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Gwen Stefani

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Gwen Stefani
File:Gwen-Stefani.jpg
Gwen Stefani in concert.
Background information
OriginAnaheim, California
Years active1986–present (band)
2004–present (solo)

Gwen Renée Stefani[1] (born October 3, 1969) is an American singer, fashion designer, and occasional actress; and is the frontwoman of the pop/ska/rock band No Doubt.

Stefani first experienced mainstream success with the release of No Doubt's 1995 album Tragic Kingdom, which spawned hits such as "Just a Girl", "Spiderwebs", and "Don't Speak".

In 2004, Gwen Stefani wrote and recorded her first solo album Love. Angel. Music. Baby.. The album contained pop music and dance tracks, including hip hop and R&B-influences. The third single, "Hollaback Girl", was very successful, and became the first U.S. digital single to exceed sales of one million.

Stefani scrapped plans for a second solo album and instead regrouped with No Doubt, and a new album from them is expected sometime in early 2007.

Early life

Gwen Stefani was born in Fullerton, California, but grew up in Anaheim. Her father, Dennis Stefani, is Italian American, and her mother Patti Flynn is of Irish and Scottish descent. She has a sister, Jill, and two brothers, Eric and Todd. Jill appeared in No Doubt's "Just a Girl" music video. Stefani attended California State University, Fullerton, and Loara High School (class of 1987), where she was on the swim team. Her first job was scrubbing floors at a Dairy Queen, and she once worked at a department store. Her brother Eric was the keyboardist for No Doubt, but eventually left the band to pursue a career in animation on The Simpsons. Other members of the group include Tom Dumont, Tony Kanal, and drummer Adrian Young.

Career

1992-2004: No Doubt

File:No Doubt - Tragic Kingdom.jpg
Stefani on the cover of No Doubt's Tragic Kingdom, 1995

The band's third album, following their eponymous debut No Doubt (1992) and The Beacon Street Collection (1995), Tragic Kingdom, took three years to make. During this time, the band almost split up due to the break up of Kanal and Stefani. However, this was to become a major inspiration for Stefani lyrically. The album was released in 1995 and spawned several hits, beginning with "Just a Girl". Following the success of Tragic Kingdom, Stefani became highly popular and recognizable. The tension this produced with the other members of the band was touched upon in their video for the song "Don't Speak". Stefani met Bush and now Institute frontman Gavin Rossdale in 1995 at a concert in which she was performing to promote Tragic Kingdom. The release of The Singles 1992-2003, a CD with the band's best hits, and Everything in Time: B-sides, Remixes and Rarities prompted media speculation about a break-up, which the band denied in later interviews.

Outside of No Doubt Stefani has collaborated with other artists, most notably for the singles "South Side" and "Let Me Blow Ya Mind" with Moby and Eve respectively. In 2002, Eve and Stefani won a Grammy Award for Best Rap/Sung Collaboration for "Let Me Blow Ya Mind."

2004-2005: Love. Angel. Music. Baby.

Stefani's debut solo album, "Love. Angel. Music. Baby.," was released on November 22 2004 in Europe and Asia and on November 23, 2004 in North America. Stefani's debut sold more copies in its first week (310,000) than any No Doubt album ever had in the United States [citation needed]. The album peaked at number five on the Billboard 200 and at number five on the Canadian albums chart; it reached number four in the UK and number one in Australia. Stefani had collaborated with singer-songwriter Linda Perry of 4 Non Blondes on the album, along with The Neptunes, OutKast's André 3000, and Dallas Austin among others.

"Rich Girl" was released as the second single from the album; it is a duet with rapper Eve, and produced by Dr. Dre. "Rich Girl" is an adaptation of a 1990s pop song by British reggae musicians Louchie Lou and Michie, which itself is partly a cover of the song "If I Were A Rich Man" from the musical Fiddler on the Roof, written by Jerry Bock and Sheldon Harnick.

File:Hollaback Girl music video shot.jpg
Stefani in the music video for "Hollaback Girl".

The third single taken from Love. Angel. Music. Baby., "Hollaback Girl" became Stefani's first North American and second Australian number-one single; it peaked at number eight in the United Kingdom. The song became the first U.S. digital download to surpass sales of one million. The fourth single "Cool" was released on July 5 2005 in North America and August 22 2005 elsewhere in the world, becoming a substantial hit but did not match the chart success of its predecessor. It reached the top twenty in the U.S. and UK, the top ten in Australia and number one in Canada. The music video for "Cool," filmed in Lake Como, Italy, shows Stefani paying homage to her Italian heritage as well as 1950s bombshells Marilyn Monroe, Jayne Mansfield, Sophia Loren, and Brigitte Bardot.

"Luxurious" became the fifth single release from Love. Angel. Music. Baby., and her sixth single "Crash" was released in early 2006 in lieu of the production of L.A.M.B.'s sequel, which Stefani postponed because of her pregnancy.

Gwen Stefani received five Grammy award nominations on December 8, 2005. She was nominated in the following categories: Best Pop Vocal Album, Best Female Pop Vocal Performance, Album Of The Year, Record Of The Year, and Best Rap/Sung Collaboration. Stefani did not receive any awards at the Grammys on February 8, 2006.

Though Stefani has had an extremely successful solo career with her album Love.Angel.Music.Baby., she plans on recording with No Doubt in 2006. The remaining members of No Doubt have gone back into the studio in mid-March and that bandmate Tony Kanal has already penned some new songs. The album is currently set for an early 2007 release.

Harajuku Girls

The release of her solo album has also brought attention to Stefani's entourage of four Harajuku Girls. Named Love, Angel, Music, and Baby by Stefani, the Harajuku girls are named for the area around the Harajuku Station of Tokyo, Japan, known as a popular shopping destination and fashion center for teenagers. Following the style of their namesake area, Stefani's Harajuku girls are usually flamboyantly dressed (sometimes in a somewhat "Gothic Lolita" style). They have been featured in her music videos and press coverage and on the album cover for Love. Angel. Music. Baby., and have a song dedicated to them on the album. However, Stefani's adoption of this component of Japanese culture drew criticism from Mihi Ahn at Salon.com, and others who feel that Stefani has stripped Japanese street fashion of its authenticity and created yet another example of the 'submissive Asian female' stereotype. Wrote Ahn,

Stefani has taken the idea of Japanese street fashion and turned these women into modern-day geisha, contractually obligated to speak only Japanese in public, even though it's rumored they're just plain old Americans and their English is just fine... she's swallowed a subversive youth culture in Japan and barfed up another image of submissive giggling Asian women.[2]

According to the Jan/Feb 2006 edition of Blender magazine, stand-up comic Margaret Cho has labeled the Harajuku Girls as a "minstrel show" that reinforces ethnic stereotypes of Asian women.

Second Solo Album

Stefani scrapped her second solo album, which was due contain rejects from the L.A.M.B. period, along with some new tracks she did with Pharrell Williams. The first single was expected to be "Wind It Up", which contains a sample from The Sound of Music. Stefani has instead rejoined No Doubt and is currently in the early recording stages for a new album due in early 2007.

This is the list of all the songs that were expected on the follow-up to L.A.M.B. were:

1. Fine By You

2. Wonderful Life for Him

3. Parental Advisory

4. You Started It

5. Orange County Girl

6. Break Up

7. Candyland

8. Can't Stop The Music

9. Criminal

10. Fluorescent Lights

11. I Wanna Yell (ft Elan Atias)

12. Just Fine

13. Orange County Girl

14. That's The Way

15. Sparkle

16. Wind It Up

This was released on http://www.ndifc.com/mainfiles/main.html

Personal life

Stefani met Bush and now Institute frontman Gavin Rossdale in 1995 at a concert in which she was performing to promote Tragic Kingdom. On September 14, 2002 Stefani and Rossdale married, and they have homes in California and the Primrose Hill district of London .

In December 2005 they announced that they were expecting their first child together, the pregnancy being announced during a concert in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. During an August 8, 2005 appearance on the radio show Loveline, Rossdale said that he and Stefani preferred to keep their relationship entirely out of the media. He also said that he grew up in a chaotic home, and stated that having a stable environment for his family was important to him. On May 26, 2006, they welcomed a son, Kingston James McGregor Rossdale, at the Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles. Kingston weighed 7 pounds 5 ounces (3.4 kilograms)[3] [4] and was born by caesarean section due to breech presentation.

Discography

Albums

Year Title Chart Positions World Sales
U.S. UK CAN AUS MEX GER AT CH NL
2004 Love. Angel. Music. Baby. 5 4 3 1 2 11 12 17 14 7 Milion

Singles

Year Title Chart Positions RIAA Certification
U.S. UK CAN AUS GER AT SW
2000 Southside (duet with Moby) 14 -- 3 -- -- -- -- Not Certified
2001 Let Me Blow Ya Mind (& Eve) 2 4 29 -- 5 6 1 2x Platinum
2004 What You Waiting For 47 4 24 1 22 7 17 Platinum
2005 Rich Girl (featuring Eve) 7 4 12 2 14 10 5 2 x Platinum
2005 Hollaback Girl 1 8 12 1 3 5 4 5x Platinum
2005 Cool 13 11 1 10 20 15 3 Gold
2005 Can I Have It Like That (& Pharell) 48 3 99 22 37 47 67 Not Certified
2005 Luxurious (featuring Slim Thug) 21 44 10 25 67 66 39 Gold
2006 Crash 49 -- 87 -- -- -- -- Not Certified
2006 All Nighter Elan Ft. Gwen Stefani -- -- -- -- -- -- -- Yet To Be Certified

It has been said on these websites that Gwen Stefani has collabarated with ELAN to make the song All Nighter.

http://www.mp3.tv/articles/article_popup_with_history.php?id=1482

http://www.msopr.com/mso/elan_files/press_release050806.htm

http://www.nowontour.com/news/pressreleases/release.php?id=1024

http://billboard.com/bbcom/search/google/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1002236232

Grammy Award history

Category Genre Song Year Result
Best Female Pop Vocal Performance Pop "Hollaback Girl" 2006 Nominated
Record of the Year General "Hollaback Girl" 2006 Nominated
Best Pop Vocal Album Pop Love.Angel.Music.Baby 2006 Nominated
Best Rap/Sung Collaboration Rap "Rich Girl" 2006 Nominated
Album of the Year General Love.Angel.Music.Baby 2006 Nominated
Best Female Pop Vocal Performance Pop "What You Waiting For?" 2005 Nominated
Best Rap/Sung Collaboration Rap "Let Me Blow Ya Mind" 2002 Won



MTV Video Music Awards

Best Male Video Award

2001: Moby ft. Gwen Stefani Southside

Best Female Award

2001: Eve ft. Gwen Stefani Let Me Blow Ya Mind

Best Group Video Award

2002: No Doubt Hey Baby

2004: No Doubt It's My Life

Best Pop Video Award

2002: No Doubt Hey Baby

2004: No Doubt It's My Life

Best Choreography Award

2005: Hollaback Girl

Best Art Direction Award

2005: What You Waiting For

Trivia

  • Stefani has created a successful fashion line, named L.A.M.B., which showcases clothing that Stefani is often seen wearing herself. She reportedly received an $8 million advance for associating her name with the line. The line also includes handbags and purses. Celebrities such as Nicky Hilton, Pamela Anderson, Carmen Electra, Nicole Richie, Jenny McCarthy, Alicia Keys and Halle Berry have been seen sporting her fashion line and LeSportsac bags.
  • Although Stefani's natural hair color is brown and she has previously colored it blue and pink, she is known for her famously platinum blond hair and bright red lipstick. She has dark brown eyes.
  • Stefani's nicknames are Sunshine and G-loc.
  • She designed and promoted a camera for Hewlett-Packard.
  • Stefani has said that the part of her body she values most is her feet.
  • Stefani has the honor of being the only person to win in the Best Male Video and Best Female Video categories at the MTV Video Music Awards, and in the same year. In 2001, Moby won Best Male video for "Southside", which Stefani was featured in, and Eve won Best Female video for "Let Me Blow Ya Mind", which also featured Stefani.
  • Stefani's favourite bands include Sublime, 311, Blur, Radiohead, Madness and Jamiroquai.
  • Stefani is close friends with Shirley Manson, lead singer of the band Garbage.
  • Stefani lent her voice to the title character of Malice, a PS2 and Xbox video game; before completion, however, the company opted not to use No Doubt band-members' voices.
  • Stefani made her acting debut playing Jean Harlow in the 2004 Martin Scorsese movie The Aviator, but made a quick cameo appearance in the movie Zoolander.
  • When not touring, or working on her other projects, she shares two homes with her husband, Gavin Rossdale. One in the Los Feliz neighborhood of Los Angeles and the other in London.
  • Her vinyl red gown that she wore on the cover of No Doubt’s Tragic Kingdom was stolen from the Fullerton Museum Centre in Orange County, United States. Speculation circulates that the dress might have been sold.
  • Stefani has been quoted as saying: "I think I've been able to fool a lot of people because I know I'm a dork. I'm a geek."[5]
  • Stefani had three weddings; one in London, one in California and a private wedding for close relatives.
  • Stefani has been quoted as saying that she and Madonna share a common Italian relative. Stefani claimed that her great aunt married a man from Detroit, Michigan (the area of Michigan that Madonna is from) with the last name "Ciccone."
  • As a friend to Bradley Nowell, of the ska/punk band Sublime, Stefani staged a benefit concert in Southern California following his death.
  • She still keeps close friendly ties with all members of No Doubt.
  • The original Italian pronunciation of her surname Stefani is Stèfani (first syllable stressed)
  • The name of her debut solo album, Love.Angel.Music.Baby. shares the name with her clothing line, L.A.M.B. (L. for Love, A. for Angel, M. for Music, B. for Baby)

See also

Notes

  1. ^ Some sources give Stefani's first name as Gwendolyn, but her first name is simply Gwen. Her listing on the California Birth Index from the Center for Health Statistics gives a birth name of Gwen Renée Stefani.
  2. ^ MiHi Ahn. Gwenihana Gwen Stefani neuters Japanese street fashion... Salon.com. 9 April 2005. Retrieved 16 March 2006.
  3. ^ http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2006/05/27/1148524919261.html], [http://news.ninemsn.com.au/article.aspx?id=103779
  4. ^ http://et.tv.yahoo.com/celebrities/14864/
  5. ^ Alison Rosen. Bursting into Stardom. Axcess Magazine. April/May 1996
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