she didn’t have enough support”.

Paul raises concerns on Winehouse’s final European tour in June, and how the shambolic Belgrade performance where she was booed offstage, contributed to the Rehab singer’s death. “If your biggest fans boo you, it doesn’t get lower than that... I feel that this was the beginning of the end”.

The London fan is not alone in his lack of surprise over Amy Winehouse’s premature demise. But was the Camden singer’s death - likely of a drug overdose - inevitable?

“About the drug abuse, I think where there’s a will there’s a way”, Paul says. Anyone can get away from drugs if there is a will to stop taking… But that all depends on the people you hang out with”.

Truth be told, much of Winehouse’s company was as ominous as the paraphernalia that led to her untimely demise. For one, the singer was perennially linked with rockstar Pete Doherty who is alleged to have supplied her with drugs.

That said, both elements – addictions and relationships – would play a considerable role in providing much of the content themes on Amy Winehouse’s five Grammy award–winning sophomore effort. Back to Black today features five songs in the top 40; including Rehab, which features autobiographical lyrics concerning the singer resisting medical help for her alcoholism.

And how better to honour our very own soul sensation than returning her to the fame and success that her music phenomenally reached over the course of just two albums? Meanwhile tributes keep coming to Camden Square with heartfelt messages such as “Your music nursed me thru hard times…” and, “At the touch of a button, you are alive again; music is immortality”.

Loyal fan Evi J puts hers simply: “She’s led the way for future artists, and to have had only two albums with such an impact; she’s created her own legacy”.

Indeed, truly will this extraordinary feat form an integral part of Amy Winehouse’s legacy. As well as for being the pioneer who delivered an elixir to the ‘stuffy’ and ‘tired’ jazz and soul genres; for being the forerunner who paved the way for Adele, Duffy, and a continuum of other British female experiments to surmount transatlantic fame; and most importantly; for being the British singer and songwriter, who revitalised the UK urban music scene; and its perception worldwide.

Perhaps summing Winehouse up best though, was my Columbian interviewee Georgina, who closed;

“Amy was totally different to most artists this side of the pond. She was a white woman from Jewish heritage, with a black voice, and a lot of soul in her voice”.

And this is yet further reason why Amy Winehouse has undoubtedly made a lasting impression on both British and global music scenes; to live on through fans throughout the world, for ages to come.