Courtney Love is known as the ultimate wild woman of rock. So when Janet Jackson exposed herself at the Superbowl live on TV it was only a matter of time before the response came.

And sure enough it did. The singer seized her chance on the David Letterman show, giving TV producers another challenge about what they could show live to an American audience.

The former lead singer with Hole teased the audience by partly raising her T-shirt several times.

Clearly bra-less, she finally exposed herself while singing Danny Boy on top of Letterman's desk, forcing the network to blur the picture using a time delay.

Love then boasted: "I haven't shown my boobs for so long."

A day after turning up two hours late to answer drug charges in a Los Angeles court, Love joked with Letterman that "the judge was cool" and insisted: "I'm not in trouble."

The widow of Nirvana singer Kurt Cobain had flown to New York for the show after causing a series of interruptions at her court appearance that clearly annoyed the judge.

At one point Love told her lawyer "you're fired". Then Superior Court Judge Elden Fox told her: "You're not doing yourself any favours" as she brandished empty pill bottles.

Courtney with Kurt Cobain's kid, Francis Bean.

Despite several efforts by Letterman to quiz the singer about the charges and allegations that she tried to break into an ex-boyfriend's house, Love played down the significance of the drugs, saying they were "one expired Percocet and one Ambien" - an analgesic and a sleeping pill. She then changed the subject.

Asked how her life was now, she replied: "Going great. Handcuffed in the bedroom, handcuffed outside."

Love, 39, also mocked Nicole Kidman, saying: "It's no secret me and Kidman don't like each other."

She then quoted a Vanity Fair magazine profile calling the two actresses "fire and ice", saying she

had put down the Cold Mountain star when they were both in a lift together by telling her: "That means you're a puddle."

At other times, Love pretended to rebuke herself, saying: "Calm, Courtney, calm." Then she asked Letterman: "Do you think I'm like wacky and stuff ?" Before appealing: "Is that against the law?"

Love is charged with possession of the painkillers hydrocodone and oxycodone.

The drugs were found when she took an overdose at her Los Angeles house last month.