No Doubt kicks off tour in Borgata by Alan Scully

When No Doubt went on hiatus in 2004, nobody in the band faced a bigger adjustment than Tony Kanal, the band’s bassist and along with singer Gwen Stefani, a key songwriting contributor for the band.

For Stefani, the break gave her the opportunity to launch her solo career, which she did with great success. She made two CDs – “Love.Angel.Music.Baby” and “The Sweet Escape” – each of which went platinum and allowed her to stretch musically into a sound that liberally mixed hip-hop and dance styles with pop. She also married former Bush singer Gavin Rossdale, with whom she has had two sons.

Guitarist Tom Dumont and drummer Adrian Young, who are also married and parents, got in some family time, pursued outside music projects and also had time for their favorite hobbies – surfing and golf, respectively.

Kanal, though, faced a different set of circumstances. By his own admission, he didn’t have any real outside interests or hobbies. Since No Doubt formed in 1986, he had basically immersed himself in the group 24-7.

“I think the first couple of years, to be honest, were kind of a challenge, the vacuum that’s kind of created by something that you had been doing at that point, what, 16 or 17 years,” says Kanal, whose band performs at Borgata Hotel Casino & Spa on Saturday, May 2. “It’s just like, ‘Wow, now what?’ But I did a lot of soul searching and I worked on music for the first couple of years, doing soundtrack stuff and working with some other people.

“And then I kind of took a break from music for a couple of years. I had bought a new house and my girlfriend and I put our whole lives into this house and just really dove in deep. And you know, I think looking back on it now, that was a good thing because it gave me some perspective on my life and music and stuff.”

After working on his house, and realizing that the No Doubt hiatus was going to stretch on a bit longer, Kanal decided to really explore a musical life outside of the band.

“I started writing with a lot of other artists and songwriters and working with other artists and pushing myself out of my comfort zone,” he says. “I think all those are great learning experiences and they’re really important in this creative journey that you’re on. Also, I think you bring all of this stuff back to the band then.”

Unfortunately, the outside musical projects of Kanal and his three bandmates have yet to produce the payoff the band wants most – an inspired and focused musical direction for the next No Doubt CD.

This also brings us to this summer’s No Doubt tour, an outing Kanal says is very much a part of the quest to find a musical direction for the next CD.

“The reason for this tour is because while we were in the writing process last year, there was something missing,” Kanal says.

“We haven’t found that thing that’s the unifying, guiding light, for lack of a better way to describe it. So Gwen said, ‘Hey, why don’t we go play some shows?’ I think it’s going to be incredibly productive and a great way to inspire some creativity for making the new record,” he says.

The band is returning to the road on a grand scale, headlining amphitheaters and bringing out a full visual production, some of which is based around the movie, “A Clockwork Orange.”

“It is one of I’d say half a dozen or so points of reference that we are using for the tour design and for wardrobe and for stage design,” Kanal says, declining to disclose other facets of the production.

As for the music, fans that come out may get a few surprises from the song selection for this summer’s shows.

“In addition to playing all of the singles, we dug a little deeper into a couple of the records and we pulled out some songs that we haven’t played in a long time that still really get us excited, (make us) feel something emotionally and are still fun to play,” Kanal says.

In writing for the new CD, Kanal says the band is looking for the same inspiration it found for making the “Rock Steady” album – a song or theme that drives the rest of the album.

“That’s what happened with ‘Rock Steady,’ with writing (the song) ‘Hey Baby,’” Kanal says. “That was kind of our take on Jamaican dancehall music. All of a sudden, this very happy and fun party record kind of unfolded in front of us. Not to use a pun, but I have no doubt we’re going to find that and it’s just right in front of us,” he says. “And as soon as it makes itself clear, we’ll be going full steam ahead.”

No Doubt

WHEN: 8 p.m. Saturday, May 2

WHERE: Event Center, Borgata Hotel Casino & Spa, Atlantic City

HOW MUCH: Tickets, priced at $105, are available at the Borgata box office, www.theborgata.com or ComcastTix at 800-298-4200.

WEB SITE: www.nodoubt.com

No Doubt’s Musical Progression

Initially formed more than 20 years ago, No Doubt has progressed artistically over the course of five studio albums. In its 1992 self-titled debut, the band came to the table with influences ranging from Madness to Blondie. While the album was not considered a commercial success, No Doubt built a name for itself in the southern California punk scene. Its pop-tinged anthems, complemented by the bouncy guitar lines of ska, offered an alternative to the increasingly popular grunge genre.

The band harnessed its raw energy into polished pop songs on 1995’s “Tragic Kingdom,” which netted No Doubt two Grammy nominations. Shaped by the breakup of singer Gwen Stefani and bassist Tony Kanal’s relationship, the album featured the heart-wrenching “Don’t Speak,” leading to sales of more than a quarter of a million copies.

Stefani jumped to the forefront as a songwriter with 2000’s “Return of Saturn,” with tracks such as “Simple Kind of Life” and “Ex-Girlfriend.” Then, in 2001, No Doubt embraced a more pop-centric sound on “Rock Steady” and incorporated a dancehall reggae influence, a progression of its past ska tendencies. The album boasted two Grammy-winning singles, “Hey Baby” and “Underneath It All.”

Fans can hear No Doubt’s musical progression with the purchase of online tickets for Borgata’s show. A free download of the band’s entire digital audio catalog is offered with each ticket purchased.
- Christine Ernest

Geared up to Rock Steady. By Jon Weiderhorn

A touring rock band has to evolve and adapt to survive. Fans might embrace a group’s original style and image for a while, but if a look and sound remains constant for too long, a band can become stale, its music bordering on self-parody.

The members of No Doubt are keenly aware of that phenomenon, which is why the band’s live performance over the years has changed as much as its music. In 1987, No Doubt was a high-octane ska/punk band armed with simple staccato songs, delivered by musicians who pogoed as they performed. Not long after, the band added ’80s pop melodies to their music and began playing with a sharper stage focus. In 1993, they downplayed the pop elements and amped up the punk-rock anger, reflecting the alternative angst of the time. The band began turning heads with its powerful concerts and the onstage energy of its front woman, Gwen Stefani.

But although anxiety and agony were at that time mass-marketable tools, No Doubt felt insincere thrashing with rage. They made their most successful album, Tragic Kingdom, in 1994; it reemphasized the group’s ska and new-wave influences within a framework of postgrunge rock. In turn, the band’s live show became more celebratory. Stefani started wearing an Indian jewel on her forehead and within months had helped trigger a new fashion trend.

No Doubt toured the record for more than two years, building up a core following by returning to the same cities two or three times. By the time they began writing their follow-up, Return to Saturn, in 1998, the band members were veritable celebrities, but they were also road-weary and burned out. Being away from significant others for months at a time took its toll, which is why Saturn songs such as “Simple Kind of Life” and “Ex-Girlfriend” seem to sting with intimate melancholy.

When No Doubt toured for Return to Saturn, they followed a less rigorous agenda, scheduling fewer promotional activities and making the most of their precious downtime. “After the shows, we’d have these dance-hall reggae parties, and we’d really enjoy dancing,” says bassist Tony Kanal. “That really made touring a lot more fun. So even though Return to Saturn was a more depressing album musically and lyrically, the tour was really great.”

The No Doubt dance-hall parties paved the way for the band’s new album. Rock Steady downplays guitar rock in favor of primal dance grooves. Most of the songs are packed with modern pop hooks reminiscent of Madonna’s Ray of Light, and the rhythms incorporate new wave, techno, hip-hop, reggae, and pop. The sound is like a spirited hybrid of Blondie, Daft Punk, and Shaggy. To match the vitality of the songs, No Doubt brought in an all-star cast of producers, including modern pop guru Nellie Hooper, new-wave pioneer Ric Ocasek, electronica wizard William Orbit, vintage reggae greats Sly and Robbie, and dance-hall reggae heavyweights Steelie and Cleevie. The group also signed on hip-hop masters Dr. Dre and Timbaland for a pair of tracks that never made the record but may surface in the future.

Just a few weeks after completing Rock Steady, No Doubt opened for U2 on a handful of dates. Because the new CD is heavily keyboard based and full of electronica elements, the band members have had to change the way they do things onstage. Four members are now playing keyboards at various points in the show, and for the first time, they’ve incorporated backing tracks.

“There’s a lot more sequences and stuff to deal with,” says Kanal. “So we’re rolling around with quite a few keyboards onstage, which is great. When we were writing this stuff, [guitarist] Tom [Dumont] and I said, ‘You know, if there are songs where I’m not playing bass and you’re not playing guitar, it’s no big deal. We’ll do whatever’s best for the song.’ So there are a few songs where we’re all [except drummer Adrian Young and Stefani] playing keyboards — including Stephen Bradley and Gabrial McNair, who join us when we play live — which is pretty spectacular.”

After the U2 tour, No Doubt will concentrate on promotional appearances until they begin a headlining U.S. tour this spring. Onstage spoke to Stefani, Kanal, and Dumont about the new CD and the challenges of playing it live.

Rock Steady sounds like such a fun and spirited record compared with your last album, Return to Saturn.
Gwen Stefani: It is. We were in a really great mood when we made it. I had such a great year. And the band and I made some decisions when we decided to do another record. We wanted to clean house as far as all the rules that had built up over the years. We just wanted to experiment and see if we could have fun making the record and not have any kind of restrictions.

Tom Dumont: We wanted to make a record that would work well, for example, in dance clubs. You can really dance to every song. At the same time, there’s a lot of variety in the record, just like on our last record. We got really inspired by contemporary dance-hall reggae, which has almost a hip-hop kind of beat to it. Some stuff is really synth-pop ’80s new-wave-sounding stuff; a couple of things are kind of just straight-ahead rock. It’s much more keyboard heavy, the result of me and Tony sitting around in my little Pro Tools studio with our keyboards, just noodling around to come up with some weird sounds.
Tony Kanal: Just the headspace we were at leant itself to what we were making here. Return to Saturn took two years because I think we felt the need to prove ourselves as songwriters and musicians. This one was more about just letting go and having fun with it. We started working on it in February, and it came out in December.
Stefani: It’s weird how it came together so fast, and we worked with so many amazing people, and it was so spontaneous. And the next thing I know, it’s done, and we love it. I couldn’t be more excited.

You’ve released four albums, including Rock Steady. But before you became a successful recording band, you developed a reputation as an exciting live act.

Stefani: Oh, in the past, playing live for us was everything. We were just learning how to make records, and we were already experienced at performing to a crowd, so we focused on playing live. It’s so different being in the studio. And I feel like we’re just starting to learn how to use computers and Pro Tools, which made this record so much different.

Has No Doubt’s emphasis on playing live changed?
Stefani: It has, because the recording process and the writing process are becoming more and more fun and we’re better at it, and the touring process is becoming harder and harder. Really, it’s harder to live the lifestyle once you’ve done it for a long time. Leaving home and being away and not seeing your family, it’s just such an extreme way to live. I still look forward to touring; I just wish we didn’t have to do it for so long. It’s like too much of a good thing, like if you love to eat chocolate but you just eat too much of it and you get sick. That’s kind of the way touring is for me.
Kanal: Doing it for too long is tough, but I love the fact that we’re touring in a different way now than we ever have before. It’s such a challenge to play with keyboards and sequencing, and I have to say, I really enjoy it. We can play older songs completely live and then also play the new stuff with sequencing. We get to do it all, and it’s just so much fun.

Was it somewhat overwhelming to go from being a completely organic band to one that mixes in recorded material onstage?

Kanal: No, because we structured the sequencing so there’s as much live stuff being played as possible. It wasn’t a situation where we’re using the sequencing as a crutch to make the songs work. I think that for the most part, it’s still very much of a live performance, with a few things augmented with the sequencing.
Dumont: It is a little bit weird for us because playing along with a track is somewhat awkward. We don’t want to break up the spontaneity of what we normally are able to do. But for the four or five songs [that we use backing tracks on], it works pretty well. The songs really kind of call for it.

Gwen, as a singer, what was it like for you to perform in this different musical framework?

Stefani: It’s hard to describe. I think I just try to perform each song the way the song wants to be. I’m not real conscious of what I’m doing onstage. Music just makes you react the way you’re gonna react, and I just react to what I’m feeling when we’re playing it. When we first tried to learn the new songs live, it was so hard. It was like a nightmare. But it was fun. It was especially rough because it was very hard to get back in the swing of it. We hadn’t done it in a year. And the first show we had to do was opening for U2 at Madison Square Garden. I was freaking, dude. It’s one thing to have a couple of warm-up gigs, but we had none. The closest thing to a warm-up gig was having my mom and dad come down to hear me sing the songs.

Is nervousness an issue before big shows?
Dumont: Every show is a little different. Generally, as long as the stage sound is good, the bigger shows are pretty easy. We’ve done enough of them now that it feels pretty comfortable. Usually a bunch of us will have a drink or so before we go on. Nothing more than that. It helps take the edge off. And this is a weird thing: I’ve noticed that if I chew gum during a show, or at least at the beginning of the show, something about having to play guitar and chew gum takes my mind off anything else. It’s the weirdest thing, but it helps.

What have you learned about playing live that you didn’t used to know?
Stefani: That it’s about what’s inside and the spirit of the music that counts. On Return to Saturn, I wanted to do more of a “show” show. I wanted to have these elaborate costume changes and incorporate more dynamics, and it didn’t really work out. I don’t think people wanted that from us. And we had two weeks of hell onstage before we kind of worked it out.

So it’s changed for this tour?
Stefani: I’ve learned that certain songs require certain things, and it’s fun to run around on certain tracks, but it’s also okay to just stand still and sing. It’s like a journey. I want to take people to different places when they come see the show.
Kanal: If you have confidence and give 110 percent every night, things usually go pretty well. You’ve just got to portray that confidence and have fun. And we definitely have fun when we play onstage.

Do you use in-ear monitors or wedges?

Dumont: We’re kind of split in the band. Gwen and our keyboard players/horn guys [Stephen Bradley and Gabrial McNair] have in-ears. They’re the ones who sing. Me and Tony and Adrian, we’re all on wedges, which is just kind of a preference. I used to have in-ears.

Why did you stop using them?
Dumont: I felt too disconnected from the show. I could certainly hear my playing with a lot of precision, could hear all the nuances, but I felt disconnected from the audience. At the end of shows, I was feeling like, “Did I play a show?” The kind of physical experience was taken away.
Kanal: I tried them but felt kind of restricted because I like to move around a lot and I always found they were falling out. No matter what I did, I couldn’t keep them in my ears. So I prefer traditional wedges and side fills.

Has having Gwen and the other singers on in-ears helped with the stage volume?

Dumont: In the past, before in-ears, Gwen needed a lot of stage volume to hear herself and sing in tune. In those days, there were sections of the stage where I couldn’t even walk because her vocal was so loud. Since she went to in-ears, her stage volume is down to a really nice level, so I can hear everything pretty well.

Tony, are you doing anything different with your stage gear now that your music has taken on a more danceable, poppy feel?
Kanal: I’ve always had a very simple rig, just an amp and a speaker cabinet. Now it’s a little more complicated, but it’s still pretty simple. I’m just using one kind of effects rack to emulate more of the Jamaican dance-hall keyboard kind of bass sounds that we’ve recorded on this record. And for the first time, I’m actually playing some keyboards onstage, too. I’m just running a MIDIman keyboard into an Emu Proteus 2000 and getting some really cool sounds.

Tom, you’re playing keyboards as well?

Dumont: Yes, on one song — “Hey Baby.” I play one of those portable keyboard units [Roland AX-1], hanging on me like a guitar. It’s kind of a novelty thing, but I’m definitely enjoying it. I’m not a great keyboard player, but I am good enough to handle the part.

Has your setup changed for this tour?
Dumont: I’m really into simplicity, and this is the first time I’ve ever used a rackmount effects processor. I’ve always used stompboxes. I’m using a T.C. Electronic G-Major. It’s cool, and it’s new for me. I’m having fun programming it, figuring it out. The big reason I use it is that I’m really anal about signal loss, cable length, and stuff. This thing sits next to my amp, and it just goes to the effects loop with the shortest cord possible.

Who puts together your live arrangements?

Dumont: We do it pretty much as a group. And Gabrial, our keyboard player, has been helping out a lot lately in sorting things out. He has a really good ear, and it’s good to use him as an objective helper. On this particular album, he didn’t really play much, so he can come and listen and say, “Okay, what about this way or that way?” And then Gwen, she gets really into the vocals and she works a lot with those guys on trying to harmonize certain parts of the album. And it sounds different from the album, because on the album she harmonizes everything with herself. She had like ten tracks or whatever going of herself. But live, she’s really good with the two of those other guys getting the harmonies right and rehearsing them.

Your new single, “Hey Baby,” is about the groupie scene. Is that something you’ve experienced firsthand?
Stefani: I have a weird point of view on that because usually groupies are these girls that are going after the guys in the band to seduce them or be with them so they can tell everybody they were with them. That is something that’s been going on forever. But since I’m the female in the band, they can’t really do that to me. So it’s just a weird perspective to have because I don’t really have guys coming up to me trying to hook up, yet I see it happening with the guys all the time. So I just wanted to write a song about a fun version of being backstage and seeing all of the stuff that goes on back there.

Your boyfriend, Gavin Rossdale, is the front man for Bush. Is it weird knowing that the kind of thing that you see backstage also goes on with Bush?

Stefani: Of course. I go out with them once in a while, and I get to see it firsthand, and it’s crazy. But music is so powerful, and it’s such a gift, and it just really makes people react funny. People really love having music in their lives. And for girls, music has a sexuality to it. So everything kind of all emerges together, and they can’t help themselves.

Your music is definitely fun and lively.

Is partying a major part of the No Doubt experience?
Kanal: Yes, but moderation is extremely important, and you just kind of learn as you go. You just start to realize that you’re going to exhaust yourself if you’re not careful.

Where do you see yourselves at this point in your career? Do you think Rock Steady will pave the way to the next evolution of No Doubt?
Kanal: We just take each record as it comes, and on this record we got to do everything we wanted to do. We’re not the kind of band that writes music on the road. We need life experience, and we need to feel the urge to create music build up before we can do anything new. So it’s really hard to say what’s gonna happen next. Right now we’re just so excited to go out and share these songs with people, that’s all we’re really thinking about. I don’t know how long we’re going to keep going, but right now things are extremely good.

Filling Out the Sound

Even with four members of No Doubt playing at least some keyboards, several songs on Rock Steady had too many elements to comfortably pull off live, so the band decided to incorporate backing tracks into certain parts of their show. They decided that rather than trying to trigger samples from a sampler, it would be more effective to play the supplementary tracks back onstage using a portable multitrack recorder — in this case, a 24-bit Tascam MX-2424 (see Fig. A). “We actually play to the track live,” says Tom Dumont. “We just press play on the machine and play along. It kind of just fills out the sound, and we use it as a click track.”

The band actually uses two MX-2424s synced together, each with the identical tracks on it. “The idea is if one breaks down, they just flip a switch and go to the second one,” says Dumont. “ The cool thing is, if both break down, we can still finish the song out. It’s not like the whole song is running on the thing. The core of drums, bass, and guitar will still be going strong.”

The band sifted through the original master tapes, found the tracks they wanted to include, and mixed them into stereo pairs on the MX-2424. “We went through the record and picked out parts that really couldn’t humanly be played live,” says bassist Tony Kanal. “And those are the only things that actually go to sequencing. The rest of the stuff is played live.”

As is often the case in backing-track situations, most of the band does not have to play to a click. Instead, they simply follow the tempo of drummer Adrian Young, who hears it through a set of headphones. “So far it’s been pretty good,” observes Dumont. “Adrian tells us that he can feel us kind of pulling fast a little bit. But for the most part, we keep it in mind to stay pretty locked. The songs we do are pretty groove oriented, so we can just lock in and go. We’ve talked about trying to pull the tempo up maybe 2 or 4 bpm on those tracks to make it a little better live.”

With thanks to Mike McKeaney of ND Universe

Back from its trip to Saturn, No Doubt is ready to Rock Steady. By Tom Lanham.

Gwen Stefani is late. Not really late, just 15 minutes or so. But the platinum-haired, pout-lipped, pinup-perfect ska-pop goddess has a good cause – her boyfriend, the similarly pout-lipped, pinup-perfect rock icon, Gavin Rossdale of Bush renown, is her wheel man this particularly crisp autumn afternoon. He must’ve missed a Hollywood-hills turn or two. And when this oft-photographed No Doubt diva arrives? Most assuredly, she’s ready for her close up, Mr DeMille; in a flowing, floor length, red cashmere cape (complete with wolf-wowing hood), Stefani sweeps into the spacious, sparsely appointed digs of her band’s bassist Tony Kanal. She doesn’t just walk – in her patent-leather pumps, camouflage pedal pushers and baggy V-neck sweater – but sweeps and ’40s film starlets must’ve swept on Oscar night.

Stefani’s trademark blonde tresses are clustered in a humble bun today. She lets her locks down, she smiles, for the music-clip shoot of “Hey Baby” – the funky-punky first single from No Doubt’s new Rock Steady comeback on Interscope. “In the video, I have total Veronica Lake hair,” she purrs, curling into a wrought-iron chair on Kanal’s back porch.

Stefani sported a self-designed hound’s-tooth-jacket-and-golf-pantaloons number on VH1’s recent Vogue Fashion Awards, where she won Most Stylish Video, “Ex-Girlfriend” (from 2000’s platinum Return of Saturn). Startling the calm Kanal, seated opposite her at his patio table, Stefani jumps up from her chair to demonstrate the surreal hands-clasped-in-triumph victory rumba she danced when her name was announced at the ceremony. “And when I got up to claim my Award, all of a sudden the single was on; ‘Hey Baby’ was blasting!” she informs Kanal. He’s shocked; the song hadn’t even hit the radio yet, but he welcomes the well-placed leak. “So I was like ‘What song is this? Hey baby, hey baby hey!’ ” Stefani trills, shimmying around the concrete while her chum gives her the thumbs-up.

And sure, she rubbed shoulders with top-name designers like Patricia Field, Donna Karan and Stella McCartney at the event, she cedes. “But ever since puberty, I’ve always liked to get dressed up, and I’ve always made my own clothes. My Mom always took me to fabric stores like Jo-Ann Fabrics, House of Fabrics, and then with the band it was like Halloween every day. Like, ‘Oh cool! Now I have an excuse to dress up – it’ll be fun!’ And I spent a lot of time doing it, right Tony?”

Kanal (no slouch himself in designer jeans, T-shirt and a meticulously blond-streaked, prickly-hedgehog ‘do) nods, smiles sagely. And who should know better? He and Stefani dated for eight years, but broke up – with some irony – during the writing and recording of ’95’s Tragic Kingdom, their 15-million-selling sophomore breakthrough. He prepares to speak, but his ex is on a roll. Returning to the Veronica Lake theme, Stefani asserts that she did “just get so inspired by that whole starlet period of Hollywood. I’m fascinated by all that stuff; Julie Andrews and the whole Sound of Music thing, and musicals. And I definitely felt weird when Tragic Kingdom was coming out and the only girls that were around were the country or folkier style – the no-makeup singer/songwriters – or the really hard L7 or Hole-type rock bands. I didn’t feel comfortable in either one of those areas, so I just decided to be myself. And it all turned out all right.”

Stefani is sporting tiny gold earrings shaped like plastic 45-rpm centers, her customary jungle-red lipstick, and huge knuckle-obscuring rings on each hand; one that reads GWEN, another that spells NO DOUBT. It’s a defiant yet remarkably feminine persona, one that teenage fangirls around the world have been copying for at least a half-decade (even though No Doubt coalesced, to little fanfare, way back in ‘86); a style so distinctly Stefani that it – along with her velvety vocal talent – helped propel recent duet clips from techno-maestro Moby (“South Side”) and Eve (“Let Me Blow Ya Mind”) to the winner’s circle at MTV’s 2001 Video Music Awards (for Best Male Video and Best Female Video, respectively). “Without Gwen, the video wouldn’t have gotten shown in the first place,” Moby shyly assessed at the VMAs. Stefani is still dumbfounded – she almost turned down the artists’ original offers, not wanting to be seen “as just a side dish.” And she was pleasantly surprised when countless folks from the techno and hip-hop communities recognized her at the show, waved friendly hellos.

“But the thing about No Doubt is, we were a band for nine years before we had any commercial success.” says Stefani, whose charming, self-deprecating humility can win you over in a heartbeat. “And that, in a lot of ways, has kept us really grounded in the sense that we know what’s happening when they take our picture, that’s not the real thing. We know who we really are, and that it can be gone at any moment. And we feel lucky to still be making music without having to grow up, to just sit around with each other and go to different countries and record with legends and hook up with all these different talented people.” So many people, in fact, that it’s a good thing phones are no longer in rotary. Her nails never would’ve survived dialing all those long-distance numbers.

Set to a cheeky, off-kilter synth riff (even most of his bass lines were performed on keyboards, Kanal swears). “Hey Baby” is Stefani’s humorous study of backstage barnacles, acolytes dying to kiss the ring (either one). “I’m the one they feed upon,” she vamps with neo-Norma Desmond drama, truly baffled to be confronted by “a stranger in my face who says he knows my Mom and went to my high school.” Produced by Sly and Robbie – with raucous guest toasting from rude boy Bounty Killa – during a hard-partying, beer’n'rum glugging stay in Jamaica, the track is a sassy, brassy leap forward from Saturn’s awkwardly insecure “Ex-Girlfriend” (“I kinda always knew I’d end up your ex-girlfriend… Why’d you have to go and pick me?“). Fans of Stefani’s spunky “Spiderwebs”/”Just a Girl” from Tragic Kingdom probably cringed to hear her melt into uncertainty on such somber Saturn sonnets as “Dark Blue,” “Too Late,” “Simple Kind of Life” and the painfully blunt “Marry Me.” Those same listeners will rejoice to rediscover Stefani on Rock Steady, writing and singing with newfound confidence and class. Any mistreating male who crosses her now will come to with a throbbing jaw and a ring indentation as a reminder of exactly who KO’ed him – GWEN from NO DOUBT.

By all accounts, the Glen Ballard produced Return of Saturn was a real bear, a total emotional drain on the group. It posed a tough question: How do you go about topping a 15-million seller? Especially when your founder and key songwriter (Gwen’s Svengali brother Eric Stefani, who first forced her to sing as a scaredy-cat teen) has just quit to sketch cels for The Simpsons? So yes, Kanal shrugs. “Making that record was a very laborious process. The head-space we were in for the whole Saturn phase was extremely serious.” So last November, he, Stefani, guitarist Tom Dumont and drummer Adrian Young “sat down and said, ‘OK – we’re gonna give it another shot, make another record.’ We kinda made a decision to move ahead, but this time we were gonna remove some of the restrictions that we’d had previously. We opened ourselves up to trying anything for this record, just having fun with it. So last January, myself, Tom and Gwen sat down again and started writing.”

The words and music flowed. On one of her London jaunts to visit Rossdale, Stefani paused long enough to co-pen a daffy dub-echoed ditty with Dave Stewart, “Underneath It All.” For two Cars-kitschy compositions – “Don’t Let Me Down” and “Platinum Blonde Life” – No Doubt (Kanal, 31, and Stefani, 32, are New Wave boosters from way back) enlisted the Cars’ mastermind himself, Ric Ocasek, as producer. Madonna mainstay William Orbit oversaw the OMD-ish “Making Out”; Prince personnaly retooled the Paisley Park-polished “Waiting Room”; and Bristol Sound legend Nellee Hooper finished off five cuts, including the Lene Lovich-retro “Running.” “Love is like a punishment/ Homegirl here to represent,” Stefani deadpans in the dancehall title track, but tacks on an optimistic punch line: “Our love is rock steady, rock steady…”

Stefani had suffered writer’s block for Saturn “But the thing I learned from my Dave Stewart experience is that you can write a song in, like, 10 minutes,” she says. “I wrote ‘Underneath It All’ in an instant, just sat down and wrote it right then and there. And the Tony – who’d flown over to England, too – got super-excited about the idea of going to Jamaica to work with all these dancehall producers: Sly and Robbie, Steelie and Clevie. We had maybe five songs written at the time, but Tony made it happen. Next thing we know, we’re in Jamaica. It was magic.”

“We found the balance on this album,” is how Kanal sees it. “All of it came from a very organic place, it was super-spontaneous, but it was just fun. Every single song on it was fun to write; every time we sat down together to work on music, it was fun. And it’s brought certain things to the band that we didn’t have before, like a feeling that we’re gonna be around a little longer. Whereas on Tragic Kingdom, I think people really thought we were gonna be one-hit wonders.”

Sept. 11 found No Doubt mixing in London, where they’d rented a house next to Rossdale’s. Stunned by the Worl Trade Center disaster – and trapped in Britain with no way home – the musicians wondered if such an effervescent, bubblegum-chewy effort would sound glib in light of such grim events. They got over it. “I mean, this is what we do, and what we need to continue to do,” figures Kanal. “And you hope that the stuff you’re creating will provide some sort of relief or a… a…”

“Diversion?” Stefani offers, hopefully. “Music is so powerful and it’s such a gift that we have here; I’m actually thrilled to be creating it and it’s such and uplifting album. And whether this stuff happened on the 11th or not, people can still put their headphones on and have a little fun for a minute, maybe not taking anything too seriously.”

It’s a sentiment tat might appear Pollyanna-mushy coming from any other artist. But Stefani – with her big, innocent eyes and down-home delivery – somehow makes it sound earnest, honest, a little heartfelt wish that the feel-good milestone of No Doubt’s career will make a few despairing souls out there, well… feel good.

A week earlier: Gavin Rossdale sits in a record company conference room, anxiously drumming his fingers on the table. Rossdale’s got a new record himself to discuss (Golden State, with Bush), but Stefani is definitely on his mind.

He felt her pain in London (“It was really hard for her after the tragedy – she was torn with being with me over there and being with her family in America”); understands the misgivings that fueled “Ex-Girlfriend” (“It’s very difficult in this line of work to find stability, substance, because the demands are so great, coupled with the distance and shear loneliness – for anybody in a traveling band, you’re incredibly alone a lot of the time”); and sensed her need for commitment, possibly a family, in “Marry Me” (“Although I don’t know if now is the perfect time to be breeding – we’d be like ‘Welcome to the world, kids! Here are your antidotes!’ “). And you can hear it in the singer’s voice – after six years together, his love for Stefani seems genuine, unflagging. There is, ahem, no doubt.

And as most of Rock Steady’s sugary poetry spins on a Gwen/Gav, enduring-love axis, Stefani’s report card on their relationship is equally glowing. “Gavin is so sweet, and he has a great heart,” she beams dreamily. “And he’s had to prove himself to people his whole life, even to all my friends. But this has been a great year for me and Gavin, for the band, for everyone. We spent loads of time together because he did his record here in LA while we were working, then when we went to London to mix, he was there the same time we were – it was perfect.” Stefani suddenly startles Kanal again by stomping her spiky heel. “But I’m tellin’ ya, nobody’s fucking asked me to get married! Ever! It’s weird. And everywhere Gav goes, everybody is at him about the ring, the ring. And there is definitely a baby boom right now – have you noticed that? Or at least all of our friends are pregnant. Adrian’s having a baby, too. It’s the first No Doubt baby, and it’s gonna be on tour with us.”

Stefani has heard all the No Doubt gossip. Or rather, the surprising lack of it – the general profile is of some nice Orange County-bred, Los Angeles-relocated kids who made good while offending the absolute minimum of bystanders along the way. “And I’m glad people think that,” she says. “Sometimes I think we should roughen up and try to get a little more” – her scarlet nails slice through the air to designate quotation marks – “you know, ‘cooler.’ ”

“It’s true – it’s really rare that people are mean to us,” Kanal chimes in. “We’re really lucky and blessed that way. And I think the reason we’re somewhat grounded, as Gwen was saying earlier, is that it was nine years before Tragic Kingdom came out, which was when we first farted having commercial success… Waidaminnut!” he stops himself, midthought. “Did I just say ‘farted’?!”

Yup, Stefani nods, laughing hysterically while Kanal hides his face in his hands. “And people haven’t heard anything yet!” she gasps, a not-so-veiled tour bus reference. “But we really do try and be nice to everybody, because we were the alternative to the alternative for a long time. It was so weird when Tragic Kingdom came out and all of a sudden we were like the mainstream, because No Doubt had always been the exact opposite of whatever was popular. And now, with Rock Steady, all we feel is lucky; really lucky to be able to try on all those different hats.”

But it’s a real red-faced Kanal who gets the last word in. Sort of. “There was a really important point I was trying to make. But now I can’t remember what it was!”

With Rock Steady, No Doubt officially joins pop-music aristocracy by Dave Wielenga

Gwen Stefani and Tony Kanal were in a London bar one night last summer, taking an all-night break from a long day of mixing tracks for No Doubt’s latest album, Rock Steady, when in walks maybe the biggest rock star in the world.

“Bono came out and met us because we had a lot of mutual friends,” explains Kanal. “We drank with him. And I’ll tell you—like I was telling Gwen earlier—the cool thing, the inspiring thing about that guy is that you see Bono, and he’s totally got his shit together. He’s this great musician—legendary now—and he’s politically active, helping people beyond, like, our wildest dreams.”

“He really does it!” Stefani interjects.

“And on top of it, he likes to drink and really let go,” Kanal continues, “which, to me, makes it very real.”

“He’s Irish!” Stefani says.

“But it’s cool to find that balance in life,” Kanal says, forging ahead, “of doing the things that are important, but enjoying yourself, too.”

“Enjoying day-to-day life,” Stefani offers.

Her final comment makes a feather-light landing, and the conversation drifts away without anybody really noticing—replaced for a moment by the lingering memory of that night in London, its lessons and their implications.

This is how they do it, Gwen and Tony, interview after interview, a half-hour or an hour at a time, sometimes all day when a new album is coming out (Rock Steady is being released Tuesday). Last time, barely 18 months ago, when Return to Saturn was about to drop, they did it at Gwen’s place, a mansion in the hills near Griffith Park. This time, it’s at Tony’s home at the bottom of the hill, sitting around a table on the backyard patio of an old house he has made completely his own in a funkily gentrified neighborhood of Los Feliz. In Spanish, that means “the happy ones.”

It’s a nice, sunny day. The garden is old Southern California suburban gorgeous—a small, green lawn surrounded along the wooden fence and stuccoed house by well-troweled beds of flowers and shrubs—and the air is quiet except for the soft murmur of traffic a block or so away. We’re all sipping hot tea.

And then: “Tony!”

Kanal is startled from his lethargy to see Stefani, his long-ago ex-girlfriend, take a piece of gum from her mouth and throw it across the patio into his precise landscaping.

“Gwen! Stop doing that!” he snaps, real irritation serrating the edge of his cool. “You threw one over there, too. Earlier, you did. Did this one go on the . . . the thing—the sidewalk, I mean—or is it somewhere in the grass?”

Stefani giggles with mischief and defiance and then ignores him completely.

“This is Tony’s house,” she tells you, with sass, “so I can throw my gum”—she pulls another piece from her mouth—”like that”—and she chucks it across the patio—”and his mom’s not gonna come and get mad or anything like she used to when we were kids.”

Kanal is exasperated, but he has known Stefani since 11th grade. He has seen much worse than this playful rebellion against his mother’s long-ago scolding. Hell, everybody who heard Return to Saturn—which dripped with the what’s-it-all-about lyrics of Stefani’s turning-30 depression—realizes there’s worse than that.

Kanal waits out Stefani’s little button-pushing episode and then steers the interview back on course. “We had a really good time making the record,” he says slowly and then looks expectantly at Stefani.

“Yes,” she says dutifully, “we did.”

They go silent for a moment before simultaneously breaking into laughter.

This is how it has been for Tony and Gwen for—well, it seems like forever. Rock Steady is No Doubt’s fifth album, but nobody noticed the first two. They were doing this long before Gwen could tell about the time one of her idols, Joni Mitchell, complimented her for “Simple Kind of Life” when they saw each other on the same plane. They were doing it long before Tony could sheepishly apologize to Ric Ocasek for writing a song influenced so much by the Cars (“Platinum Blonde Life”)—and before Ocasek could sheepishly apologize that he really hadn’t noticed the resemblance.

Not that Gwen and Tony seem to drop these names with arrogance or calculation. “I mean, can you believe we had the opportunity to write a song with the guy who wrote ‘Sweet Dreams’?” Stefani gushed, in reference to Dave Stewart of the Eurythmics. And, speaking of gushing, she reports that Puff Daddy approached her at a party to report that he had heard the new record. “He said he had to change his pants after hearing it—that he peed his pants, he liked it so much,” Stefani says, perhaps offering an inadvertent insight into the hip-hop mogul’s new P. Diddy moniker.

Mostly, however, these illustrious names seem to emerge naturally in conversation, which, in this case, illustrates the essential message of the new album: with Rock Steady, No Doubt has officially ascended into the pop-music aristocracy.

Sure, Orange County’s long-ago house band has been world-famous for seven or eight years. But the 15 million sales of Tragic Kingdom could have been a Spice Girls aberration. And the 1.4 million sales of Return to Saturn was nearly a Hootie and the Blowfish disappointment. But rather than descending into the world of Geri Halliwell or Darius Rucker, Gwen and Tony have emerged as something like their generation’s Sonny & Cher. By now, the crème de la MTV has become No Doubt’s for-real runnin’ buddies. In half an hour, they mention Bono, Prince, Kid Rock, Puff Daddy/P. Diddy, Ric Ocasek, Nellee Hooper, Steely & Clevie, Joni Mitchell, the Neptunes, William Orbit, Sly & Robbie, Bounty Killer, Dave Stewart, Eve, Jimmy Iovine, and Dr. Dre. There are times during the interview when it’s obvious Gwen and Tony are trying not to mention a celebrity, perhaps self-conscious about the impression they may be creating. But by now, Gwen and Tony get their names dropped as often as any of the others.

In fact, the fuel for Rock Steady is nothing less than the interface of the internationally famous. No Doubt literally traveled the globe to write, record and produce it with the people who helped compose Mother Earth’s late-20th-century soundtrack. Prince co-produced and sang background on the gushy-funky “Waiting Room.” Ric Ocasek gave a Cars overhaul to “Platinum Blonde Life” and “Don’t Let Me Down.” William Orbit plugged in “Making Out.” Hip-hop crew the Neptunes co-wrote “Hella Good.” But high-profile mixmaster Nellee Hooper provided the closest thing to a production theme, turning the knobs on five of the songs. Additionally, the band traveled to London and Jamaica—their demos stored in ProTools computer programs—to work with Dave Stewart and the dancehall production teams of Steely & Clevie and Sly & Robbie.

This is a long way from that garage on Beacon Street.

“Well, it is, and it isn’t,” says Stefani, blowing at a wisp of straight, bleached-blond hair that has escaped from the clip intended to keep it out of her face. “In some ways, this record feels as though we sort of went backward toward what we used to be. Because No Doubt has always been kind of an up, positive band. This record has that approach. It’s really spontaneous and fun. It has a lot of our roots, which are, like, the ska-reggae-dance-hall thing. It all kinda comes from that same place, of making music with our friends. In some ways, it feels like we are coming home in a way. Except we’re more mature and maybe a little bit better musicians . . . hopefully.”

And except that their friends are more famous and more talented. And, again, that the members of No Doubt are, too.

The band has never before displayed such elasticity and command, such mastery of modern pop songs and production. Stefani bends and shapes her voice into the styles of chanteuses ranging from Janet Jackson to Nelly Furtado, from Pat Benatar to, well, Madonna—whom she appears to have supplanted on the throne of over-the-top queen—without falling into imitation. The contributions of Kanal, Tom Dumont and Adrian Young—who often have seemed overlooked in the light of Stefani’s stardom—remain in the background. But now their presence seems essential, not only for their emotional stability (the band-ness of No Doubt) but for their musical virtuosity as well. Maybe it’s that we’re just noticing, but these guys are good.

“When Tragic Kingdom came out, people had a tendency to write us off—not necessarily as one-hit wonders, but as one-album wonders along the lines of a bubble-gum pop situation,” Kanal says. “I think we had that chip on our shoulders when we went into Return to Saturn. For lack of a better word, that was a ‘labored’ process. But I think we proved ourselves as songwriters and musicians. There’s not a day that goes by that somebody in our peer group doesn’t tell us how much they liked that record.”

Many from that “peer group” also wanted to work on the next one.

“But this time around, it was more like, ‘Let’s just fuckin’ have fun,’” Kanal says. “It was really free. We took off all the restrictions we previously had. Tom and I even said, ‘If we don’t play our instruments on some of these songs, that’s okay. Whatever’s best for the song.’ So sometimes we’ve got Tom on keyboards and me on keyboard bass—and when we do ‘Hey Baby’ onstage, we’re going to have four of us playing keyboards. But the key was we wanted to work with people we’d never worked with or people you’d never think we’d work with.”

Like Bono, for example. He didn’t do any work on the album, but their all-nighter in that London pub led to the mini-tour as U2’s opening act that No Doubt just finished.

And considering the way No Doubt’s world is expanding, you wonder aloud whether, like Bono and U2, there might potentially be a political or humanitarian or somehow activist side to Gwen and Tony and No Doubt? And it turns out that Gwen has been wondering, too.

“You know what? The world is changing,” she says excitedly. “I’ve been thinking about this a lot. Because at the VH-1 Fashion Awards, they were asking that. And I was thinking, ‘I’ve never written a song about those things before, but it will be interesting to see how the changes in the world affect us creatively.’”

Tony seems uncomfortable with the direction of the conversation.

“I just think that we—that’s No Doubt—have been about fun, about having a good time, just kind of a release for people who come to see us to get away from all those serious things,” he says. “So I think the way we help is by lending ourselves to charity events, things that everybody does. That’s how we help, rather than songs that are political statements. That’s never been our thing, you know?”

Another of those small silences ensues. Tony turns to Gwen and continues, backtracking a little, perhaps concerned he’s stepped on her toes.

“That’s not to say that you wouldn’t do it . . . like, write lyrics about that in the future,” he says. “We’ll just see if it happens naturally.”

Stefani isn’t mad, but she is a little ruffled.

“I know, I know—that’s what I was saying,” she tells Kanal. “I was saying, ‘I wonder if, in some way, it’s going to affect everyone.’”

“Like, if you get inspired someday,” Tony offers.

“Look, I’m just wondering how it’s going to affect us creatively,” Gwen says. “I don’t know. It’s going to affect us, no matter what. And I’m wondering if it will be beyond, you know, where everyone’s like, ‘Did you wear a different outfit tonight because of the whole terrorist thing?’ And I’m, like, ‘No, I didn’t! I’m not!’ Oh, you know what I mean. We hear the stupidest questions.”

By Mar Yvette

It’s not often that a band can withstand its founding member departing, increasing creative uncertainty, weak record sales, mounting industry pressure and loads of internal (and extremely personal) tension. But that’s exactly what O.C. darlings-turned-world-famous wünderkinds No Doubt have done – and they’ve got their very own episode of VH1’s Behind The Music to prove it. Together now for almost 15 years, chances are many of you Mean Street readers got to experience the group’s kinetic live shows back in the day when Anaheim was known simply as Disneyland’s epicenter and Gwen wasn’t touted as a diva in fashion magazines; a term the gregarious lyricist laughs about. “I think of Aretha Franklin when I hear that word. I don’t wake up in the morning and go, ‘you diva!’ “

But now that frontwoman Gwen Stefani, guitarist Tom Dumont, bassist Tony Kanal and drummer Adrian Young have sold a gazillion albums (okay, maybe only multi-millions), have toured the world over and are international superstars, circumstances have changed tremendously; the band, however, remains much the same.

“As far as all the fame and celebrity stuff, that really is a strange part. But it doesn’t really soak in. It doesn’t enter the real world of four best friends who make music together and get to have this extended childhood and go around dancing onstage for people,” reveals Stefani. “We feel very, very blessed to be doing this still. Everything after Tragic Kingdom has just been borrowed time. None of us expected that we’d still be doing this, you know?”

When I finally get the chance to begin the interview, a PR associate warns that Stefani is feeling a bit under the weather and must be very careful about saving her voice for the show. This lowered my expectations slightly as I envisioned a truncated discourse where Stefani might not be too enthusiastic about yet another scribe badgering her for details about everything from musical inspiration to favorite lipsticks (she loves The Sound of Music and the staining power of Anna Sui lipstick, by the way). But once she starts talking, one would never guess that the fashion-forward singer is battling a cold with only “two bites of salad” in that oft-bared tummy of hers. Perky and genuinely friendly, Stefani’s manner is warm and welcoming while her unaffected speech is marked by a plethora of “you know?” and the occasional “dude.” In essence, she is a real slice of Orange County. Likewise, when guitarist Tom Dumont speaks, he is sincere, gracious, given to laughter and shares in Stefani’s sentiments about No Doubt’s success.

“When Tragic Kingdom came out in ‘95, we had been together for eight years not because we were extremely successful, but because we had a really strong friendship.

“The cool thing about all the fame and stuff after Tragic Kingdom is that we’re still here and we still have the same friendships and still enjoy being together,” he reveals. “It’s cool that we’ve made it without hating each other or becoming drug addicts or anything bad, you know what I mean? The analogy I use is that we’re like brothers and sister. There are moments when we drive each other crazy, but at the same time we’re really tight and have this deep connection. No matter what I do to piss off Tony today, tomorrow we’re gonna be hanging out drinking and playing tennis.”

It’s been little more than a year since No Doubt released a new album, and just in time for the holidays comes Rock Steady – a danceable collage of ska, reggae, dancehall and new wave synthesizers bobbing within a sweet pop bubble. Rerouting themselves from the slightly dark departure they took on Return Of Saturn, No Doubt is feeling fine and ready to share the love.

“We were in a really good mood while making this record and it was probably one of the most magical times in the group,” gushes Stefani, waiting for sound check at the Staples Center before she and the group open for U2 on their current Elevation Tour. “The last record was like our growing pains record. We came off of Tragic Kingdom and we made a record that we took very seriously. Everybody took it on like a huge responsibility to prove to themselves that they could become better songwriters and all that stuff, so it was definitely a darker phase for us. And after completing that goal and going on tour with that record, we felt that we really did it. We love that record. It just set us up for this really great space to be in. Our friendship and chemistry is, I don’t know…” she pauses for a moment, “just better than ever! Which is just so mind blowing after all these years.”

From the smooth, tropical “Rock Steady” and the new-wavy “Making Out” to the Elastica-meets-Garbage vibe of “Platinum Blonde” and the perfectly percolating reggae-synth of “In My Head,” No Doubt has audibly delved into a new multi-layered, somewhat experimental sound that is as sonically diverse – everything from laser gun noises to Jamaican dancehall beats – as it is unifyingly upbeat.

“It’s been a record where we just sat down and said, ‘well, if we’re gonna make a record, we’ve gotta clear the slate and be really free; be able to do whatever we want.’ So it was a real experimental record in a lot of ways,” remarks Stefani.

And like mad musical scientists, the group spent the last year honing their experiment at home in Southern Cali, in Jamaica and in London. As Stefani recalls, “We found this music called dancehall, which is a Jamaican [type of] music that’s basically the evolved, modern version of ska [and] reggae. And that’s what we’ve always loved. I mean, we started our band as a ska band. So when we started making this record we said, ‘let’s make a record that we can dance to ‘cause we wanna be in a club and hear our song come on.’ So we just sat down and started writing and ended up recording in Jamaica with legendary Sly and Robbie, Steely and Clevie and just these hard-core dancehall producers. We had a real magical time there and it just set up the whole vibe for the record.”

Adds Dumont, “Some of the stuff was inspired by contemporary Jamaican dancehall music. But accurately, there is this huge cultural difference between what dancehall music in Jamaica is doing right now and what we’re doing.” Which is? “Well, we’ve got a white girl singing, not a Jamaican singer doing more of a rap thing,” he laughs.

Another fresh element of Rock Steady is the inclusion of more electronically inclined components in the songs. As Tom explains, “As far as the electronic thing, it didn’t happen on the whole record, but it did on a lot of the record. It’s kind of me and Tony, deciding out of our own tastes, to lay down our instruments to experiment with keyboards. We just got a bunch of synthesizers and started messing around with making songs that way. So like on ‘Hey Baby’ Tony played half the bass line on the keyboard, and all these weird Star Wars sounds and laser noises that you hear were just us having fun with it. Right now, for me, using all these new elements to push music forward is really exciting.”

Moreover, with the ProTools program, the technologically savvy Dumont was able to transform his Mac computer into a full-blown recording studio.

“ProTools is really expensive, but once you have it, it’s so amazingly powerful. Like on a lot of the songs all the vocals and keyboards were recorded in my living room,” he enthusiastically recalls. “It opened us up creatively in this amazing way because it was just us being creative all day long with a microphone. So when we had about six or seven songs we were like, let’s go to Jamaica and record these things. Then we came back and recorded more at my house again and when we had about 15 songs that we really loved, we went to England to record them and we were done. That’s how this album came about: writing and recording in bits and pieces with things that were exciting and inspiring to us.”

Rock Steady signifies another first for No Doubt: outside collaboration. In addition to Jamaican producers Sly and Robbie and Steely and Clevie, the group enlisted the help of other celebrated artists like Rick Ocasek (The Cars), Orbital, Dave Stewart (The Eurythmics) and Prince. As Stefani readily offers, “We decided to open ourselves up to other people that we respect, because for the 14 years we’ve been a band we always made records with just us four and nobody else. Our success has afforded us to work with some incredible people, and we did that because we had the opportunity to. Can you imagine if we just said, ‘nah, we’re not gonna let anyone inside our world.’ This record was all about letting people into the No Doubt world and I think it reflects it. We don’t get sick of it or jaded by it. I mean, we’re on tour with U2 and it’s intense!” she declares with amazement. “It doesn’t get old.”

Dumont agrees. “It’s kind of like going to music school ‘cause we’re sitting with people like Prince and watching how they work and learning from them. Or working with Dave Stewart on “Underneath It All” was literally just us and a guitar for a half an hour and [coming] up with this really pretty, sweet song with a reggae vibe. When you collaborate, you’re filtering your creativity through someone else’s sensibility, so you come up with a different result than you would if you were just working by yourself.”

Stefani can’t help but express her enthusiasm for the new album and all that went into making it.

“I’ve been in the band since I was seventeen, and just to get to this point where we can make a record that we’re all in love with and work with all these people is amazing. This record was done so quickly, it was almost a miracle for us to get it done in a year. If you would’ve told me a year ago that I would be sitting here talking about this record coming out I would have said no way!”

But despite all the opportunities afforded by fame and success, life in the public spotlight is often just as much about adulation and respect as it is severe scrutiny and judgment. Stefani candidly reveals. “I wrote a record called Tragic Kingdom and it was all about Tony and me and our split up. I certainly didn’t think that that record would come out and I certainly didn’t think that 16 million people would hear it. And then I didn’t think that I would go on tour for two-and-a-half years and every day having people pick at my wounds. That was definitely challenging for me and for Tony, but we’re very open about it. I don’t really have that much to hide. I’m really a regular, normal person. I have the same problems that everybody else does and for some reason, the way I put it down with the melody people can relate to. That makes me feel great and even more normal.”

Perhaps an anomaly in the world of entertainment where artists go to great lengths to ensure privacy, Stefani doesn’t attempt to shield her deepest thoughts and feelings. “I don’t censor myself at all when I’m writing, even now that I know people are going to hear it. I don’t really consider anyone else when I’m writing, just my own thoughts. The only other person I usually consider is the person I’m writing about. I can see how with Tony a song might hurt, and I never want to hurt anyone. Or when writing about Gavin, I know that people are gonna read into it. So there’s been a couple of songs I may have changed some of the words here and there, but only because I don’t want to hurt my boyfriend or anyone [else].”

So what about a song like “In My Head” that carries the verse, “Let’s talk about the future/ Let’s talk about the wedding”? Is that truly what’s in Ms. Stefani’s head at the moment? She laughingly replies, “Dude, that’s been on my mind since eighth grade! It’s like, uh … when am I having the kids, when am I gonna get married? I mean, every girl thinks of those things all the time. That’s the thing: It’s only 12 songs at two minutes each and if everyone thinks they know everything about me from that they’re crazy, you know? It’s only a snapshot of one night or one idea, so I feel like I am sharing a lot, but yet I’m not.” She pauses, “I just think that I’ve been really blessed. Me and Gavin are totally in love and anything that we don’t have control over – like all the stuff that’s written about me or the band or our music – is something that I can’t really think about. My job is to try to write great songs and try to put on a great show.”

Signaled that it’s time for sound check, Gwen Stefani and Tom Dumont are off to do just that.

With thanks to Mike McKeaney of ND Universe