Amy Winehouse launches St Lucia residency bid

Amy Winehouse has supposedly filed a residency application to live in St Lucia permanently.

The 'Rehab' singer has spent much of 2009 on holiday on the island, and is now looking to settle there full-time, claims the News Of The World.

The newspaper quoted an anonymous St Lucia official as saying that authorities had received a residency application which was in the process off being assessed.

"We are aware of Amy wanting to live here on a permanent basis," they are quoted as saying. "We have received an application and are looking into it."

The jazz-pop musician would stand to make large tax savings if she were to live on the Caribbean island as oppose to in the UK.

Amy Winehouse had been set to play her first UK gig of 2009 last month at the London Shepherd's Bush Empire, although the show was pulled without a reason being given.

NME.com

Winehouse album is UK top-seller

Amy Winehouse's second album Back to Black is set to be the biggest-selling album of the year.

The troubled singer's soul-tinged CD, released at the end of 2006, has now sold more than 1.5m copies in the UK, achieving five platinum sales awards.

Leona Lewis's Spirit and Mika's Life in Cartoon Motion are currently the second and third best selling albums of the year, with just over a week left to go.

Winehouse was recently nominated for six Grammys including song of the year.

The 24-year-old's debut album, Frank, also sold 300,000 copies in the UK this year, despite being released in 2003.

"Amy Winehouse's Back To Black is in pole position to be the year's biggest seller," British Phonographic Industry spokesman, Matt Phillips said.

"But more than 6 million albums were sold last week, and as this weekend is likely to be the biggest of the year for music sales, Leona may close the gap."

Lewis sold 1.27m copies of her album in just five weeks, becoming the fastest-selling debut in UK history and making the former X Factor winner the fastest female million-seller in the UK, according to the BPI.

Spirit was the second album to sell a million copies in 2007, after Back to Black.

Lewis's single Bleeding Love is also the best selling single of 2007 so far, after spending seven weeks at number one in the charts.

Mika's debut album, released in February, has just passed the one million sales mark.

BBC News

Amy's husband in 'trial fixing plot'

Amy broke down in tears as her husband Blake Fielder-Civil was dramatically arrested in front of her over an alleged £200,000 trial-fixing plot.

“I want to go with him,” she begged hysterically as eight plain-clothed policemen handcuffed him in an east London flat, reported the Mirror.

As he was led away, the distraught singer kissed and hugged him repeatedly, sobbing: “Baby, I love you. Baby, I'll be fine.”

The 24-year-old ran out of the flat in Bow to catch a final glimpse of Fielder-Civil who managed to yell out “I love you” before he was taken away in an unmarked people carrier.

Police are investigating allegations following a tip-off by the newspaper that a key witness was offered £200,000 to stay away from the case and refuse to give evidence.

Fielder-Civil was arrested on suspicion of perverting the course of justice in connection the trial involving assault charges which was due to start next week. There is no suggestion that Amy was involved in the alleged plot although three other men were arrested at addresses in east London.

If Fielder-Civil is convicted the maximum sentence for the offence is life.

Last night, up to 13 officers stormed the house, bursting through the door using a battering ram and crow bar.

Witnesses said three policemen and ten plain-clothed officers searched the property, just an hour after Winehouse's husband Blake Fielder- Civil left in a chauffeur-driven Mercedes.

A police spokesman said four men had been arrested in east London earlier and were being questioned.

The four men, two 25-year-olds, a 22-year-old and a 19-year-old, were all arrested in west London and were being held in an east London police station.

The spokesman confirmed the arrests related to next week's trial involving Mr Fielder-Civil, 25, and a second man, 39, who both face charges of grievous bodily harm.

Fielder-Civil, 25, is at risk of being jailed when he appears before Snaresbrook Crown Court in London on Monday on assault charges.

He was allegedly involved in a bust-up at Hoxton's uber-cool Macbeth pub in London and subsequently charged with grievous bodily harm.

Barman James King required medical treatment following the incident, which was said to involve Fielder-Civil and another man.

Fielder-Civil has pleaded not guilty and has been out on bail since.

The search of the couple's home comes just weeks after they were arrested and held in Norway for the possession of marijuana.

Bergen police held the pair for 12 hours after finding 7g (a quarter of an ounce) on them. On that occasion they escaped with a fine.

Winehouse's latest controversy comes after she has spoken publicly about her drug abuse shame.

Speaking on her European tour the singer confessed she thought she was going to die last August after she was raced to a London hospital following a reported binge on ecstasy and cocaine.

'I really thought I was on my way out,' she admitted. She added: 'Often I don't know what I do, then the next day the memory returns.

And then I am engulfed in shame.

Metro