Amy Winehouse Storms V Festival

Retro-pop superstar Amy Winehouse has stunned fans by appearing onstage with The Specials at the weekend's V Festival.

Amy Winehouse last appeared in public at the V Festival. However last summer's show was widely judged to have been a disaster, with an incoherent Winehouse booed offstage by disgruntled fans.

Since then the singer has left the UK to live in Saint Lucia, hoping that a break away from the tabloid press would give her peace. Returning to Britain earlier this year Amy Winehouse walked into a blizzard of press attention, centring on an assault charge.

An incident at a show last year saw the singer brought to court, after allegedly striking out at a fan. However the judge was later to acquit Amy Winehouse, stating that all the witnesses to the case were drunk at the time.

Now it seems that the singer is ready to let the music do the talking. Taking to the stage with The Specials, Winehouse ran through a short medley including 'You're Wondering Now' and 'Ghost Town'.

A spokesman for Winehouse said: "While living in St Lucia, Amy missed the band's reunion tour and decided to head to V to catch her favourite artists".

Amy Winehouse was scheduled to appear at the Island 50 celebrations in London earlier this year. However the singer cancelled the performance, following on from a heavily criticised show in Saint Lucia.

Introduced as "our good friend Amy" the singer was on good form, and clearly revelled in the crowd's attention. Amy Winehouse was also seen onstage alongside Pete Doherty, though she did not perform with the Babyshambles man.