Bake Fielder, the man who inspired Back To Black is tired of being a scapegoat for Amy Winehouse’s death and blames the people around her who were not looking after her best interests. He insists he could’ve saved her had he not been in jail.
Amy Winehouse’s ex husband Blake Fielder insists he’s not responsible for her death but says it’s “unforgivable” her team didn’t save her.
The inspiration behind the late star’s hit break-up album Back To Black, Fielder reckons he was made a “scapegoat” for Amy’s issues with addiction.
Almost 15 years after her tragic death he points the finger at those around her holding the purse strings.
Fielder said: “I think her manager says…I did the job I was expected to do, which is put Amy on as many stages as possible.
“He says it wasn’t my job to look after her health, it seems strange as a sentiment, but I don’t think there was a responsibility…there was a convenient scapegoat all along.
“So there was never any sense of ‘what can we do to help this?’. Amy was still performing a few weeks before she passed away and was clearly in trouble.
“I kept reading at the time about the recovery of Amy, look how great she’s doing, but I could see that the weight she put on seemingly was from alcohol.
“So I thought this isn’t true, it’s a lie.
“It’s a bit unforgivable from a sense of, you asked a question of responsibility, whether it was (to) get her on stage, let’s do our job or hang on a minute, this person doesn’t look right.”
Being portrayed as the villain of Winehouse’s story just papered over the real issues for Amy.
Fielder told the We Need To Talk podcast: “A lot of her family, possibly the management, they quite quickly came around to the idea that get rid of me, get rid of the problem. And that obviously didn’t happen.
“I had a part to play. But there’s one thing aside from everyone else that also had a role to play – Amy herself had agency and that is in no way at all disrespecting her by saying that.
“Amy did what she wanted to do. And even though the drinking had started to hurt her, she carried on. And I just feel that sometimes that can get lost on that album.
“There’s that element of her being helplessly in love, but she was actually a very strong woman.”
Although they were no longer together at the time of her passing in 2011 Blake was still in contact and believes he could have saved her had he not been in jail.
He explained: “If Amy and I had been in a relationship at the time of her passing, I would have been with her.
“Amy and I had spoken on the phone, and she had fallen asleep on her front doorstep. So I rang her manager from jail and got him to go and pick her up. I’m not saying I’m great, not at all.
“I’m just saying I still had that level of ‘yo, you need to get over there’. I would never in a million years have let her just sit and get drunk all day.
“I once got on stage and took Amy off stage because she was struggling.
“I wasn’t bothered about people who paid 40 pounds to see her. I didn’t care. That was my wife.”
Now clean, Blake wants people to know the real truth behind Amy’s end of life: “Amy died of drink, nothing to do with drugs.
“But still I know what is common, the idea that that’s my doing, my fault. I never blamed the person that gave me drugs for the first time.
“So I never understood, did these people think that I forced Amy to do drugs? That’s not what happened.
“A young woman in her 20s drank herself to death in million pound mansion with security and family. That’s depressing, sad, and tragic.”
Fielder told TV host Paul C. Brunson that he fully expected to get back together with Amy had she not passed away.
“The week Amy passed, I was in jail, unfortunately, we were still very much talking about the possibility of reconciling again,” admitted. “So I would say the definitive moment I realised that wasn’t gonna happen was when I got told that she’d passed away. That’s not me saying, oh, if Amy’s alive now, we’d be together, I’m not saying that, I have a life now I’m in love, happy.
“However, I have no qualms about saying that, that we would still be in each other’s lives now…I would’ve met her today for a drink or a coffee, whatever. The final moment was never final for me, the divorce wasn’t the end.”
Have you joined Threads? Follow Daily Star to keep up to date on all things sho wbiz here .
Want all the biggest Showbiz and TV news straight to your inbox? Sign up for our free Daily Star Showbiz newsletter.