Amy Winehouse will always remain a legend of her own right. Her sudden passing in 2011 stunned the world. She lived a dangerous life, that much is given. However, no one anticipated it to end as tragically as it did.
Winehouse left her property to her parents, Mitch and Janis Winehouse. As her will was finalised last week, once again, the extend of mismanagement in her life is under scrutiny.
The singer, who was 27, left an estate worth £4,257,580, which was reduced to £2,944,554 after debts and taxes were paid. Understandably, it was widely accepted in the music business that this enormously talented young woman, whose second album was a smash hit in the UK and America, was worth considerably more.
The Sunday Times Rich List thought she was worth £10 million, those close to her claim it was probably £15 million. So where did the money go?
Her management company says, bluntly, that she spent it all — on drugs, on men, and on ‘friends’ who said they needed her. Before Winehouse died, money was being leeched off her left, right and centre. It was like taking money off a baby when it came to Winehouse — she couldn’t stop giving it away.
It was claimed that she paid for their drug addictions , rehab stints and rent. She was generous to a fault. Her former husband Blake Fielder-Civil was apparently adept at milking her for money, as it was widely assumed she funded both their drug habits for years, too. Within three weeks of their marriage in 2007 she had a near-fatal overdose.
Her spending on drugs, although never fully quantified, must have been enormous. Her heroin and cocaine habit in the days when she was using drugs — she stopped around 2008 — was in the nature of £1,000 a day. She might have spent £1 million or more on drugs alone between 2006 and 2008.
Winehouse also spent alot of her cash on bodyguards and her pets. The fact is although Winehouse was an international star, she was mostly famous for her volatile lifestyle. She was nevertheless a talented artist, but with only two albums under her belt.
Plus, due to her drug abusing problems, she never toured as she was deemed unfit to do so. Therefore her earnings were not as impressive as other artist in her league. Amy Winehouse will be remembered , but hopefully for her music rather than everything that went wrong. RIP Winehouse.