St Louis Post-Dispatch (July 9th 2000)
There’s No Question: No Doubt Is Refocused
Fame came on its own terms for the ska-rock band No Doubt. No one noticed when the band released its self-titled 1992 debut record, but when the near-perfect pop album "Tragic Kingdom" came along in 1995, the group was suddenly on everyone's lips.
At least colorful lead singer Gwen Stefani was.
Stefani is the most recognizable member of the band. And for some, she was the only one anyone knew. When she started popping up on magazine covers alone, the Southern California band went through an odd period.
"When we first experienced success and things started happening, it was strange," says bassist Tony Kanal, interviewed recently from Virginia Beach, Va. "We were together eight or nine years as equals. But it's inevitable people will concentrate on the singer no matter what the band. When it's a female, it's extreme. And when it's a fun singer like Gwen, it's even more extreme.
"Now we accept it as a very beneficial thing. And we know that without any of us No Doubt wouldn't be as strong as we are now. It's important to realize that."
Guitarist Tom Dumont and drummer Adrian Young share with Kanal in backing Stefani. No Doubt was a group for eight years before the "Tragic Kingdom" hit, and the struggles in those hard times forged tight friendships.
In addition to the attention lavished on Stefani, No Doubt had to cope with constant questions about Stefani and Kanal's relationship. "You have to roll with the punches," says Kanal. "It's part of the game you play with the media, and those are the kind of things they're interested in."
Remaining in a band with a former lover is never easy.
"Being on the road for so long became tough. It was tough on each other for years," Kanal says. "It can bring about some weird emotions. You lose perspective. But when you spend a day doing press, talking about yourself and what happened, you're putting a lot of time into self-therapy. It can tweak your mind."
No matter what the focus might be for others, "what's important is sharing songs with people, making music, writing songs, and getting up on stage," says Kanal.
The band's summer tour lands at Riverport Amphitheatre Wednesday night. No Doubt is promoting its new CD, "Return of Saturn," which has already kicked out two hit singles in "Ex-Girlfriend" and "Simple Kind of Life."
No Doubt took a couple of years to complete "Return to Saturn," a long time (though it took three years to record the group's previous album). After two years with the "Tragic Kingdom" tour, the band wanted no time limits on making the new record.
"Looking back on it, we needed that to be proud of it. And we needed to experiment. So we went through the process of writing, recording, and pushing ourselves as musicians and as songwriters," says Kanal.
The group approached the CD with an open mind, using different instrumentation and finding a place where each member could respect the others' ability to express themselves musically. They also went in a different direction in the choice of producers, dropping Matthew Wilder, who worked on "Tragic Kingdom."
"We worked with him before and just decided it was time for something new. We wanted to push in new directions," says Kanal. Instead, the band worked with Glen Ballard, the producer behind Alanis Morissette's ground-breaking "Jagged Little Pill" CD.
"We didn't start with Glen until we were a year into the project. We had a ton of material when we met Glen. But he did help us to focus," says Kanal.
"It was hard for us to get a perspective. It was hard for us to discern which ones were the best to focus on. We needed that feedback," Kanal says.
There was no fear of Ballard giving No Doubt too much of a Morissette sound. "We came out of our meeting with him knowing he was a nice guy and that we could put our trust in him. He helped us be more No Doubt than we've ever been before," Kanal says. As a result, "Return to Saturn" is the band's most focused record, unlike "Tragic Kingdom," which was recorded while some band members were still in school.
Stefani decided on the "Return to Saturn" title after realizing the lyrics behind the songs were all about reassessment of life.
"It takes 29 years for Saturn to orbit the sun, and it also takes that much time to reassess life and the future. After the songs were written, she realized that was a good theme to unify the whole project," Kanal says.