I’m sure I’m not the only one eager to hear a new album from Amy Winehouse. In fact, I know I’m not the only one because her record label has been on at her for months about getting it finished and released. But Winehouse isn’t a lady (at all, arguably) to be rushed, and seems to be taking her sweet time over the follow-up to Back To Black.

Winehouse has been spending a lot of her time in St. Lucia, the Caribbean island where she has been living since December. So maybe it’s no surprise to hear that she’s been inspired by her new home when writing the new album. Although that doesn’t mean it’s necessarily a good move. Winehouse the reggae artist, anyone?

The Sun newspaper reports that Winehouse is basing the album not on her troubled love life or dalliances with substance abuse, but on island life and the folk stories surrounding St. Lucia. Not only that but she’s also hired three local musicians, who play traditional Caribbean instruments, to record the album with her.

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Amy Winehouse has been a mess for a number of years now. As soon as she found fame and fortune it seemed to go straight to her head and set her off on a whirlwind descent into drink, drugs, and destruction.

She has spent the last six months or so relaxing in St. Lucia, having decided to take a break from performing live. She was meant to have written and recorded material for her new album in that time but that doesn’t seem to have happened.

Winehouse made her live comeback last night at the St. Lucia Jazz Festival, an annual event now in its 18th year. Unfortunately, it all ended a little prematurely and her appearance wasn’t quite the return to form we’d all hoped for.

Winehouse did manage an hour-long set which included 14 songs. However, she forgot her words on a number of different occasions, constantly looked about to fall over, mumbled to herself throughout, and altogether failed to deliver the goods.

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Amy Winehouse seems to be intent on delaying working on her new album until either one of two things happen: her record label get tired of waiting and cut her loose; we all forget who she is, what she sounds like, and the fact she even exists.

Most artists try to release new material every two years, although some, especially in the rap genre, tend to release an album every year. Amy Winehouse’s last record, Back To Black, which made her a household name around the world, was released in October, 2006 - two-and-a-half years ago.

Her record company knows it’s been too long and is desperate for her to hurry up and record the next album. There’s obviously some selfishness there because Universal knows it can make a load of money from it. But even I think Winehouse should get on with it.

Amy seems to have fallen in love with something other than Blake Fielder-Civil recently, spending all her time in St. Lucia. So her record company sent her back over there to lay down some tracks for the next album.

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Brit Music Scene has been a bit of an Amy Winehouse-free zone for the past month or so, partly because some readers requested less frequent reports on every facet of her life, and partly because she hasn’t actually done anything for weeks, having been out of the newspapers for some considerable time.

Winehouse was taken to a London hospital suffering from a chest infection last week, but is now back at home and thought to be on the road to recovery. She’s reportedly not well enough yet to have met up with husband Blake Fielder-Civil who was released from jail today (November 5th, 2008).

Fielder-Civil has straight away entered rehab as part of his release conditions and is unlikely to meet up with Winehouse for some time. Meanwhile, she is thought to be back at home working (finally) on her new album, which is well overdue with Back To Black having been released over two years ago now.

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Back To Black was a massive hit, propelling Amy Winehouse from perennial struggler known by a few people and their dogs in the UK to an international superstar whose name is known by almost everyone in the world. And now it’s time for her to produce a follow-up.

The problem is, this doesn’t exactly seem to be going very smoothly. In fact, friends of Winehouse are said to fear her third studio album may never actually happen, or at least not until she manages to kick her drink and drug habits completely.

The follow-up to Back To Black has seemed to be in question all year. At the end of March, it was claimed that friends who had heard some of Winehouse’s new tracks described them as “suicidal music”.

Then in April, the singer cancelled a booked recording session in the Bahamas to concentrate on writing and recording the new Bond theme. Hmm, well that worked then, as Jack White and Alicia Keys got the gig instead.

It was then reported that Winehouse’s record company had issued her with an ultimatum - get clean or lose your record deal. She still isn’t clean but still has her record deal, probably because Universal Music realise what a guaranteed payday Winehouse is when she’s on form (which is rare these days).

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Why change the habits of a lifetime? Amy Winehouse certainly looks to feel that way, as she turned up late once again for a scheduled festival appearance. The festival in question this time was Bestival on the Isle Of Wight, which had already been a wash out thanks to rain and set cancellations.

The trouble for Winehouse started even before the festival kicked off, with newspaper reports that she had ordered 48 bottles of Jack Daniels for her rider. Amy was one of the headliners for the waterlogged festival and did at least show up.

The problem was she turned up on stage 40 minutes late, which isn’t so much being fashionably late as abnormally late. Some reports suggest the delay was caused when Winehouse refused to leave her car before the rain subsided but that isn’t confirmed.

Fans present at the gig report that she was clearly drunk (probably on that Jack Daniels hoard) and even fell over at one point during the set. She was also said to be shaky and unable to sing in her usual style. The set was then cut short after just 30 minutes, in which time she had only sung 10 songs.

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Throughout all of the troubles Amy Winehouse has had, and they’ve been plenty, I have always tried to see past the drugs, drink, and general wrongdoing in her private life because of the quality of her singing. Unfortunately, even my faith in that part of her life has now been shaken.

This weekend saw The V Festival taking place jointly in Chelmsford and Stafford. Unlike Glastonbury, V is very much a pop festival, and embraces a more diverse mix of artists - one of whom was Amy Winehouse, taking part in her penultimate gig before having an extended break from performing.

The problem was that Winehouse completely failed to live up to expectations. Not only was she late for one of the sets, a lateness that got her booed by the majority of the crowd, but her performance on stage also left a lot to be discovered. If you don’t believe me, just check out these two videos from the weekend.

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Mark Ronson is a confident (some would say cocky) young man who doesn’t suffer fools gladly. He’s a super-producer who has not only been one of the main reasons for Amy Winehouse‘ worldwide success but has also released his own album full of cleverly re imagined covers.

So the man knows his stuff, which is why it’s no surprise to see that he is the first person to have reacted to Noel Gallagher’s drunken rant about various musicians and artists the other day. In fact, rather than just defend himself, Ronson went on the attack, and owned Gallagher.

Speaking to Radio One, Gallagher had said this about Ronson:

“He wants to write his own tunes instead of ruining everyone else’s. Mark Ronson needs to learn three chords on the guitar and write a tune.”

Now, writing on his MySpace Blog, Ronson has hit back with some jibes of his own and even brought up the subject of Jay-Z. Gallagher had earlier criticised the decision to have Jay-Z headlining Glastonbury, and Jay-Z had fought back by covering Wonderwall at the start of his festival set.

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Amy Winehouse seems to be in the process of sorting her life out. She’s apparently split with Blake Fielder-Civil, and is looking to start her own record label with alleged new squeeze Alex Haines.

Although the split has yet to be confirmed, reports are already emerging that Fielder-Civil is looking for a £3 million payout in the event of a divorce. She has already spoken to her financial advisers about keeping her fortune safe from Blake, but without a pre-nup (surprise surprise), the chances are he’ll get something out of it.

Amy seems to have already moved on to Alex Haines, her manager’s assistant. And not only are they said to be together, they are making business plans.

Winehouse is currently signed to Island Records, but the deal ends after her next album, whenever it ends up arriving. Rather than signing another deal, Amy is thought to be planning to start her own record label, and signing up friends Tyler James and Remi Nicole in to the bargain.

Island Records are desperate for Winehouse to get clean and finish her third album for them, and they want it to be a classic which makes even more money for them than Back To Black has. Winehouse seems to finally be wising up to the fact that the world is her oyster, and with control of her own destiny, she could make an even bigger fortune than she already has.

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Amy Winehouse has been issued an ultimatum from her record label which could see her never release another album. At least if she doesn’t get clean, and then stay clean in the build up to the promotion of her forthcoming third album.

Just a few days after I reported that her album has been put back to 2009, after she cancelled a trip to the Bahamas intended to be a recording session away from her usual haunts and vices, it seems that her record company aren’t willing to wait forever.

According to The Sun, chiefs at Universal Music issued the stern ultimatum in order to remind Winehouse of her responsibilities. Apparently, the warning came from Lucian Grainge, who issued a similar clean up order last year which saw Winehouse finally enter rehab.

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