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Gwen Renée Stefani (born October 3, 1969) is an American singer-songwriter and fashion designer. Stefani is the lead vocalist for the rock and ska band No Doubt. Stefani recorded her first solo album Love. Angel. Music. Baby. in 2004. The album was inspired by music of the 1980s, and was a success with sales of over seven million copies. The album's third single "Hollaback Girl" was the first US digital download to sell one million copies. Stefani's second solo album, The Sweet Escape (2006), yielded "Wind It Up", "4 in the Morning" and the highest-selling single "The Sweet Escape". Including her work with No Doubt, Stefani has sold more than forty million albums worldwide. She won the World's Best-Selling New Female Artist at the World Music Awards 2005.
In 2003, she debuted her clothing line L.A.M.B. and expanded her collection with the 2005 Harajuku Lovers line, drawing inspiration from Japanese culture and fashion. Stefani performs and makes public appearances with four back-up dancers known as the Harajuku Girls dancers. She married British grunge musician Gavin Rossdale in 2002 and they have two sons: Kingston James McGregor Rossdale, born May 26, 2006, and Zuma Nesta Rock Rossdale, born August 20, 2008. Billboard magazine named Stefani the fifty-fourth artist and thirty-seventh Hot 100 artist of the 2000–09 decade.
Stefani was born and raised in Fullerton, California, and grew up in a Roman Catholic household. She attended Loara High School in Anaheim, California. She was named after a stewardess in the 1968 novel Airport, and her middle name, Renée, comes from The Four Tops' 1968 cover of The Left Banke's 1966 hit song "Walk Away Renée". Her father, Dennis Stefani, is Italian American and worked as a Yamaha marketing executive. Her mother, Patti (née Flynn), is of Irish and Scottish descent and worked as an accountant before becoming a homemaker. Gwen's parents were fans of folk music and exposed her to music by artists like Bob Dylan and Emmylou Harris. She is the second oldest of four children: she has a younger sister, Jill Stefani, a younger brother, Todd, and an older brother, Eric. Eric was the keyboardist for No Doubt but left the band to pursue a career in animation on The Simpsons on the Fox TV network.
Many of the women in Stefani's family were seamstresses, and much of her clothing was made by them or her mother. As a child, Stefani's musical interests consisted of musicals such as The Sound of Music and Evita. After making a demo tape for her father, she was encouraged to take music lessons to train her "loopy, unpredictable" voice. Stefani made her onstage debut during a talent show at Loara High School, where she sang "I Have Confidence", from The Sound of Music, in a self-made tweed dress inspired by one from the film. Stefani was on the Loara swim team in an attempt to lose weight. She first worked at a Dairy Queen and later manned the MAC makeup counter of a department store. After graduating from high school in 1987, she began attending Fullerton College before transferring to California State University, Fullerton.
Eric introduced Gwen to 2 Tone music by Madness and The Selecter, and in 1986 he invited her to provide vocals for No Doubt, a ska band he was forming. Finally, in 1991, the band was signed to Interscope Records. She also was a featured artist for Sublime on their song "Saw Red", notably before either No Doubt's breakthrough success in 1995 or Sublime's the following year.
The band released its self-titled debut album in 1992, but its ska-pop sound was unsuccessful due to the popularity of grunge. Stefani rejected the aggressiveness of female grunge artists and cited Blondie singer Debbie Harry's combination of power and sex appeal as a major influence. No Doubt's third album, Tragic Kingdom (1995), which followed the self-released The Beacon Street Collection (1995), took more than three years to make. During this time, the band almost split up because of the failed romantic relationship between Stefani and bandmate Tony Kanal. Their break-up inspired Stefani lyrically, and many of the album's songs, such as "Don't Speak", "Sunday Morning", and "Hey You", chronicle their relationship and her happiness. Five singles were released from Tragic Kingdom and "Don't Speak" led 1996's US year-end airplay chart. Stefani left college for one semester to tour for Tragic Kingdom but did not return when touring lasted two and a half years. The album sold more than sixteen million copies worldwide, and received several Grammy Award nominations.
No Doubt released the less popular Return of Saturn in 2000, which expands upon the New Wave influences of Tragic Kingdom. Most of the lyrical content focuses on Stefani's often rocky relationship with then-Bush frontman Gavin Rossdale and her overall insecurities, including indecision on settling down and having a child. The band's 2001 album, Rock Steady, explored more reggae and dancehall sounds, while maintaining the band's New Wave influences, and generally received positive reviews. The album generated career-highest singles chart positions in the United States, and "Hey Baby" and "Underneath It All" received Grammy Awards. A greatest hits collection, The Singles 1992–2003, which includes a cover of Talk Talk's "It's My Life", was released in 2003 to moderate sales.
Before the mainstream success of both No Doubt and Sublime, Stefani contributed guest vocals to "Saw Red" on Sublime's 1994 album Robbin' the Hood. During the time when No Doubt was receiving mainstream success, Stefani has collaborated on 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". She also collaborated with The Brian Setzer Orchestra on a cover of "You're the Boss", originally performed by Elvis Presley and Ann-Margret, for its 1998 album The Dirty Boogie.
Following No Doubt's hiatus, Stefani sought out her former bandmate Tony Kanal to discuss the possibility of a solo career. The idea was to make a quick dance record, but this became a large collaboration with other artists, producers and various non-ska influences. The result was two successful albums. Currently, Stefani has two solo albums, Love. Angel. Music. Baby. (2004), and The Sweet Escape (2006), with combined sales of nearly twenty million copies.
Stefani's debut solo album Love. Angel. Music. Baby. was released in November 2004. The album features a large number of collaborations with producers and other artists, including Tony Kanal, Linda Perry, André 3000, Nellee Hooper, The Neptunes and New Order. Stefani created the album to modernize the music to which she listened when in high school, and L.A.M.B. takes influence from a variety of music styles of the 1980s and early 1990s such as New Wave and electro. Stefani's decision to use her solo career as an opportunity to delve further into pop music instead of trying "to convince the world of talent, depth and artistic worth" was considered unusual. As a result, reviews of the album were mixed, and it was described as "fun as hell but not exactly rife with subversive social commentary." The album debuted on the US Billboard 200 albums chart at number seven, selling 309,000 copies in its first week. It sold well, reaching multi-platinum status in the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia, and Canada. At the 2005 Grammy Awards, Stefani was nominated for Best Female Pop Vocal Performance for "What You Waiting For?", and at the next year's awards, Stefani received five nominations for Record of the Year, Album of the Year, Best Female Pop Vocal Performance, Best Pop Vocal Album, and Best Rap/Sung Collaboration.
The first single released from the album was "What You Waiting For?", which charted outside the US top forty, but reached the top ten on most other charts. The song served to explain why Stefani produced a solo album and discusses her fears in leaving No Doubt for a solo career as well as her desire to have a baby. "Rich Girl" was released as the album's second single. A duet with rapper Eve, and produced by Dr. Dre, it is an adaptation of a 1990s pop song by British musicians Louchie Lou & Michie One, which itself is a cover of "If I Were a Rich Man", from the musical Fiddler on the Roof. "Rich Girl" proved successful on several formats, and reached the US and UK top ten. L.A.M.B.'s third single "Hollaback Girl" became Stefani's first US and second Australian number-one single; it was less successful elsewhere. The song was the first US digital download to sell more than one million copies legally, and its brass-driven composition remained popular throughout 2005.
The fourth single "Cool" was released shortly following the popularity of its predecessor, but failed to match its chart success, reaching the top twenty in US and UK. The song's lyrics and its accompanying music video, filmed in Lake Como, Italy, depict Stefani's former relationship with Kanal. "Luxurious" was released as the album's fifth single, but did not perform as well as its predecessors. "Crash" was released in early 2006 as the album's sixth single in lieu of Love. Angel. Music. Baby.'s sequel, which Stefani postponed because of her pregnancy.
Stefani's second solo album, The Sweet Escape, was recorded by Guy Charbonneau's Le Mobile Remote Recording Studio and released in December 2006. Stefani recollaborated with Kanal, Perry, and The Neptunes, along with Akon and Tim Rice-Oxley from English rock band Keane. The album focuses more heavily on electronic and dance music for clubs than its predecessor. Stefani commented that it differed from L.A.M.B. because "I just wasn't inspired to do another album and…I was a lot more relaxed making it." Its release coincided with the DVD release of Stefani's first tour, entitled Harajuku Lovers Live. The album received mixed reviews by critics, who found that it "has a surprisingly moody, lightly autobiographical feel... Stefani isn't convincing as a dissatisfied diva" and called the album a "hasty return" that repeats Love. Angel. Music. Baby. with less energy.
"Wind It Up", the album's lead single, was panned by critics for its use of yodeling and an interpolation of The Sound of Music, but was moderately successful, reaching the top twenty in most markets. The title track was well-received. To promote The Sweet Escape, Stefani was a mentor on the sixth season of American Idol and performed the song with Akon. It became Stefani's most successful song of her solo career and earned her a Grammy Award nomination for Best Pop Collaboration with Vocals. In November 2006, the club single "Yummy" was released as a three-track maxi promo single and as a 12" vinyl single, both featuring a radio edit, an instrumental and an a cappella version of the song. "4 in the Morning" was released as the album's third single. The album's fourth single was a hybrid version of "Now That You Got It" which featured Damian Marley. "Early Winter" was released in February 2008 with initial success on European charts. To promote the album, Stefani embarked a worldwide tour, The Sweet Escape Tour. The tour covered North America, Europe, Asia and the Pacific and part of Latin America.
In an interview with Entertainment Weekly on June 6, 2011, Stefani confirmed that she would no longer continue work as a solo artist, stating, "That was a moment in time It went on a little longer than we all thought it would, because it was inspired and you have to go with wherever you're at in that time in your life... everything works out how it should."
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