"Back to Black" is a song by English singer and songwriter Amy Winehouse, released on 26 April 2007 by Island Records as the third single from her second and final studio album of the same name (2006).
[11] Matt Harvey from BBC felt that the song owed to the "sonic heritage" of singers Phil Spector and Scott Walker and called it "a tortured monster of a track - Amy displaying the sort of vocal depth that Marc Almond has always dreamed of".
[12] AllMusic writer John Bush found universality in the song and opined that even Joss Stone could take it to the top of the music charts.
[13] Alex Denney from the website Drowned in Sound found "grit and gravitas" in Back to Black best shown in its title song with a "heart-stopping shuffle" and lyrics about a man's philander.
[15] Slant Magazine also mentioned it in their respective list of the best singles of the year, with Sal Cinquemani writing, "[It] is not only the singer's finest moment but producer Mark Ronson's as well".
[6] Tim Chester of NME also wrote that "Back to Black" was a song by which the singer should be remembered following her death, with Motown influence in her trademark vocal performance along with its powerful lyrics.
According to the official Winehouse website, "Amy's sultry new video for Back in Black [sic] is both beautifully and artistically shot in black-and-white and compares in imagery a doomed love affair with that of a funeral.
It was the final song recorded for the album and was included after the producers wanted a darker moment on The Great Gatsby: Music from Baz Luhrmann's Film.
[105] Anton Monsted, who served as a producer for the soundtrack, talked about the placement of the cover of "Back to Black" on the track listing during an interview with The Hollywood Reporter: We have to thank Jay Z for bringing this into the overall thinking.
The first party is a gaudy, rich, Venus flytrap of a celebration designed to attract Daisy's interest by physically bringing the entire city of New York to Long Island.
"[108] Kia Makarechi of The Huffington Post noted that Beyoncé did not use the song as a personal record and thus it was "slightly curious" for Winehouse to request for her to pay out.
[116] A writer of Rap-Up magazine described it as a "dark and haunting collaboration" adding that it features "[André 3000] rapping his verse, while Queen B[eyoncé] burns slow with her seductive vocals.
"[115] Sam Lansky of the website Idolator wrote that the cover was "a fairly sinister, gloomy affair" because of the lyrics, which according to him were connected with Amy Winehouse's death, and the film's noirish bent.
[114] Eschewing the 1960s Wall of Sound style of the original, the remake takes a minimalist, synth-heavy approach, with an occasional, echoing guitar twang.
[123] The 1960s pop string orchestration of the first version is exchanged for a "meatier, keyboard-fueled, big beat groove", as stated by Keith Murphy of Vibe magazine.
[117][126] Instead of belting her verse out, she whispers with seductive and sultry vocals, while André 3000 "buzzes" and raps over a nostalgic Aquemini leaky faucet beat as stated by Rogulewski from Vibe.
[127] A writer of Consequence commented that the cover was "an intriguing take on the sultry number, featuring a soft pulse of dub underneath the syrupy sing-talk of André and breathy croon a la Marilyn Monroe/Betty Boop from Queen B.
"[128] Paula Mejía of the same website listed the song as a highlight on the album, adding that the singers "take an unsettling postmortem stab": "Oozing womps from the latter [Beyoncé] trickle into the ear slowly, mimicking that feeling when you're walking alone at night and have the suspicion you're being followed, but you're too freaked-out and cool to look behind you.
"[129] Christina Lee of the website Idolator wrote in her review of the song that it was "a gloomier take on Southern hip-hop's codeine effect", comparing it with OutKast's album Aquemini (1998) reinterpreted for contemporary times.
[130] Charley Rogulewski of Vibe magazine commented that the cover was "a drugged-out slow burner in comparison to the doo-wop original, which boasted Winehouse's robust vocals".
[132] Describing it as a shift in Beyoncé's usual approach, Ann Powers of NPR noted that "[she] gets stuck in the 1950s, sounding far more like a torch singer than a blues queen" but added that it was not a problem since "Lurhmann's [sic] postmodernism has plenty of room for the juxtaposition of historic and current styles.
"[133] She further added that André 3000 sings in a "dandyish snarl that's been off-putting to some, but his radical rearrangement of the song comes closer than anything else here to Lurhmann's [sic] own nearly surrealist aesthetic".
"[7] Thomas Conner from the Chicago Sun-Times wrote that Beyoncé surprises by downshifting into "indie-chanteuse mode" for the cover, which he noted was sung "with a sad sexual tension that approaches torch song but never ignites it".
"[121] Jim Farber of New York Daily News wrote in his review that "unfortunately" Beyoncé only makes a cameo appearance in the song while André 3000 dominates with a "rank rap and a woeful vocal".
[138] Paste magazine's Philip Cosores wrote that "'Back to Black' sees Jay Z sticking his wife with a pretty raw deal, with the male half of the duet getting the opening verse and the chorus virtually to himself, leaving Bey with scraps at the end.
"[139] Mark Beech from Bloomberg L.P. gave a negative review of the cover, writing that Beyoncé and André 3000 "murdered" the original version and noted that F. Scott Fitzgerald, the author of the novel The Great Gatsby on which the film was based, would be "baffled" by it.
[140] Kathy McCabe from The Daily Telegraph wrote that the song was the most controversial musical moment from the soundtrack and added that it seemed "unrecognisable from the original, darker and so cut and pasted, it gives you the jitters after a couple of minutes".
He added that Beyoncé sounds "way too pristine" on it and wrote, "Please avoid covering the late Amy Winehouse if you are unable to project her heartbreaking anguish.