The Orlando Sentinel (Dec. 16th 2005)
It's Stefani's ‘extraordinary world,’ and we just live in it
We get it already: Gwen Stefani ain't no "Hollaback Girl."
Yet what exactly does this mean? Allow her to explain:
"I wanted to write a song with a lot of attitude," Stefani says. "You can talk whatever [expletive] you want about me, but the truth is, I have a history and you can't erase it.
"I don't really have to answer back. I can just answer back by doing what I do."
At the moment, she happens to be doing a pre-concert phone interview while on the road to promote her debut solo album, Love.Angel.Music.Baby. You can hear water running in the background.
I'm just sitting here -- where am I? -- um, in Seattle, in the dressing room, getting my hair bleached," says Stefani, 36.
Girls, girls, girls. They're the focus of many a catchy ditty sung by this spunky pop superstar, starting with her band No Doubt's breakthrough 1996 smash "Just a Girl."
Producer Pharrell Williams of the Neptunes recently collaborated with Stefani on "Orange County Girl," an autobiographical tune with a nod to her California roots.
"I'm living in this extraordinary world, but the truth is, I'm just from Anaheim," says Stefani, who grew up in the shadow of Disneyland.
She also has a song titled "Harajuku Girls," an ode to Japanese fashionistas.
On her Harajuku Lovers Tour, four female Japanese dancers share the stage with Stefani, who has come under fire on the Internet for exploiting Asian culture and perpetuating stereotypes of submissive Asian women.
"It upsets me," Stefani says of the flap. "I mean, the whole point of `Harajuku Girls' is glorification. It's me screaming, `This culture is incredible!' "
Fresh off a big win at the American Music Awards, where she was named favorite female pop-rock artist, Stefani clearly has quite a following herself. Love.Angel. Music.Baby. has sold more than 5 million copies worldwide, casting doubt on No Doubt's future.
Does Stefani need the band anymore?
"This album was just an experiment, a side project," she says. "The band, it's my life. It's something I've done since I was 17. They're my best friends. If we're inspired and we get back in a room and write a record we think deserves to come out, then we'll put one out."
Stefani collaborated with her husband, ex-Bush singer Gavin Rossdale, as well as Eve, Dr. Dre, Outkast's Andre 3000 and others on Love.Angel.Music.Baby. In addition to chart-topping, cheerleader- channeling "Hollaback Girl" (the first song to sell 1 million downloads), the album has yielded Top 20 hits in "Rich Girl" and "Cool."
"Making the album, there was a lot of pressure, not necessarily because I was scared of what people would think of it," Stefani says. "It was more because I was writing with new people. . . . It was totally intimidating."
Pegged by some as her generation's Madonna, Stefani has become a pop-culture powerhouse whose influence extends beyond music. Moonlighting in the movies, she played Jean Harlow in Martin Scorsese's 2004 film The Aviator. Stefani oversees her own L.A.M.B. clothing line, too, with annual sales of $40 million.
"I'm really running on fumes at this point," she says. "I'll need to take a long hibernation nap in January and then talk to you, because I don't know what's going to happen next."
After her publicist signals an end to the chat, Stefani leaves us with these righteous words: "Thanks, dude!"