PUC Chronicle

Issue date: 1/16/07 Section: Entertainment

Gwen's latest CD "Sweet Escape" may have this year's worst track of the year.

It seems like it was a different world 10 years ago when Gwen Stefani burst onto the scene with her band, No Doubt. She was bleached blonde with a rock and roll edge and had attitude to spare. She was beautiful and wasn't shallow and stupid.
"Tragic Kingdom" was a great alternative rock album and it made Stefani into something special. She was a hero for a generation of girls who wanted something other than the cookie-cutter, bubble-gum pop artist. She held her own in a male dominated world.
Those days are no more.
Stefani is nothing more than the average, sexed up, shallow pop artist- she is talented but keeps letting it go to waste by making music that any other female vocalists could make just as well. Her latest CD, "Sweet Escape" just further proves the point that even the mighty sometimes fall and can't get back up.
"Love, Angel, Music, Baby" was a colossal disappointment of a first solo album, at least for Stefani's rock-minded fans. After sitting out hits like "Hollaback Girl" many fans were holding out that her next album would return her to her roots. After all, some of the originality and attitude was still there- buried but it was there.
Oh, how those hopefuls were wrong.
"Sweet Escape" is even further watered down and clichéd than "L.A.M.B." It's just another album that could easily be made by virtually any blonde pop princess.
The stand out track on "Sweet Escape" is "Early Winter." While the ballad still has a dance-pop feel it is much more understated. The song has traces of No Doubt and a slight rock feel. More importantly "Early Winter" is the only song on the album conjuring up any feeling stronger than "par-tay!"
The biggest disappointment of the album is that the powers-that-be went with "Wind it Up" as the first single- a song so retched words cannot describe it. Of all the shallow dance music on the radio, "Wind it Up" takes the cake as the worst song of the last year or so. While the "this is ladies night, and the feeling's right" vibe is much appreciated, the yodeling gets in the way. Not to mention the shameless self-promotion in dropping her clothing brands name in the lyrics. Lame.
Silly, shallow lyrics, passable dance beats and some fairly lame vocals make this CD disappointing all around. We know Gwen can do better. Hopefully we will soon see her out of the club and back into music that means something.

Page 1 of 1

Article Tools