McCartney, Mills attend divorce hearing

Paul McCartney and his estranged wife, Heather Mills McCartney, appeared in London's High Court today for a preliminary hearing in their divorce case, according to Reuters. Mills McCartney, 38, said nothing as she arrived at the courthouse for the closed-door session. The 64-year-old former Beatle arrived at the court's backdoor soon after. McCartney whistled and snapped his fingers as he left the building after the two-hour hearing, flashing a peace sign to photographers stationed outside the court's parking lot before being driven off in a waiting car. Mills McCartney left through a backdoor about 30 minutes later. The couple separated last May after four years of marriage and began divorce proceedings in July. They have a 3-year-old daughter, Beatrice.

Fiona Apple, others to play benefit show

Fiona Apple and a slew of friends are set to play two benefit shows next week to help her production manager, Gordon "Gungi" Paterson, deal with the financial burden of his cancer treatment. For the March 5 and 9 shows at Largo in Los Angeles, Apple will be joined by collaborator Jon Brion, as well as Dave Palmer, David Garza, and Nickel Creek's Sean and Sara Watkins. Paterson was diagnosed with cancer last summer. All proceeds for the shows will go to Gungi and his family. "Gungi is one of those people that you just love, really actually LOVE, within five minutes of meeting him," Apple wrote on her Web site. "As you may know, I am a girl prone to low days. I don't know how many times I got to soundcheck in a grumpy, nasty, teary rut, and when I saw Gungi, all nearly seven feet of him, across the empty theatre, and we waved to each other and he asked me how I was, I immediately got a jolt of life...His face is a pep-talk!...His eyes are HUGS!"

Bobby Brown out of jail

After ponying up $19,000 in child payments he owed to the mother of two of his teenage children, Bobby Brown was let out of jail last night after three nights in the big house. Brown appeared today in Norfolk (Massachusetts) Probate and Family Court, a familiar place for the 38-year-old singer, who has a long history of failing to pay support on time. A judge had ordered Brown held in the county jail until he made the payments after he was arrested while watching his daughter's cheerleading competition at Attleboro High School. Phaedra Parks, an attorney in Atlanta, where Brown lives, said the singer has been struggling to meet monthly payments to Kim Ward, with whom he two children. Brown has a third child with singer Whitney Houston, who filed for divorce from the singer last year after 14 years of marriage.

Seal loses bid to avoid paying commissions

Seal has to pay up, but he still gets to go home to Heidi Klum every night. The Grammy-winning singer lost his bid this week to overturn a British court ruling ordering him to pay his ex-manager commissions on earnings from his first two albums. Court of Appeal Judge Roger Toulson dismissed Seal's challenge to a High Court ruling in June that his former manager John Wadlow was entitled to unpaid commissions due under a 1995 agreement. Both of the albums in question were recorded before that date. In June, the court had ordered Seal to make an interim payment of $922,000. Seal, 44, argued the agreements weren't valid because his former manager had used "undue influence." Toulson said the terms agreed on in the settlement were "not unreasonable or oppressive" from Seal's point of view. The court heard how a then-undiscovered 24-year-old Seal met Wadlow, who was a partner in a recording studio business known as Beethoven Street Studios, in 1987.

Deep Purple live album recalled

Sony BMG recently released a live Deep Purple album called NEC 1993. But the label giant forgot to get one thing before doing so: the band's permission. When Deep Purple frontman Ian Gillan found out about the release, he asked fans not to buy it, calling the Birmingham, England, concert one of the band's worst and "one of the lowest of my life." According to BBC News, the label has decided to recall the album and will investigate why Gillan was not told about its plans. "Sony BMG is not in the business of releasing albums without the knowledge of the artists," a label spokesperson told BBC News. "It is in our interests to work with artists, so they can promote their records and continue to work with us."

Gillan told the BBC that he and guitarist Ritchie Blackmore were barely on speaking terms at the time of the concert and the tension led to a bad performance. "It was one of the lowest points of my life--all of our lives, actually," he said. "In fact, it lasted five or six shows after that Birmingham show. Then Ritchie left the band. And we've had 13 years of stability ever since then."