Amy Winehouse_ The Biography - Chas Newkey-Burden [63]
Amy’s albums were far from ignored in America, though. Both received plentiful reviews in the US press. Many of these reviews were enthusiastic, too. Frank tended to be the more reviewed because, as mentioned, the two albums were released in a different sequence in America.
In the Northwest Herald, Bryan Wawzenek wrote, ‘Where Back to Black is sharp, short and sweet R&B, Frank is smooth, meandering jazz-pop.’ The Philadelphia Inquirer added, ‘Without the conceptual glue of Mark Ronson’s smartly retro R&B production moves, this earlier disc – more stylistically varied and less cohesive – shows Winehouse leaning more toward jazz.’
Said USA Today, ‘Winehouse fuses her influences with such breezy authority that the songs never sound flagrantly derivative or stale.’ The MSNBC website declared, ‘Now, just in time to capitalize on the success of the BRITs breakthrough, Back to Black, the debut is appearing stateside for the first time. While the latter disc found Winehouse cackling over lush vintage soul backdrops, Frank uses sparse instrumentation to achieve a subtler, jazzier effect.’
The U-Wire Arizona attempted to put the album into its historical and contemporary context: ‘Back to Black plays as if it is out of the doo-wop era until a track with Ghostface Killah brings the listener back to the need today to feature rappers in music.’
The Allentown Morning Call concluded, ‘Swinging a mixture of soul, ska and girl-group theatrics, the 23-year-old Brit sounds like she’s lived every one of her lyrics.’
Writing in the Minnesota Daily, Becky Lang said, ‘Frank is not only good musically, it’s somewhat of an anthropological relic for a case study of the triad closest to our culture: copulation, mind-altering substances and parent-offending music. Er, sex, drugs and rock’n’roll.’ Boston Now gave the album four stars, adding, ‘Musically, the CD is laidback, with the band providing sparse, yet tasty accompaniment to Winehouse’s vocal stylings. Not without its faults… Frank is still an outstanding debut.’
The influential tabloid the New York Daily News gave a long and considered thumbs-up. Jim Farber wrote,
It’s understandable that Universal Records wanted to introduce the singer to this country not with this sound but with the more instantly accessible Black. Now that we’re conditioned to Winehouse’s persona, and her life, as hovering somewhere between the difficult and the troubled, we’re in the right mind to hear a quirkier take on her dazzling talent.
The Tennessean praised Amy for taking ‘jazz and soul and [infusing] it into a sultry, classy brand of pop that kicks up adrenaline like smashing a crystal brandy snifter’. Not that there was much danger of Amy’s getting carried away with all these compliments. After all, one report misspelled her surname as Weinhaus.
As for her live performances in America, they largely went down well, too. Her opening performance in the country came at Joe’s Pub in downtown New York. Amy’s always been a fan of the city, and of the television show set there, Sex and the City. ‘I liked the way Samantha would just say anything, tell it like it is. I’m exactly like that,’ she says. ‘But I’m pretty much like that anyway. I’m not really a product of culture. I’ve always done my own thing.’
The Village Voice voted the increasingly legendary venue the ‘Best Excuse to Let a Single Venue Dictate Your Taste’. Newsweek calls the club ‘one of the country’s best small stages’ and New York Magazine added that ‘you never know what you’ll find next at Joe’s Pub, but you can count on the fact that it will be good, very good.’ Charlie Gillett of BBC radio rated it as ‘one of the best small music venues I’ve ever been to’. Alicia Keys, who has performed there, says the artist ‘gets all the sweat and the heat from the performances