The first really serious one I heard was Unholy War, where she used this very current phrase that was all over the news, and she’d made it about her own mess and unsolvable problems. I remember the first two songs she came up with for Back to Black were two completely opposite styles of her: Addicted, which went “you got me addicted, more than any dick did”, although this was way before any signs of any problems. There were two sides to how Amy would write: either playful, tongue-in-cheek, almost concept-based, like I Heard Love is Blind and Fuck Me Pumps, or extremely personal and deep. We were young, we were kids, we were figuring it out in our own ways. If there was a good studio with loads of instruments, or some musician who could really play, she’d be out the door like a flash. Two, there had to be a strong musical pull. There were two motivations: one, you had to make it fun. If I booked in a session and didn’t literally get her out of bed, in the car, drop her off, pick her up, sit in on the session, it just didn’t happen. I’d feel completely inadequate because I thought I knew my music – I assumed, I’m the guy in music, I’m gonna know more than you – and I learned very quickly that she knew so much more. We connected on music, we used to go to a lot of gigs. What was your relationship with her like as a manager? She was different, she used to make a lot of her own clothes. From the off, she was very funny, very blunt.
As soon as producers heard her they were in. I put it on in my car and it blew my mind.
It didn’t fit with the girl who didn’t want to be noticed. I got this package through the post with a demo tape with two songs on, and the jiffy bag was covered in stickers of hearts and kisses, and it had “Amy” scribbled over it about 100 times. The whole time she was saying she had absolutely no interest in making music. She flicked my ego away like it was a pea on my shoulder, and I realised humour was the backup plan, and that’s how we connected. I called her and pretended I was this big manager who could make things happen, giving it all the showbiz talk, and obviously she thought I was a wanker, she made it very clear. Looking back on it, I was 19, working in the music industry but I didn’t really know anything. He now works as senior A&R manager at Island Records.Īn artist I was looking after, Tyler James, said he knew a girl called Amy Winehouse who’d dropped out of school, and things weren’t happening for her. Together they released her debut album, Frank, in 2003. Nick Shymansky met Amy Winehouse when she was 16, and worked as her manager between 19.
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