Winehouse joins forever 27 club

"Police were called to an address in Camden Square shortly before 16.05hrs. On arrival, officers found the body of a 27-year-old female who was pronounced dead at the scene...I can confirm that the deceased is Amy Winehouse."

While it is always sad when a young person loses their life, it hardly comes as a surprise to hear that Amy Winehouse has become the latest member of the Forever 27 club.
Considering her heavy drink and drug lifestyle, the surprise is that she made it to 27 at all to join Kurt Cobain, Brian Johnson, Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin and Jim Morrison in the exclusive club.
One common theme through all of the above mentioned musicians who burnt bright rather than fade away as Cobain put it, was the self destructive heavy use of drugs.
The stories of Amy Whinehouse's drug problems always eclipsed her music which had dried up recently as she battled her demons, unsuccessfully as it turned out.
The question is would Winehouse and the rest have been the musical forces that they were if they were not out of their heads on heroin for the majority of their careers? Would they even be remembered today if they had faded away.
It seems the best way to be remembered is to die tragically young and leave a promise that much more was yet to come. Hendrix and Morrison definitely, Cobain possibly but for Johnson, Winehouse and Joplin it's doubtful.
While we all love our music stars to live up to the Rock n Roll image of sex and drugs and rock'n'roll, it's exciting and what we think we would like to do if given the opportunity, it is always sad when it is taken to its extreme.
A whole industry will now spring up around Winehouse, yet another fatally flawed talent who lived fast and died tragically young to stamp her place in musical history.