Amy Winehouse Back To Black

Ultimately, Back To Black is a haunting masterpiece because it is timeless in its pain. It captures the universal feeling of loving someone who cannot love you back, and the specific agony of turning to substances to fill the void. Amy Winehouse gave the world a piece of her soul, unpolished and trembling, set against a backdrop of golden-age glamour. The album remains not just a high-water mark for the music industry, but a permanent echo of a talent that burned too bright and faded too soon.

This is the apology without the amendment. Over a sultry, hip-hop-influenced beat, Winehouse admits to infidelity. "I cheated myself / Like I knew I would." The song is a portrait of a serial self-saboteur. She knows she isn't good for anyone, yet she craves the comfort of a lover. It is brutally honest and uncomfortably sexy. Amy Winehouse Back To Black