This Day in Music History: OCTOBER 25TH

1968 The double album 'Electric Ladyland' by the Jimi Hendrix Experience was released. There were complaints about the naked females on the cover, so they had to make a second more modest album cover available for the stiffs. The female models were each paid £5 for the photo shoot and another £5 if they posed completely naked.

From Swims in My Eyes to Swims in a Sea of Mediocrity: Adele’s Success Reminds Us of the Tremendous Loss of Amy Winehouse

Adele “burst” on to the music scene a few years back as the more packable, controllable, and far less substantial version of Amy Winehouse.  As her talent is aggrandized by the masses with the release of her new album, we can’t help but re-mourn the loss of a much rarer talent who, though never as commercially successful as Adele, but has proved to be every bit more enduring – Amy Winehouse.

Amy came out with “Back to Black” in late 2006 – a brash, honest and incredible album, dripping in soul and sincerity. Though her fame skyrocketed, her brand was not clean-cut nor easy to control. Following Amy’s success, Adele was among the flock that attempted to capitalize on that cash cow that was neo-soul – and she’s been quite successful in doing so. She was packaged and sold to be a neater, more commercially appealing version of Amy, with all of the sharp edges filed and smoothed down.

Granted, Adele has a beautiful, powerful voice and should be commended for writing her own music - as trite as the lyrics may often be. But to us, the enormous success of her “safe,” widely appealing, radio-friendly music mirrors the shallowness of the music industry and, in turn, society at large.

 “[Did] Amy Winehouse invent white soul? Wearing a beehive? No. But she did something brand new and fresh, altogether as a package. And you see who's in her wake, from the Duffys to the Lana Del Reys. Adele selling 20 million records? That would not have happened if Amy Winehouse was alive” – Jack White (Rolling Stone Magazine, 2014).

When it came to her art, Amy lived by her conviction that there is nothing more important than soul and sincerity. Unlike the vast majority of musicians today, authenticity was far more important to her than getting rich or being popular. Sure, she could have made more money if she had forsaken her truth in order to churn out as much marketable, widely appealing material as possible. But she would have rather died.

“I don't ever want to do anything mediocre. I hear the music in the charts and I don't mean to be rude, but those people have no soul. Learning from music is like eating a meal...you have to pace yourself. You can't take everything from it all at once. I want to be different, definitely. I'm not a one trick pony. I'm at least a five-trick pony.” – Amy Winehouse

We live in a world where painfully mediocre (at best) musicians like Adele and Taylor Swift are considered to be the cream of the commercialized crop, often (laughably) lauded as “true artists.” Society’s incessant preference for shallowness over depth is evident in every area of culture, from the mass-produced garbage on the radio to the mindless reality shows on television.  And although there’s no use in getting agitated over it, sometimes it’s difficult not to.

But brilliant, gutsy artists like Amy remind us that soul will never die – even in this pitiful cultural climate, she found success. And her legacy is already being remembered alongside the legendary likes of Jimi Hendrix, Kurt Cobain, Jim Morrison and Janis Joplin. Amy is a bittersweet reminder that, even in the midst of permeating shallowness, there will always be individuals who recognize and appreciate authenticity, and keep it alive.

Long Live the Soul of Amy Winehouse. 

With love, Kaitlin & Julia