The Courier-Mail (Nov. 27th 2004)

She’s cool, no doubt

Gwen Stefani might be the seriously rich star of the band No Doubt, she might be married to the handsome rocker Gavin Rossdale but, as she tells Jo Hawkins, she's really just an ordinary girl

Gwen Stefani is sitting in a trendy London hotel room calmly explaining that she's just the same as me, really.

She says it so earnestly -- that she's still just a girl from California's Orange County -- that it seems churlish to pick her assertion apart.

But just for the record, I haven't made pots of money from being in a band; I am not married to a handsome rock star; and I am not particularly renowned for my dress sense.

I doubt whether Stefani's entourage would buy the "just a girl" line either.

Earlier, their behaviour had left me in no doubt that they thought they were dealing with a very big star.

Summoned to something called the "listening room" to hear tracks from Stefani's debut solo album Love. Angel. Music. Baby. , I was asked to hand over my tape recorder, sign a disclaimer that I wouldn't dream of placing one word of my interview anywhere but in the publication for which I work, and thoughtfully consider three of Stefani's new songs, while a press officer stood protectively between me and the stereo.

I then got to listen to them again -- and then again -- because "Norway", as the harrowed PR quickly explained, was running late because of a problem with "Spain" earlier in the day.

I was saved from having to listen to the songs -- including her annoyingly catchy new single What You Waiting For? -- for a fourth time by the news that "Norway" had finished his interview early. So thank God for those efficient Scandinavians.

Back upstairs in the penthouse suite, Stefani seems warm and chatty, enthusiastically telling "Australia" about her babies -- her new album and a possible real one of her own -- and about it being a magical time in the album's gestation. She speaks fast, often not finishing sentences before launching off on another tangent.

"It's right before the album comes out, before anyone is judging it. I feel so proud of it. And I know it's crazy, ridiculously good."

Before I have a chance to ponder Stefani's apparent lack of modesty, she quickly adds: "And I can say that because I didn't do it myself, I wrote with so many people who contributed their talents. It is just very exciting. I set out to do something and I did it."

Stefani is, of course, better known as the lead singer with No Doubt whose on-off-on-again popularity culminated in the smash hit 2001 album Rock Steady and its Grammy award-winning single, Hey Baby.

The 35-year-old wasn't intending to start work on a solo record so soon, especially since she says she was exhausted after the band had spent the better part of a year touring.

But as she tells it, she realised she didn't have any time to waste.

"I knew I had to do it right away, otherwise the next No Doubt record would take forever to write, and I want to have a baby, too, plus I want to do movies really bad. How would I get it all done?" she asks in her sing-song Californian accent.

She says her fellow band members -- ex-boyfriend and bass guitarist Tony Kanal, guitarist Tom Dumont and drummer Adrian Young - - were supportive of her decision to put the band on indefinite hiatus.

Continued BAM 4

Stefani's so cool,

there's no doubt

From BAM 1

`We had never taken a break in 17 years," Stefani says. "And I had just gotten married (to Bush frontman Gavin Rossdale), and that changes a lot in your mind because your priorities change.

"I had dedicated all that time to them but they're cool with me and I am happy for them. They are doing their own s--- too."

Stefani is at pains to point out that Love. Angel. Music. Baby. (which cannily links in with her fledging clothing line L.A.M.B.) is a dance rather than a solo project.

Running her red nails through the familiar shock of peroxide blonde hair, she explains the difference; although I have to say that some of the songs, particularly What You Waiting For?, the title of which refers to her initial apprehension about working on her own, easily could be mistaken for No Doubt.

"If this was my big solo debut, I would be sitting writing a record that would finally be the true Gwen Stefani, the pouring my heart out record, but I've already done that with the No Doubt records.

"This is actually less of me, because I have worked with people such as Andre 3000 and the Neptunes who I have admired over the years."

Stefani has never been shy about baring her soul through her music. No Doubt's 1995 breakthrough album Tragic Kingdom spawned the mega-hit Don't Speak, into which a then heartbroken Stefani had poured her anguish about the breakdown of her relationship with Kanal. Unfortunately, the then quite unsuccessful band never expected it to be a hit, and a squirming Stefani later had to sit next to her ex-boyfriend when she was asked to explain the song.

Later, after Stefani had met her British husband, Rossdale, she documented their on-off relationship in songs such as Ex- Girlfriend, in which she brooded: "I always knew I'd end up your ex- girlfriend."

Fortunately, her pessimism about Rossdale proved unfounded and the pair married twice, once in California and once in Rossdale's native London in September 2002.

I tell Stefani I once spent a week with Rossdale before they married; when Drop the Debt charity Jubilee 2000 took us to Tanzania for a story I was doing on Third-World debt.

I remember him telling me how "uncomplicated and sweet" Stefani was; but how balancing their lives between Los Angeles and London was a big task.

I also remember hours trailing around markets in Dar es Salaam, as Rossdale tried to find just the right kanga (a Tanzanian sarong with a local saying embroidered into it) as a present for Stefani. She seems a little wary about my relevation but says: "That just makes me so happy to hear that. I feel lucky to have found love and to be able to have a husband, you know?"

In the course of this interview, Stefani spoke a few times of her desire to have a baby.

"I do want to have one really bad but I also want to try everything, and do everything," she says. "But maybe once I have that little person, I am going to be staring at it the whole day and not do anything else so I had better do the other stuff quickly."

In the meantime, Stefani is dipping a cautious toe into the acting pond, with a small role as Jean Harlow in Martin Scorsese's film, The Aviator.

"My part is very, very, very small. It was magic. But I was very nervous beforehand."

Our interview is coming to an end. Stefani's assistant tells her that Rossdale is waiting downstairs and she breaks into a huge grin. She certainly looks like the cat who got the cream. So can she believe the way her life has panned out?

"I am basically just a girl from Anaheim who didn't really know what she was going to be when she grew up," she muses, "and here I am with the world within my reach and I intend to take advantage of it all. I can't believe it, I feel like a lottery winner at this point.

"Now, what was your name again? I'll see if Gavin remembers you," she says, her eyes twinkling mischievously

Yeah, maybe she is just a girl, after all.