CD Review: Amy Winehouse – Lioness: Hidden Treasures

While the unexpected passing of Amy Winehouse last July during one of the lower points in her rollercoaster tabloid-fodder life meant that little original material remained to pull together an album worthy of her legacy, the posthumous collection Lioness: Hidden Treasures still holds a couple of gems in the form of well-tackled covers and duets.

Understandably, most of the songs are either those we have heard before, albeit in a different version, so in terms of the quality of surprise, you will be disappointed. However, the collection does provide an insight into the early days of Winehouse’s rise to fame and brings the focus back on why we fell in love with the pop-soul singer with the crazy beehive hairdo and batwing-lined eyes in the first place.

Probably one of her greatest cover hits to date, Valerie by English indie band The Zutons, is given a ’68 twist on this record, with a Motown vibe and a faint static noise in the background as Winehouse croons in a seemingly offbeat manner. This unfortunately, cannot beat the very signature sound that got her recognized on the bonus offering of Back to Black. It somehow lacked that grittiness and gnarling tone that I actually adore in her vocals. Speaking of Back to Black, the original of Tears Dry was a slowed version, and accurately brought out the emotions of regret and sorrow better than the jazzy take on her sophomore album.

The Girl From Ipanema is a stoic reminder of how such a young and breezy talent was discovered from the start. It features Winehouse giving her own take on the bossa nova standard, and the effortlessness of her switching range and making sweet sounds with that unharnessed vocal of hers, and nary a dry eye will be amongst us once we listen to it and understand that what a waste it was to have lost something once so innocent and beautiful to vice. A Song For You was also another cover that she made her own, with her retro drawl glossing over the track, extracting the essence of the song of longing for a lover.

Like Smoke, which sees a heavy collaboration with New York rapper Nas spitting rhymes like no tomorrow, is another miss for me. It deviates further from an already scattered bunch of songs to begin with. While Winehouse’s chilling chorus croons, recorded in 2008, were supposed to be the highlight of the song, Nas’ dense verses in between were a jarring impact to the soulful, laid-back tune, making it sound more of a hip-hop track than anything else.

In conclusion, this album is fraught with less hits than misses, but for a troubled singer that has left us too soon, could just be as good as it will ever get. Her shining era was during Back to Black, where her vocals were in spectacular form, and her live performances were so captivating before her run-in with drugs and alcohol, so perhaps putting together an album of her finest live moments throughout her career would have been more worthy a tribute to her legacy.

Track Cuts: The Girl From Ipanema, Tears Dry, A Song For You, Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow