Amy Winehouse, the British pop singer whose hard-partying ways often overshadowed her soulful singing, has died at just 27, police confirmed.
The tortured songstress, who had a history of substance abuse and shot to fame with the song "Rehab," was found dead Saturday in her London flat, according to police.
"Inquiries continue into the circumstances of the death at this early stage. It is being treated as unexplained," a police spokesman said.
London Ambulance Services said the singer died before ambulance crews arrived. The cause of death was not immediately known.
"We are deeply saddened at the sudden loss of such a gifted musician, artist and performer," her record label Universal said in a statement. "Our prayers go out to Amy's family, friends and fans at this difficult time."
Winehouse, with her trademark beehive hairdo and sailor-style tatoos, went global when her 2006 album "Back to Black" won five Grammy's.
The album featured the song "Rehab," which includes the chorus: "They tried to make me go to rehab, I said, 'No, no, no.'"
The troubled Londoner pulled out of her European tour last month after being jeered at her comeback show in Serbia because she appeared to be too drunk to perform.
She sang garbled versions of her songs and frequently left the stage for 90 minutes. After the breakdown, her management vowed she would take time off to recover.
"I didn't go out looking to be famous," Winehouse told the Associated Press when "Back to Black" was released. "I'm just a musician."
Since then, the singer has been better known for drunken fights, stints in hospital and rehab clinics, making her fodder for the gossip pages and late-night TV talk shows.
Winehouse was born in 1983 to a taxi driver dad, Mitch Winehouse, and his pharmacist wife, Janis. She grew up in the suburbs of northern London and leaned toward performing at an early age.
At 10, she started a rap duo, Sweet 'n' Sour, with Winehouse as Sour. She went on to attend a school for British music and acting, and then to a performing arts academy in the style of "Fame."
Initially signing with "Pop Idol" producer Simon Fuller's 19 Management, Winehouse refused to become a packaged star.
She debuted in 2003 with the critically celebrated, jazz-influenced album, "Frank," but then entered a slump during which she had a bad breakup and suffered writer's block. She later said she also smoked a lot of marijuana during the period.
"At one point it had been two years since the last record and (the record company) actually said to me, 'Do you even want to make another record?' I was like, 'I swear it's coming.' I said to them, 'Once I start writing I will write and write and write. But I just have to start it.'"
That led to the album "Back to Black," which brought her global fame.
Since then Winehouse's managers have gone to increasingly desperate lengths to keep the star on the straight and narrow.
She was investigated by police, but never charged, after a a video emerged that appeared to show her smoking crack cocaine.
In 2010 she pleaded guilty to assaulting a theater manager who asked her to leave a family Christmas show because she was drunk.
A judge fined Winehouse and warned her to stay out of trouble before praising her for trying to get clean.
Winehouse had a brief marriage to music industry hanger-on Blake Fielder-Civil, which ended in 2009.
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