'Leave her alone, you dirty scum! Why don't you just leave her alone?' As two paparazzi scramble on to the pavement to catch Amy Winehouse emerging from her Mercedes van, a pair of young women bustle out of a café. 'She's just trying to live her life!' they scold, before pursuing the singer into the newsagent's. 'You doing all right then, love?' the pair cluck. One throws an arms around Winehouse, drawing her tight, while the other steadies her mobile phone camera for the shot. 'Now then, Amy,' the woman exhorts. 'Smile!'

 Winehouse surrenders an unseeing gaze to the lens, then turns to study the news-stand. 'Look at Chantelle's tits!' she says. 'I've got to have that.' A cover shot of the newly pneumatic Chantelle Houghton, of Celebrity Big Brother fame, is scooped up along with the Sun, the Mirror and Heat.

 At the counter Winehouse realises the shopkeeper is filming her on his mobile. 'What do you think you're doing?' But her scowl sags half-heartedly, and the question must strike him as rhetorical, for as he takes her money he doesn't even bother to answer.

- Decca Aitkenhead, The Guardian, December 2007