Amy Winehouse_ The Biography - Chas Newkey-Burden [27]
Within days of performing at Montreal, Amy turned out at Cannizaro Park at Merton and in London’s Old Street, where she had trouble remembering the lyrics. ‘She actually said, “I have to try and remember this shit now,”’ says one audience member. ‘That’s not exactly a very good plug for her new material.’ She also put in an appearance at Pizza Express Jazz Club in 2004. The Guardian review gave a drenchingly positive write-up:
Amy Winehouse joined for the second half, mixing singles from her album Frank with jazz standards including ‘Caravan’ and ‘What a Difference a Day Makes’. Her timing and inflection come from hip-hop, contemporary soul and R&B rather than jazz – but an improviser’s instincts often made her swim spectacularly upstream against the undercurrents.
However, it was the Daily Telegraph’s report that best captured the drama of the evening. Neil McCormick wrote,
Freed from having to concentrate on her own guitar-playing, she really shone as a vocalist, while the trio jazzed up her songs (and a sprinkling of classic covers) with genuine brio. Highlight of the evening, however, was when Winehouse’s oft-mentioned dad, singing taxi-driver Mitchell Winehouse, took over for a smooth rendition of a Frank Sinatra song. Confidently demonstrating the genetic root of Amy’s talent, Mitch seemed unimpressed by some of the trio’s experimental trimmings. With all the casual menace of an EastEnders villain, he paused his performance to inquire of the fresh faced piano player: ‘Was that the bridge, or are you just doodling about as usual?’
That told him!
Later on while recalling the night, McCormick wrote, ‘I watched her perform in a Pizza Express with her father Mitch, a Sinatra-singing taxi driver, and met a loving family clearly proud of Winehouse’s success.’ Amy was winning a huge reputation as a live act at this point in her career. The Daily Mirror previewed a concert of hers thus:
She has an incredible voice, a great talent and a real knack for putting her foot in it. But frank comments about fellow performers aside, it is in the live arena that Amy has to be savoured. Madonna may, or may not, mime, but Amy has a voice of such intensity as to make Madge look like a karaoke singer.
Reviewing a concert of hers at the UEA Norwich, John Street wrote in The Times,
To begin with, her voice seems almost to take her over, like a headstrong dog dragging its owner across muddy fields and flooded ditches. As the show proceeds, these vocal mannerisms tend to become repetitive, as if trapped in a single emotional and musical register. Her voice is at its best on the more tightly arranged songs, where the attention is on the detail: ‘Stronger Than Me’, ‘What is it About Men?’, or ‘Help Yourself’. The swoops and dives, the half-checked angry bark, populate these numbers with a twisting trail of sensations.
Amy has always said that performing live is what it is ‘all about’ to her. ‘I love being on tour, but I wish I could work off the crowd better; be more of a showman,’ she says. ‘For me, it’s all about the songs, and I’m so busy concentrating on that, I’m not paying as much attention to the audience.’
Meanwhile, her growing reputation domestically was being echoed around the world. A Singapore newspaper wrote of Amy,
Sporting thick black eyeliner and singing songs like ‘F*** Me Pumps’, this London native is surely the genre’s bad girl. Although she sings in typical jazz-blues fashion, the beats reflect mainstream hip-hop and R&B more than scat or even soul.
However, it was at home that Amy’s star was shining brightest. Around this time, the Observer Music Monthly dispatched a journalist to pen the first major feature on Amy. Respected music critic Garry Mulholland landed the gig and had several interview sessions with Amy for the feature. During an interview with the author, he recalled the experience fondly. ‘She’s a dream interviewee,’ he says, smiling. ‘Firstly, because she’s an