Amy Winehouse’s ‘Back to Black’ Video Hits 1 Billion Views on YouTube 16 Years After Its Release

Greater than a decade after her tragic dying, Amy Winehouse‘s music remains to be reaching large success.

This week, the late Grammy-winning singer’s music video for the 2007 hit single “Again to Black” surpassed a billion views on YouTube, making her a part of an elite group of musicians to realize the spectacular feat.

Directed by Phil Griffin, the black-and-white music video portrays Winehouse attending a funeral procession for a failed romance. Amongst a gaggle of individuals, she attends the burial, the place a headstone reads, “R.I.P. the Coronary heart of Amy Winehouse,” although that imagery was eliminated following her 2011 dying from alcohol poisoning at age 27.

“Again to Black” was written by Mark Ronson and Winehouse, impressed by her troubled relationship with ex-husband Blake Fielder-Civil, who’d briefly left her for an ex-girlfriend two years previous to their 2007 reconciliation and wedding ceremony. (The pair later divorced in 2009.)

The track’s lyrics discover Winehouse lacking the connection, regardless of how troublesome it could have been. “We solely stated goodbye with phrases / I died 100 instances / You return to her / And I am going again to black,” she sings on its refrain.

Launched on her 2007 album of the identical title, “Again to Black” initially peaked at No. 25 on the UK Singles Chart that yr earlier than reaching No. 8 following Winehouse’s dying. Since then, it is develop into one in all her signature hits and obtained many notable cowl variations, together with one by Beyoncé and André 3000 for the 2013 movie The Nice Gatsby.

Final yr, Ronson spoke about his expertise co-writing and producing the track with Winehouse and shared previously-unheard uncooked vocal takes from the legendary neo soul singer in a TikTok video.

“Hello, I am Mark Ronson. For these of you who won’t know me, I wrote the track ‘Again to Black’ with Amy Winehouse some 15 years in the past at this precise piano proper right here,” the 46-year-old “Uptown Funk” musician stated within the clip, displaying followers the grand piano the place he labored with Winehouse.

“Amy got here to my studio proper right here. We met for the primary time, and I immediately liked her,” Ronson continued. “She performed me all this nice ’60s music, and he or she left, and I bought very impressed, and I got here up with this piano proper right here.”

“Subsequent day she got here in and wrote these unbelievable lyrics, which she scribbled within the again room. And for the primary time ever possibly, listed below are the very first vocals that she did,” he continued, earlier than enjoying an audio clip of Winehouse singing a barely totally different model of the then-work-in-progress observe.

Since posted, Ronson’s TikTok has garnered over 4.7 million views and practically 1,000,000 likes on the social platform. In a follow-up video, the musician responded to a fan’s remark that learn, “This made me tear as much as hear her uncooked takes. Thanks for sharing,” by sharing extra audio clips from his “Again to Black” periods with Winehouse.