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Read other letters about this article
Author here: Dr Z: Nowhere did I say she "shouldn't" use the media for her personal gain. I may have implied that it's a dangerous game, because I actually do fear for stars who make the choice she has, but a hypocrite I am not. And if I may remind you, you don't know my life. "Pligger" indeed.
I'm not sure where you got the received idea that "most writers, poets, musicians (and comedians of all people) [are] a bit less than little Mary Sunshine in their private lives" but firstly, I assume that "a little bit less than little Mary Sunshine" doesn't mean "suicidal" or "hell bent on self-destruction" and secondly, it's clearly not the majority--just the talented tragic ones that get all the attention, and Winehouse can't be unaware of that.
I meant to say more in this piece about the high-functioning alcoholic/drug addict crazy pop star (Sly Stone, Keith Richards, Macy Gray) but there's only so much one can cover before trailing off into another subject in these articles. Furthermore, they go out fairly quickly and there's slim chance of making corrections, so I regret the implication that Sharon Jones' band are old fogies. Jones herself is an older-timer for sure, though. Also, I wish I had compared Winehouse to Tracey Ullman's pop career instead of Lauryn Hill's song; that would have been a much better example of pastiche.
Winehouse has a great voice. But her material is extremely derivative. I tried to avoid in this article making easy assumption that her music inauthentic because white folks can't play the blues, or can't get over in black music, because that's patently false. But sometimes in pop music it's hard to tell the difference between heavy influence and pastiche, so for balance perhaps I can provide a counterexample of a Motown-influenced white band whose music does not sound like pastiche: listen to the Spoon song "You Got Your Cherry Bomb." The Motown influence is apparent, but not *imitative*, as with Winehouse. The issue for me is not "who can play black music"--hell, Amy Winehouse sings more convincingly "black" than I, despite being a black American, ever will--but "who can play black music *convincingly.*" Her voice convinces me, no question. Her material and its production values, however, don't.
And to the guy who had a critical note for my bio--lay the f**k off already. That bio was originally for a piece about Larry Craig, and the freshness date on its relevance has admittedly passed long ago.
