Whitney Houston on 'Rolling Stone' cover courtesy Beth Furtwangler/Wenner Media
The charming church girl, the shining diva and the demons that came out in force.
The new issue of Rolling Stone takes a revealing look back at Whitney Houston’s life, including her dark side that people around her still have a hard time comprehending. “A lot of us talked about that, and no one could come up with an answer,” says Gerry Griffith, the A&R man who brought Houston to Clive Davis‘ attention around 1982. “Where is that rebellion coming from? It didn’t come out for a while.”
A genuine crossover star, Houston was a pop rarity who reached audiences young and old, black and white. “Because of her cousin Dionne [Warwick], she understood all those pretty-ass melodies from Burt Bacharach,” says Narada Michael Walden, one of Houston‘s many producers. “But because she was young and from the era of Michael Jackson, Prince and Madonna, she had soul in her too – those rhythms. She had both sides. Plus, she was so damn gorgeous. You couldn’t say no to her.”
The full article is in the upcoming issue of Rolling Stone on newsstands Friday.
More at www.rollingstone.com.