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

No Doubt’s Drummer dusts off his ska roots, teases the Mohawk, and proceeds to party on with the release of Rock Steady

It’s a Psycho-suburban dream come true: Adrian Young was a striving young drummer living in suburbia, playing golf, drumming at home, and playing in a local band called No Doubt. Fifteen years and seventeen million records later Young is a striving young drummer living in suburbia, drumming at home, playing golf and playing in a famous band called No Doubt.

On the eve of their latest release, Rock Steady, No Doubt was days away from ‘warm-up gigs’ with U2. Drum! magazine caught Young at his very large house on a country club golf course. He graciously offered a tour (because the reporter was staring at the pad). The house was tastefully decorated by Young and his beautiful wife Nina in a dark wood, Southeast Asian opulence. Many of the furnishings were picked out by Young while on tour with No Doubt and shipped home. “We went to Malasia, Thailand, places that were new to us. Those are great. I loved going over there” Young pointed a casual finger into bedroom after bedroom, saying, “We party here a lot and people like to stay over.” The bar is large and well stocked and a grinning Young says. “We’ve had a lot of good parties here!

There’s a game room, complete with arcade video machines. The game room ceiling is papered with album covers, mostly ‘70s acts, some ‘80s: Fleetwood Mac, Steve Miller, Madness, The Police. “A lot of those are my wife’s, but my parents were sort of hippie types, they had a little rock band so I grew up on all that stuff, too. I lived in the Santa Barbara/Pismo Beach area until I was ten. That probably affected me more, musically, than growing up in Orange County did. When we moved I stopped listening to as much ‘70s rock and started listening tening to more new-wave, punk, and ska.”

There’s a room that used to be the office – you can tell by the wall full of gold and platinum records — but it’s being redone as a nursery. “I’m the only married one in the band, and the first with a baby.”

As Young walks around the house, he looks more like an athlete than a musician, If it weren’t for the Mohawk, he could easily pass for a young pro ball player instead of a rock star. “When I was growing up I was all about sports. Basketball in high school, and golf. I didn’t start playing drums until I was 18, a senior. It was sports. Now I’m on a basketball team, and a softball thing. My main thing is golf. I probably spend more time golfing than I do drumming.”

All the members from No Doubt claim roots in neighboring Orange County. Anaheim, in particular, serves as a metaphor for things plastic and “Tragic” in the Orange County “Kingdom.” But now some of them live in L.A., and Young is in a suburb known more for Aviation executives than celebrities. “We’re all from Orange County. I live here because I love [this area]. My parents are still in [a town about ten miles away], I like to be close to them still. LA’s too much. Too much partying, too much everything.”

Young waves off the last couple of rooms, offices, guest bathrooms, blah, blah, blah, he seems uninterested. But he gets a spring in his step when he takes us back downstairs to a room near the bar. He slides a large sofa aside to reveal a trap door. “My drum room is down here,” he says, “Watch your head.” We descend the short steps into a basement that has been padded with acoustic treatments. There’s a kit wedged into the corner, a stereo system, piles of CD’s. In the room directly above us, a tape recorder and some other studio gear is wired to capture evenings of inspiration in the drum room. It’s everything a drummer needs — especially privacy. Last night I was playing in here until about 12:30. It’s great. I don’t have a standard practice routine. During the off time I just keep my chops up, trying to stay fluid. I play to Steely Dan records a lot. I’ve been playing to Jeff Buckley’s stuff. I don’t know the drummer’s name, but he’s good. Some Erika Bahdu for groove. I’ve got a Rush CD down here still [laughs]. Last night I was playing to some 311 stuff.”

Young warns us to mind our head again as we come out of the little studio and go to a front room where we camp with some food and drink and get the low-down on his working life. Through the front window the golf course is busy with players. Behind us is the huge backyard and the stone-rimmed swimming pool.

“On Thursday we’ll start three weeks with U2 as a warm up before the record comes out. So awesome. U2 is totally bitchin’. We’ll do our tour next year. This is the beginning of a long cycle for this record. We’ll do a lot of national and international promo for the record first. Do some live dates. Wherever the record’s doing good next year, wherever we could do good tours, that’s where we’ll go. It all depends on how the record does. For us a lot of things are decided close to the dates. We won’t do the states until next spring or summer. By February we’ll know.”

The promotional tour is comprised of a barrage of radio station visits, press interviews, television appearances, and anything else that might shout from the rooftops, “THE NEW NO DOUBT RECORD, ROCK STEADY, IS IN STORES NOW!”

“It’s not ike a regular tour. We don’t take quite as much stuff. I take my kit, I don’t do rental stuff, It’s a little bit broken down. It’s more of a pain in the ass because you’re doing interviews every day, multiple interviews every day. And different timezones. It’s just work.”

“We didn’t want to wait until next year [to release the CD]. The record company’s behind it, they think it’s going to fly. If we have their confidence then we’re pretty much willing to do anything. Because if the record company’s behind it, your foot’s already in the door for your record to do well, because the dollars are going to be behind it. That’s half the battle.”

With Rock Steady the band has turned into a dance hall groove machine. “During the last tour we put on dance parties after the shows. We were listening to a lot of dance hall music and a lot of ‘80s stuff, too. This is the fastest record we’ve ever done. It usually takes us two to three years to make a record. This one’s a total funk-party record. We weren’t trying to prove anything. Just trying to have fun. There was lots of pressure on us for the last of record. This one we were like, whatever.”

The fact that the airwaves are saturated with beat-box rhythms was likely not far from their minds, either. By the time this interview hits the newsstands, most Americans will have heard “Hey Baby,” No Doubt’s first single from Rock Steady.

“Even though I don’t write any of the songs, I still get to have a pretty free opinion about direction [of the songs]. That’s what’s made it cool over the years. I’ve taken a little more of a back seat on this record, though, as far as involvement goes. The songs, pre-recording, are always a struggle and a challenge, and it’s very rewarding. Any band will tell you that. This time I didn’t have it in me to the fight, you know, and I was more comfortable taking the lesser role. And I’m glad I did. It’s been more fun.”

Young told us about the birthing of the infectious dance-hall groove on “Hey Baby.” “My wife and I have a friend with a Victorian house in San Francisco, a one bedroom place. It came vacant, and he said, ‘Do you want to stay in it for a while?’ This was during some down time for the band and me and Nina wanted to get away, so we got a U-Haul and took one rooms worth of furniture, just grabbed the sofa nearest the door and whatever else we needed and went and lived there. But while we were up there, trying to get away, Tom and Tony came up to work on ideas. Work was following me [laughs]! So we went to this recording studio to work out some ideas.

“Tony had this bass line, this dance hall bass line, and I came up with a beat. There was a million ideas, but this one idea became ‘Hey Baby.’ The drums were just recorded stereo, it wasn’t supposed to be a real recording. We got to Jamaica [later, to record tunes for the record with Sly & Robbie] and tried to re-record it. But we couldn’t get it happening. So we just flew [the stereo drum track] into Pro Tools, and it became the first single.”

We asked if the band jammed on it a lot, or did a lot of takes. “Not really. Pro Tools does that. You can stop stuff or cut it up. Versus the last record, when I was hardheaded about the whole thing. My approach then was, ‘I don’t want to cut anything, I don’t want to do any of that crap.’ Sort of an unnecessary, macho way looking at it. But, I feared that if I started doing that, then people would say, ‘That guy’s not really doing that; he’s getting all cut up on tape or Pro Tools. I didn’t want to become one of those guys. But after using Pro Tools] on two records I realized it’s a creative tool. It’s not a way for lousy players to sound good … well, maybe it is, but I don’t think that applies to me.

“The whole thing was done on Pro Tools. So was the last one, actually. A lot of the songs were done at Tom’s condo. He’s got a Pro Tools setup there. So, a lot of the parts recorded in the demoing sessions in his apartment were kept. That environment creates more of a drum machine, drum loop thing, versus four fight people just getting together and jamming. At least for the starting ideas, before I get to play on it. I did all my parts after the fact. It was different, kind of going backwards, drumwise.”

Was that better? “It’s not really better for me, it’s just different.” Did it increase the fun factor for the band? “I think so, yeah. There’s only like two rock tracks on this CD. Those are the two Ric Ocasek did. It’s a pretty eclectic record, which I guess all of our records are. It’s one of our happiest records. We’ve always had that ‘80s thing going on, there’s no shortage of that on this record.

“There were various individuals we wanted to work with, and this was a good way to hit a lot of ‘em. The record was co-produced by the band plus the producers: Nellee Hooper, Ric Ocasek, Sly & Robbie, Steely & Cleavie, William Orbit, and Prince.”

Once the record is out and the promotional tour is done, it’ll be time to pack up the OCDP kit and hit the road. Young, for the most part, looks forward to it. “Touring was one of the best things for me. We toured Tragic Kingdom for two-and-a-half years. After that I felt really, really strong. Definitely helps, getting out on that road and working on your thing. That repetition is a good thing. I love playing live.” And sometimes friends need a favor and Young is happy to oblige. “Sitting in with other bands is a bigger thrill than playing our own show sometimes. I was in Vegas — my wife was working for Stone Temple Pilots at the time — and Eric [Kretz] asked me to play on ‘Plush.’ That was cool. But I don’t know if I can keep touring as much, now that I have a family on the way.” The enthusiasm in his manner as he talks about playing live seems a bit stronger than his cautious words about fatherhood. And he’s enthusiastic about his new drum set, too.

For this tour Young will be pounding on a brand-new kit from Orange County Drum and Percussion, made from a jellybean jar selection of acrylic shells. Young was excited to get to New York for the U2 shows, because, “I haven’t played this kit yet. This will be the first time I use it.

“There’s a lot more sampling and sequencing on this record, too. So, live, I have a lot more samples to play. Some of the tracks I’ll be playing to clicks. We’re using Tascam 2424 Recording machines, and the tech will be running that. I’m going to give him the look— ‘push the button.’ I’m wearing headphones, and I tried to get the biggest, most obnoxious ones I could find. I’m going to make them even bigger, put stuff on ‘em.”

Some drummers, in the off-season between tours and records, like to hook up some outside gigs, some sessions, some clinics. Was sitting in with Stone Temple Pilots an omen of things to come? “I don’t really have time to play with other bands. No Doubt is full-time. I’ll do little things when I’m out, sitting in with other bands, I love doing that stuff. I’d love to play on other people’s records in the future. I could never picture myself doing clinics. I can’t really solo, and my reading is not very proficient. I’ve taken some basic reading classes, but I haven’t really utilized it much.”

We give a hearty “yeah, but.” Enough of the modesty. How does it feel to sell seventeen million records and tour the world? “It’s pretty awesome. Definitely one of the best things about this is the drum recognition from young people. And from people that are older, too, actually. I’ve even heard people cop licks [from No Doubt recordings]. I’m not going to name bands, but I’m flattered by it, I love it. I do it, too. I still do it; I hear my peers, I can’t help it. My friend Josh Freese lives around the corner. I subbed for him a couple times in the Vandals a while back. I copped some of his stuff on this record.”

We asked Young what he would recommend to young drummers shedding for their future. “I would suggest playing to a lot of different CDs. Mixing it up. Keep those horizons expanded. As teenagers musical tastes are usually skewed into tunnel vision. So, expand. Work on groove stuff. If a kid wants to go to school and be taught properly, that’s great, that can only be a good thing. But some kids that come up learning only like that play so stiff it’s amazing. I’ve seen players with lots of drum corps chops but — so stiff. It’s too one-sided, I think.”

Young cast a glance across the way to the fairway. Would he golf today? “I don’t play rounds every day, but as far as playing or practicing goes I probably get in five days a week.” And would he ever consider switching from drums to golf? “Go pro? No. Too hard. I’m not good enough. Right now I’m a 5.3 handicap. That would be rad, though. I work on my game enough.”

Is there a similarity between golfing and drumming? “Oh, yeah. You’ve got to stay relaxed. [laughs] Stay relaxed or everything goes to hell.”

With thanks to Mike McKeaney of ND Universe

In which we celebrate the union of Gwen and Gavin, the spectacular success of the little so-cal band that could and the arrival of a dangerous character known as the douche. by Neil Strauss

Thousands of Staind and Linkin Park fans are packed into the Universal Amphitheaters in Los Angeles, unaware that No Doubt are about to make a surprise appearance. And to tell the truth, no one is sure if these fans really care. No Doubt are the only band tonight with a female member, the only group more attuned to ska and reggae than rap and rock, and the only act whose current single “Hey Baby,” is full of New Wave electronics and drum machine beats. There is no aggression or angst to be found in “Hey Baby,” kids, just Gwen Stefani singing about sipping chamomile tea. Can you relate to that?

It is Sunday, December 9th 2001, and it’s the sixth anniversary of many things for No Doubt. In 1995, performing at this same same holiday concert for local radio station KROQ proved a pivotal moment for the group and its breakthrough album Tragic Kingdom, which went on to sell 10 million copies and transform this oddball Orange County, California, band into international superstars. It was also the night that Stefani met Gavin Rossdale, the singer of the show’s headlining band, Bush, setting off a six-year relationship that continues to this day. And it was the night that the Douche first appeared. Yes, the Douche. Watch out for the Douche.

The Douche, anyone from the band will tell you with equal parts glee and dread, is guitarist Tom Dumont’s alter ego when he’s drunk. At the time, No Doubt had just landed the prized opening gig on Bush’s upcoming tour. The bands hadn’t met before, and no one was more excited about breaking the ice than Dumont, who idolized Bush guitarist Nigel Pulsford. Unfortunately, Dumont got drunk and the Douche arrived at the KROQ show instead. He barged into Bush’s dressing room, walked up to Pulsford, who plays Fender guitars, and spat, “Fender sucks!” Eventually the band kicked him out. The next day, No Doubt received a frantic phone call from Bush’s record company, telling them that if they couldn’t keep themselves under control, they’d be off the tour.

Tonight, Bush and No Doubt are together on the KROQ bill again, and they are both facing a new predicament: Most of their fans who were teens in 1995 are now grown up. Each band must win over a new audience.

“We were, like, nothing six years ago,” says Stefani.

Sort of like At the Drive-In when they opened this concert last year? “Yeah,” she says. “But not as cool.”

No Doubt bassist Tony Kanal, Stefani’s ex-boyfriend, looks at the band’s career like the original Star Wars trilogy. Tragic Kingdom was Star Wars, exploding out of nowhere to become a huge international phenomenon. Return of Saturn, the follow-up, was The Empire Strikes Back, darker and less entertaining, and left people scratching their heads. Rock Steady, their new dance-hall-meets-New-Wave album, recorded with Ric Ocasek, Prince, rap producers the Neptunes, Nellee Hooper of Massive Attack, and reggae tweakers Sly and Robbie, is Return of the Jedi. “It’s, like, full of Ewoks,” Kanal says. “You know, just happy.”

Happy and fun are the operative words for No Doubt this time around. Stefani can’t help talking about how thrilled she was to see their poster outside Tower Records on Sunset Boulevard. There’s only one thing she’s more excited about right now, and that’s spending time with Rossdale.

“Can you ever know that one person is the one?” she asks. “I’m always questioning that. I think we both question that The one year I think we had so much fun together was this year, because we spent so much time together and got to really know each other.” She pauses. “Not that we didn’t know each other already.” She pauses again. “I just can’t believe it’s been six years.”

Any concerns that No Doubt won’t fit into this hard-rock lineup disappear as soon as the band is announced and the audience erupts for the hometown heroes. Moving onto the stage, Stefani rolls her torso like a belly dancer with a spinal problem; Kanal, with spiked blond hair, skanks around like a cockroach; drummer Adrian, shirt off and mohawk up, slaps his own ass; and Dumont, he just looks uncomfortable.

The band leaves the stage feeling good. Rock Steady will be released in two days, and all is well. “It’s just such a magical year,” Stefani says. “It’s so sad, because I know we’re going to have a crash landing at some point, because we’re just riding so high. Touring to me is becoming harder. The physical part of it is hard, the traveling part is hard, being away from people you love is getting harder and harder.”

Later, backstage, Rossdale arrives in No Doubt’s dressing room, slumping around in a hat pulled anonymously over his eyebrows. Stefani, enthroned at the back of the room, spies him and seems unable to focus on the conversation she is having with a friend. Soon, the happy couple leaves arm in arm. Thus begins a pattern that continues in the next week: Every time Rossdale arrives, he and Stefani disappear.

It’s not simply that they want to be alone. Stefani says that in six years, they have never been together around a journalist. They are adamant about keeping their relationship private. And despite how clearly in love they are, their time together hasn’t been easy. Much of Rock Steady is about how hard it is having a relationship that’s not only long-distance but also between two people in different touring rock bands.

Stefani remembers writing a song with Dave Stewart of the Eurythmics. “The day before we went over there, I was in the park with Gavin, and I had been keeping a journal.” she says. “And we were so in love, and I wrote that line, ‘You’re lovely underneath it all.’ You know, like, ‘After all the shit we’ve been through, you’re a really good person. I really think I might like you.’ ”

Stefani is a bit obsessive, to put it mildly. “I’m really self-centered,” she admits. “I really am, I’m also pretty lazy. I love to sit around and watch TV, and eat ice cream, not work out and be a slob.”

There seem to be two things that make her world go round: Rossdale and No Doubt. Nothing else much matters. I learn this during dinner with her and the band. She slinks into the restaurant in a gray sweat shirt with a hood pulled over her face. Her shoulders curve so she she is practically staring at the floor. As she eats, she only perks up twice: The first time is when Kanal says he’s upset that a journalist called him “anal.” “Well, you are anal,” she says to her ex. The second is when her new album is discussed:

The new record is more… sexy.

Yeah, the record does have a sexiness and hipness that we’ve never had before. The thing about the sexy side for me is that I earned it. It wasn’t until I felt comfortable wearing high heels, because when you’re on heels – dude, you should try it – all of a sudden you’re sexy. I finally feel like there’s a side to me like, “I’m a woman now,” which is fine.

That’s pretty good – you’re thirty-two.

Yeah, I never felt strong growing up. I didn’t know where I fit in. All the women around me that I could look at were in bands like L7 or Hole. They were angry, and I didn’t really feel like that. And the other ones were these folky girls, so there wasn’t really anybody, until I discovered Blondie. She was sexy, and she wasn’t ashamed to be rocking out, and to me, that’s having it all. Because we all want to be sexy, even guys do. It’s in human nature, because we gotta have babies.

But the way you work, it is all your own.

I think the whole sexy thing, to do it seriously, is just a joke. I mean, have you seen me when I wake up in the morning?

Stefani was raised in a catholic family, which is what she blames for her worst faults – namely, that she is too judgmental and not open enough. “My brother was an artist since the day he was born,” she says, referring to Eric Stefani, who left No Doubt during the recording of Tragic Kingdom. “He would win all these awards at school. I didn’t have to do anything, because I had him. I was always a passive person, a one-on-one person. I always had my one best friend, and I didn’t have a lot of girlfriends. I never have.”

Outside of the first boy she kissed, Stefani has dated only two people: Kanal and Rossdale. As for her goals in life, starting a family is the only one she hasn’t yet fulfilled. In her music, she’s already there: “Having a song ['Don't Speak'] that’s going to be there when you’re dead is just, I’m sorry, but it’s just pretty cool,” she says.

An evening with Stefani: When No Doubt walk the red carpet at the Billboard Awards in Las Vegas, the paparazzi scream not for the band but for “Gwennnn,” who obliges them by opening her fur jacket and sticking out her chest, which is covered by just a bikini top. Later a fan runs up to Kanal. “Man, I love your band,” he says. “I just have to ask you: When you guys first got together, did you just think, ‘Wow, she is hot!’ ” Kanal doesn’t answer.

Young comes from the opposite background from Stefani. He was born to hippie parents though his mother left when he was young. The exhibitionist of the band, Young is a madman with a conscience. When he heard that a girlfriend was cheating on him, he got drunk, wrote tat she was the Antichrist across the driveway of the Anaheim, California, house where the band lived and passed out on the roof. Since the house belonged to Stefani’s parents, he spent the next morning scrubbing the driveway.

Now married (to a woman who used to work in the band’s touring production office) and with a child on the way, he’s mellowing out. He just wants to drive some golf balls and be with his wife, though he still can’t seem to avoid singing, “Hey, we want some pussy,” during any lull in the conversation.

An evening with Young, age 32: In the bar of a New York hotel, Stefani lifts her glass for a toast: “To fifteen years of blood, friendship, love and the release of our new record.” Young stands up and takes of his jacket. Underneath is a faded No Doubt shirt. “It’s from 1987,” he says. “I bought it at a No Doubt show.” Young is the band’s newest member, having joined in 1999; before that he was the band’s biggest fan. “You shouldn’t wear that shirt,” says Stefani. “You should frame it, and cut it so that both sides show in the frame.” Young says nothing, but it is clear that in his mind, shirts are for wearing.

Kanal, as cool as he seems, is the band’s most tightly wound character. His father and mother moved from India to London and then emigrated to America with their two young sons in 1981. Eventually, they opened a store in Anaheim called Kanal’s Gifts and Fashion. “They’re such beautiful people,” Stefani says of Kanal’s parents, “and they have such open minds. Especially in their community, because all their friends’ kids are rich and going to Harvard. And here was Tony. In a band. With a white girlfriend.”

An evening with Kanal, age 31: After a twelve-hour photo shoot and a Korean meal, he offers a tour of his house. “This window isn’t supposed to be open,” he says when we enter the bedroom, sounding like a cop on patrol. In an office upstairs, he finds a discs out of order. “I can tell my brother’s been borrowing my CDs,” he says, rearranging them. They run from Eighties groups such as Human League and Men at Work to Oasis and U2. “We judge everything we do by the Clash and U2,” he says. Every time it comes to making a decision, No Doubt ask, “What would the Clash or U2 do?”

He pulls out a daybook, in which he’s listed a chronology of each day’s events for the year of making Rock Steady. “Adrian has golf, Tom has surfing, Gwen has Gavin, I guess, and this is all I have,” says Kanal. “I wake, eat and sleep No Doubt.”

Dumont grew up as the only adopted child in a family of three kids. “His dad was really strict,” says Stefani. “Like, if a chair was pushed out from the table when he went to bed, he’d have to go back and push the chair in. I think his parent’s divorce was just so hard on him. And he really takes care of his mom.”

An evening with Dumont, age 34: He invites me to his small West Hollywood apartment to hear the original Rock Steady demos, recorded on a mini-Pro Tools rig in the living room. He plays an unreleased track recorded to a Dr. Dre beat and failed jam called “Expensive Sushi” with improvised Stefani lyrics and samples he downloaded from Napster. “I’m the opposite of Tony,” he says. “I’m lazy – I would just let something go and later on regret it. I always do this in my life.”

Four days after Rock Steady is released, the band is backstage at Saturday Night Live. After touring with their idols U2, the success of the KROQ show and the buzz about Rock Steady, No Doubt feel like they are getting a second chance. On their first walk through the gauntlet of popularity, they were too confused to enjoy it. Kanal remembers that when No Doubt played Saturday Night Live last time, in 1996, he was so nervous he screwed up.

Tonight there is other drama. Young’s wife, who is seven months pregnant, is sick. And Young is worrying himself sick, too. He calls her doctor and returns to the dressing room, his face ashen. Stefani walks in with a torn black top and a hair cut that basically amounts to a mullet. She isn’t feeling sexy in high heels tonight. “They’re too high,” she says. “I can’t feel my feet.”

She switches shoes while Young places a paper bag next to the drum set in case he vomits during the performance. All goes smoothly, however, and after performing “Hey Baby” and “Hella Good,” the band, plus Rossdale, climbs into a limo. “Can I borrow your phone?” Dumont asks Kanal. “I need to call my mom. She’s been upset today.”

As we sit in the limo, waiting to go to the Saturday Night Live afterparty, it sinks in what a strange group this is. You’ve got a mama’s boy who’s completely uncomfortable with himself, another guy that’s so compulsive that he keeps a log of what he does every day, a punk with a mohawk who is actually a sensitive golf-playing father-to-be and a blond sex symbol who is actually a totally traditional love-smitten woman.

“Most people don’t get it,” Stefani says in the limo. “I love that you are getting it.” And with that, she grabs Rossdale by the hand and jumps into another limo, and the lovers disappear into the night.

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