| Road
To The Grammys: The Making Of Gwen Stefani's 'Hollaback Girl'
Going solo wasn't as easy as Gwen thought it would be.
She'd originally
intended to just take a break from No Doubt and make a fun little dance
record. But, encouraged by her label boss and others, she'd decided to
swing for the fences, and
now that she was deep in it, the album suddenly didn't seem like it was
going to be all that much fun — and it definitely wasn't going to
be little.
Stranded
without her longtime bandmates and plagued by writer's block, she nervously
turned to a host of producers, songwriters and musicians for creative
help. This strategy proved useful, but it had a downside: The music came
so easily to everyone else that it made her feel insecure — and
jealous. "I've had a hard time with my ego," she said, "because
it gets bruised."
After a whole
year of work on the album that became Love, Angel, Music, Baby, she had
20 songs in the can. But Gwen still had a nagging feeling that something
important was missing. "I could have put the record out," she
said. "I had so many songs. But I knew that I kind of had this missing
vibe on the album." And she knew she would have to find it.
Who could
help her? She'd already worked with every big name she could think of
— and after one bout of panic, she'd already resorted to calling
in No Doubt bassist Tony Kanal.
So she decided
to give it one more try with Pharrell Williams, a man she felt was on
her creative wavelength, even though a tentative get-together with Williams
early on in the album's production had been a bust. "We didn't have
a great session," she recalled. "It didn't have the sparkle."
This creative
strikeout nagged at her. "I was like, 'Geez, I can't believe we didn't
end up doing something great together.' So I called Pharrell, 'Dude, it's
crazy that we didn't do a track together.' The next thing I know, I'm
on a plane to New York, booked for seven days in the studio — another
week of torture."
Although
she was nervous, their first day together was an immediate success. "It
was like having a baby," she said (an interesting comment in retrospect:
see "Gwen Stefani Confirms Pregnancy While Onstage In Florida").
"I went in there, it was 4 p.m., and by 11 p.m. we had a song.' "
The next day they had the same experience, popping out another song with
equal ease. "We wrote this second song, and both of us loved it.
It sounded like an early, early No Doubt song."
With two
songs finished (neither of which made the album's final track listing),
a tired but happy Gwen was ready to wrap it up. "But Pharrell said,
'Don't leave yet.' And he started playing me his solo record."
Gwen's green-eyed
monster — the one with the bruised ego — nudged her in the
right direction. "I was like, 'You are a fricking genius, I can't
believe I'm sitting in here with you, right now, and you have those songs!
We have got to write another song!' " Gwen recalled, adding with
a smile, "I'm greedy!"
So the pair hunkered down to write their third song in three days. And
this time, they finally found the missing vibe.
Gwen had
been thinking about what some No Doubt fans might say about her solo effort.
"The fans were probably like, 'Why is she doing this record? She's
going to ruin everything,' " she said. "And I didn't know why
I was doing it either."
So Stefani
and Pharrell stayed up all night and came up with a reply — that
Gwen didn't have to have an answer for what she was doing, not for the
fans, not for anybody. The song was, of course, "Hollaback Girl,"
and it introduced a new phrase into pop culture. As Gwen recalls, "We
looked at each other when we wrote that song and we were like, 'That's
it!' It's a song that says, you know, you don't have to answer back. To
me, it is the freshest attitude song I've heard in so long."
Pharrell
was impressed. "Gwen is like the girl in high school who just had
her own style," he said. "Everyone went to high school with
that girl — that girl who's just different, right? And she's really
cute with it and you can't really say anything about it. You just like
it, and it's her."
Those who
didn't like Gwen and her cute style only inspired her more. "One
time, this person was talking sh-- about me, saying I was like a cheerleader,"
she recalled, "and I was like, 'You know what? I am a cheerleader
[a role she sort of fulfills in the video: see "Pharrell Was Supposed
To Battle In Gwen's 'Hollaback': VMAs Behind The Camera"]. Watch
me onstage.' So I wanted a song like that, that was like my 'Just a Girl'
song for now. It feels good. It's a slap: It's a slap on the bottom, it's
a slap on the face."
Stefani and
Williams extended her slap into a storyline, in which "Hollaback
Girl" was a high school throwdown, something that could be a cheer
at a football game, with fighting words, chanted lyrics, and a marching-band
beat, kind of like Queen ("Another One Bites the Dust" is quoted
in the song). "Pharrell had some really funny lyrics he wanted me
to do," Gwen said. "Usually I'll come up with a lyric, and sometimes
he'll have a hook that he wrote that has a word or some lyrics already,
but we'd change it because I was like, 'I'm not saying that!' "
"Hollaback
Girl" wound up transcending musical boundaries, leaping across all
radio formats and cultural barriers and being downloaded more than a million
times.
"You
can feel the energy around 'Hollaback Girl,' " Gwen said. "
'Don't Speak' was kind of like that. You go to different countries and
they feel this song, even though they don't know what you're really saying.
'Hollaback Girl' has this feeling, this massive thing. Like: 'You know
who I am? You like my song? Cool, thanks!' "
Even more
importantly, Stefani felt that the song was a personal triumph, proving
that "if you push, you can come through with a song that captures
a moment," she said. "People can try not to like it —
they can try real hard. But it's going to be at least a guilty pleasure.
Even after you die, that song will live on."
As this year's
Grammys approach, you can get all the latest news on the show, the scene
and the nominees in our Grammy news archive. On the big night, February
8, be sure to tune in to MTV at 7 p.m. for our "All up in the Grammys"
preshow. Plus check out videos of the nominees and more right here on
mtv.com.
— Jennifer
Vineyard
Waverunners
From Hella Good Video Up For Charity Auction
Two of the original Waverunners ridden by the band in the Hella
Good video are now up for auction with all of the proceeds benefiting
the Sweet Relief Musicians Fund. The wave runners were customized for
the video which was shot in Long Beach Harbor by acclaimed director Mark
Romanek.
Check out
the auction HERE
Click HERE
to see the video.
For the past
eleven years Sweet Relief has been assisting ill, injured or elderly musicians
with costs of alternative and traditional medical treatments, and with
expenses for basic needs. For more information visit sweetrelief.org
[posted 2/1/2006
U.S.A.]
Webmaster`s
26th Birthday
Today i`m celebrating my 26th Birthday. It`s also my 9th year
as No Doubt fan. I`ll hope No Doubt returns to the studio this year and
making a record due No Doubt`s 20th Anniversary next year.
|
