GWEN STEFANI IS REPRESENTING SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA SO WELL.

i fucking love this fine album. I fucking love fine Gwen too.

All in all is a good pop album.
My faves are:

Rich girl (but is the na-na part original? I think I already heard it!)
Cool (cool!)
Bubble Pop Electric (except when she "sings" the title!)
Luxurious (remember TLC?)
The Real Thing
Serious (but Madonna should be credited!)
Danger zone (great!).

Musically, there's nothing new in this album but it's the kind of CD that may be hard to remove from your CD player if you like the eighties.

I think the album has a very fun 'vibe' 2 it, but
most of the songs r rather weak or just standard.
They created 2 much 'sound' & it sits like
carefully applied Kabuki make-up. & then there's
the who's who through 80's bimbo land...So many
bits & pieces remind me of other people..But I
guess it's pretty clever as a post-modern
pop album...blah blah blah..

Btw, doesn't anyone hear the purple one in 'Cool' circa LoveSexy..
I can so hear him toss that tune over 2 Martika at certain points...

It is not a lasting album. Fun for one time, but nothing I would play back to back non stop.

I gave my copy away.

i don't really think its the kind of recording that you try to deconstruct or dissect. its just pop, albeit with some complimentary quirks. most people wouldn't try to dissect a britney spears cd or a spice girls cd...this is the same, in my opinion. it may certainly wear out after a while (though i have had this and u2 on repeat since i bought them), but by that time there will be another record to occupy our time. ah, the cycle of pop music...

sallysassalot said:

This IS the kind of album you can dissect. I wouldn't put Gwen in the same category of artists like Britney, Spice Girls, etc. She's using very notable producers and writers for this album. It deserves to be analyzed. The message in "Long Way To Go" isn't fluffy by any means. Pop can be analyzed when it's done right, and this is one of those cases.

I listened to the album nonstop last week... after awhile it got tired... it's great pop music but i don't think it's a pop masterpiece... it is by no means anywhere near as timeless as the people's work she or her producers where influnecned by.

I think the best pop is when you add all the influences together and get soemthing totally different... not a retread of some great stuff...

great start though... Maybe the next one will be light years ahead of this one because she'll have confidence she can do it on her own

It's an alright album; it's far from "classic" pop, however. I expected Gwen to retain more of herself throughout the album. Unfortunately, most of the tracks sound like Gwen had little influence other than referencing "Harajuku Girls" or hyping her clothing line.

JANFAN4L said:

nah, sorry...one song amidst 10 others does not cause for deconstruction make. other than about 4 tracks, the majority of the album is fluff. that's cool with me...i like fluff. you can only talk about making it in the backseat, vivienne westwood and harajuku girls so much though. i really, really love the cd...i don't wanna sound like i'm ragging on the record. not at all. i just don't think there's anything there worth dissecting. there's no metaphors on this record. there's no symbolism. there's nothing deep in there...hell, even gwen said that much. it is what it is. even "long way to go" isn't anything deep. i mean, yeah, its a commentary on race issues which is always good to see on a pop record because it will hit a larger audience. i don't think the way the message is handled is anything especially...well, special.

but its cool. i am not attempting to take away anyone's joy from the record. if its deep for you or worth further investigation, hey, dissect away! this is just one opinion in a pool of them.

someone mentioned that no doubt must be hating gwen right now...well being that that tony kanal wrote and produced 3 tracks (SERIOUS is the fucking bomb! Then again, I'm a big fan of madonna's first album! ) - and he's going to be gettin' some royalties! and gwen has said that tony inspired her to get into the dance pop thing....so not all of NO DOUBT is shitting in their pants...


I think my favorites are COOL (this song is great...), SERIOUS, CRASH (love this fucking song! DO ME REAL HARD!).

The only song i don't like is BUBBLE POP ELECTRIC.
[Edited 12/6/04 16:19pm]
[Edited 12/6/04 16:26pm]

purplegypsy said:

first you vote off bedtime story from the madonna survivor thread and now you don't like one of the best tracks on this record.

do i even know you after all these years?

truevirgin said:

Rich girl = Rich man from Fiddler on the roof. There is a reggae version of that song too

and Serious is not Madonna-ish at all!
[Edited 12/7/04 2:47am]

I orginally was going to get the album last month when it came out but the store that was selling it only had copies of the bonus stuff included I don't know what it was inside looked like a t-shirt. Did anyone get the bonus cd edition ? I went to another store that was just selling only the cd I've listen to yesterday.

My Favorite tracks
What you waiting for ?
Hollarback Girl
Bubble Pop Electric.

Janfriend said:

Are you kidding? Serious is the emotion of THINK OF ME and a copycat groove of EVERYBODY (with a little bit of PHYSICAL ATTRACTION - the ooh's and yeah's)
[Edited 12/7/04 6:17am]

Janfriend said:

yeah, serious is VERY madonna. right down to the whispered speaking and the "i think i'm gonna need a doctor."


[Edited 12/7/04 8:36am]

Yes, I like this CD. Her voice is so cute! She was meant to be famous! Some people just have STAR written all over them. I think if she was single, she and Andre would be dating. He is in awe of her.

purplegypsy said:

You're joking right? I'm listening to it right now. The style is nothing like what Madonna did. It sound more like Nu Shooz or Pretty Poison or even Jody Watley. It sound nothing like everybody. "Everybody" doesn't even have the emotion Serious does

Just cuz a white blonde girl sings an 80's style song, doesn't make a Madonna-type song. Madonna would have never put out that song back in the day

sallysassalot said:

That's at the end of the damn song. I'm sorry, I don't hear it

Im listening 2 samples and i really wish whomever produced "Luxurious" SISNT DO THAT! I automatically took all credit off for just 'slowing down' the beat for "Between The Sheets"

but Im feelin Serious, and Harajuku Girls so far...

Janfriend said:

Listen to the bassline - that's 1983 era Madonna right there. Listen to the double-tracked background vocals behind the lyrics - Madonna. Listen to the "ooh, yeah, ohhh" behind the pre-chorus - straight Side 2 Madonna.Listen to the treated guitar that pops in and out of the mix, it could've come right from 'Lucky Star'. That "rap" at the end of the song, well it might as well be on 'Physical Attraction'.

It's not like it's a surprise; Gwen said that Madonna's first album was one of her main influences on this album.

I'm not saying that parts of the song aren't influenced by Lisa Lisa, Nu Shooz, Pretty Poison, because certain motifs in the song certainly are. However, the song is pretty much a straight lift from

Axchi696 said:

That's solely a Madonna thing? The bassline? Madonna didn't write the basslines in her songs



Madonna invented that? Is that solely her signature? No.



That's not a "rap." She is singing S.E.R.I.O.U.S.. Only Madonna had treated guitar popping in and out of songs? Didn't Prince do that along with everyone else in the 80's? I didn't know Madonna invented "rapping" at the end of a song

Janfriend said:[quote]

Axchi696 said:

Well, I can see that there's no point arguing with you. I guess just because Gwen Stefani herself said that Madonna's first CD was a big influence on the sound of her album doesn't mean that she was really influenced by Madonna, does it?

I'm not saying that Madonna invented any of those sounds on the song, doesn't mean that the song can't be Madonna influenced.

I'm with Janfriend on this one - I don't hear anything that exclusively reminds me of Madonna on this track. It sounds a lot like the pop of that era in general, but that could be anyone from then, not just Madonna.

The eighties are all over this album, but Serious is (seriously) very Madonna-ish (ok it reminds of Nu Shooz and Jody Watley as well but who did they copy??) just like The real thing is very New Order and Long Way to go seems a (decent) reject fron "The love below". But all the elements in this album (eighties, hip-hop, R'n B) are put together very well and that's what finally counts.

truevirgin said:

Who did they copy??? Are you serious? Am I the only one who remembers the 80's? Nu Shooz and Jody did not copy Madonna. Madonna wasn't the first dance/pop female artist for fuck's sake. You people act like she was the first for everything. Keep in mind, all of that music from that era was pretty much alike and it had to do with the composers and producers that created the music, not the people singing it.

RipHer2Shreds said:

Exactly. When I heard it, I immediately thought 80's not an exclusive Madonna lift. The "ooh, yeah" is so typical for any dance song in that era. I have tons of 80's music and it sounds like a lot of different artists from that time and Madonna wasn't sounding any different from anybody else at that time either

Speaking of Harajuku... Did anyone see America's Next Top Model this week? The girls were in the streets of Harajuku, Tokyo. They dressed up as Harajuku girls. Thought of Gwen's song.

Ima havta go cop dat disc. I saw it in the wrecka stow tanite, but I picked up Lenny Kravitz' extended DVD for Where Are We Runnin' and the DVD/CD thingie from Primus last year. Sweet1