No Doubt

[Guest EricMM]

Dude if it's been done before, shoot me, but I remember someone calling No Doubt a guilty pleasure, and well I'd have to disagree.

 

Maybe it's because MTV2 just played a No Doubt Boxed Set of videos, live performances, and such, but I REALLY got nostalgic. I think they had some great songs and their videos were really good especially (the overplayed, yes fine) Don't Speak. The cuts to the live performance, the quality of all the live performances I just saw speaks volumes for a band that seems to have 4 pretty different remarkably talented performers.

 

What do you all think? I Need the Smarkboard opinion!!!!

[Guest bob_barron]

Yay- I've saw them live last October (they opened for U2) and they were really good. They played all their hit sogns to get the crowd into it and were very lively.

 

I also saw Gwen Stefani Live another time when I went to SNL and she sang that song with Eve.

[Guest Nevermortal]

Is there even a No Doubt anymore?

 

Because judging from their latest album, its basically just Gwen Stefani singing to a pre-recorded track.

 

Guess the band has finally been pushed to the background.

[Guest Black Lushus]

when No Doubt played that latest single of theirs on MTV they all were playing, so even though it has an electronic sound, perhaps the others in the group are the ones making the music?

[Guest Nevermortal]

But the fact is that it sounds *NOTHING* like them. In fact, when I saw them perform, the guitarist & bassist were playing keyboards. No shit.

 

So you've got Keys, Drums, and a Vocalist. Yay. Its no longer their sound. Its no longer ska. Not to say that ska is good, because as Propaghandi once said, "Ska sucks. Ska revival isn't cool, you stupid fuck. And if you don't believe it, you're a schmuck."

 

Why am I complaining about a band I don't even like? Man...

[Guest Black Lushus]

well I haven't listened to this latest album, but from what I've been told, those first two singles are really the only, non-No Doubt sounding songs on the album, the rest are pretty much what everyone is used to...

[Guest The Man in Blak]

Nay - No Doubt had their peak period with "Don't Speak" and the stuff off of Return of Saturn...but now they're just pop-star caricatures of themselves.

[Guest saturnmark4life]

I *kinda* like their new stuff but not in the same way i liked the ska stuff. Not that i liked their ska stuff much. I like ska usually.

[Guest evenflowDDT]

New No Doubt is pure garbage, plain and simple. Notice that the only song you ever hear off the new album is "Hey Baby"... there's a reason for that.

 

No Doubt hasn't been the same since 1996. Return of Saturn had some decent songs, but it was all about Gwen whining about how she's 30. Nevermortal hit the nail on the head, ever since it hasn't been about the band, it's been about Gwen. Gwen makes Teen People, and maybe the boys get a quote about her in the article... maybe...

[Guest HollyandTestMark]

Yeah, Gwen sure has No Doubt pretty whipped, all right.

[Guest Mark4steamboat]

theyre an entertaining band but i wasnt too fond of hey baby. i like hella good though.

[Guest Vyce]

Yay.

 

Screw the rest of the band. Gwen Stefani is the main reason I like them at all.

[Guest Kinetic]

Gwen Stefani falls under the "as a button" classification of cute, but that isn't enough to save her horrible band from a resounding NAY, bee-atch. The only No Doubt song I've ever taken to was "Sunday Morning," which, coincidentally, seemed to be the least popular single from Tragic Kingdom. The rest of their stuff does nothing for me.

[Guest Incandenza]

I don't even find Gwen Stefani attractive, so there goes THAT only potentially redeeming factor for the band.

[Guest Mindless_Aggression]

I'm sure her band doesn't mind being pushed to the background. Sure, it's an ego shot, but that check rolling in every month probably ain't small. And lets face it, she's the reason they get a large portion of said check.

[Guest KingOfOldSchool]

A huge NAY.

 

The only time they seemed worth something was back when Tragic Kingdom was released, when they broke big. But even then, my interest was passing, and everything since then has done nothing for me.

 

And if it wasn't for the fact that Gwen collaborates with no-talent female rappers to make crap, it would be the fact that they did a song with the word "hella" in it. The latter is enough to get me to dislike them.

[Guest dreamer420]

i loved tragic kingdom but now no doubt only ocasionally puts out a song that catches my ear. i wouldn't buy one of their cds now.

[Guest BottleRocket]

So you've got Keys, Drums, and a Vocalist. Yay. Its no longer their sound. Its no longer ska. Not to say that ska is good, because as Propaghandi once said, "Ska sucks. Ska revival isn't cool, you stupid fuck. And if you don't believe it, you're a schmuck."

Ooh...blast the ska revival by quoting a Propagandhi song from 1993. Pretty rebellious.

 

Unfortunately, the American ska revival (aka "The Third Wave") was pretty much killed off a couple of years ago when Moon closed up shop, Hepcat broke up, and American teenagers discovered emo.

 

There are painfully few national ska acts still touring. I suppose you could catch Bucket and The Toasters limping through your town to play drunken versions of "Weekend In L.A." or Django and his Nu-Metal All-Stars mangle old Skinnerbox cuts, but, with the exception of the Slackers, virtually no acts have survived intact from ska's most recent golden age.

 

I suppose one could argue that Goldfinger, Reel Big Fish, and Less Than Jake are still hanging around, but all of those bands distanced themselves from the ska "scene" long ago and are truly just pop-punk bands with occasional horn sections that in no way attempt to approximate Jamaican R&B from the early 1960's.

 

Yes, taking potshots at a buried genre using someone else's words certainly takes a lot of balls. Especially since it is still ALL the rage.

 

So why blame a POP act like No Doubt for completely abandoning a genre that they basically left in 1995 when they broke big?

 

You see, dispite still playing some older numbers in concert and riding the third wave mania, the "Tragic Kingdom" era was tragically short on ska in the first place. Just listen to the album as a whole.

 

Certainly "I'm Just A Girl" and "Spiderwebs" had SOME elements of ska, but Middletown, USA, didn't really stand up and take notice until the band released a breathy, Madonna-esque ballad as a single.

 

So unless you were a huge fan of the self-titled album, their appearance on "California Ska-Quake," or their early local shows, you have no reason to complain that they sold out. Hell, even Robert Nesta Marley moved past ska after a few years.

 

In my opinion, the band always has had a new wave shine to their material ever since they appeared on the national radar. So why was everyone so surprised by "Return Of Saturn" in the first place? It was a logical extension of what they were already beginning to do.

 

Yes, their sound has changed, but at least with "Rocksteady," the band is still attempting to show their allegiance to Jamaican music. Their stabs at dancehall don't work, in my opinion, but I applaud them for the effort. They used production from Sly and Robbie and cast two legitimate deejays, Bounty Killer and Lady Saw, in cameo roles, so more power to them.

 

Maybe they'll enlist Lee Perry, Red Rat, and Laurel Aitken for their next album.

[Guest hardyz1]

I liked Tragic Kingdon and Return of Saturn. Rocksteady just makes me want to spew.

[Guest Edwin MacPhisto]

"Sunday Morning" is still the best, but "Hella Good" blows my mind. Catchiest god-damn single in a while.

 

I give them a yay. They get bonus points because Gwen Stefani is GORGEOUS. Oi.

[Guest pinnacleofallthingsmanly]

I never really listened to No Doubt, but I don't like the stuff they are doing now. I don't know that much about them, but I know damn well they weren't making pop songs in their heyday. I like Don't Speak, but I don't know many other songs that they had before they went pop.

[Guest thefrenchargel]

They suck.

[Guest starvenger]

>They suck.

 

Ohhhh, good commentary.

 

I like them, if only because they seem to be having FUN out there. Bonus points for trying different things each time out.

 

As for Gwen, she's got one of those looks that you either like or dislike with seemingly no grey area in between the two. Me, I'm in the "like" camp.

[Guest TheyCallMeMark]

"Hella Good" is really catchy. I kind of like their other songs, not that I've heard alot. At the same time though I don't really look at them as a band, just as Gwen Stefani. I like them more like the way I enjoy Pink.