Gwen Stefani Biography

news-detailsGwen Renee Stefani is an American singer and the frontwoman of the band No Doubt. She was born on October 3, 1969 in Orange County, California to an Italian father named Denis and an English and Scottish descent mother named Patti. Gwen has one sister named Jill and two brothers known as Eric and Todd. During her school age, Gwen attended Cal State Fullerton and throughout her high school she was listed as one of the swimming team members because she was chubby.

Preceding her success, Gwen got her earliest job scrubbing floors at a Dairy Queen and working at a local department store. Her singing career began in 1986 when her brother Eric along with his friend John Spence founded No Doubt. Eric who used to be the keyboardist for No Doubt then left the band to pursue his animation career on "The Simpson," while Gwen became the band's lead singer after its original frontman, John Spence, committed suicide in December 1987. It required hard work from all the band members who during the three years long to produce their third album almost split up. Yet, they could stand still and finally outed its third album titled "Tragic Kingdom" in 1995, which spawned several hits began with single "Just a Girl."

Following the success of "Tragic Kingdom," Gwen became more popular and recognizable. The same hold true with the band success video for the song "Don't Speak" included in the same album, which many of its songs were inspired by Gwen's relationship and breakup with fellow band member Tony Kanal whom she dated with for eight years but had to end it up because Kanal needed more space for himself. Facing separation with the person she loved very much had driven Gwen into a depression and it tortured her even more after the tiring tour for "Tragic Kingdom" album.

The world seemed so blue in Gwen's eyes, but not anymore until she met Bush guitarist, Gavin Rossdale, at a concert she was playing with No Doubt in 1996. After sometimes developing their relationship, Gwen married to Rossdale on September 14, 2002 in a wedding dress designed by John Galliano. And after three-years of marriage, the singer happily confirmed during a concert in Ft. Lauderdale, Fla held in December 2005 that she indeed is pregnant with her first child with Rossdale. And on May 26 the next year, the couple happily welcomed their first child, a baby boy named Kingston James McGregor Rossdale.

Beyond her activity as No Doubt frontwoman, this beauty is known for her solo career too. She once became very famous for a pair of popular 2001 duets, both with techno artist Moby that produced the "Southside" and with rapper Eve that produced "Let Me Blow Ya Mind," for all of which she has become the first artist in history to win both Best Male Video and Best Female Video awards at the 2001 MTV VMAs. After that Gwen recorded her first solo album entitled "Love.Angel.Music.Baby", released in America on November 23, 2004 and was widely recognized for its first single "What You Waiting For?" which successfully debuted at #1 on the Australian ARIAnet singles chart and #4 on the UK chart. Greater than that, the set's other single "Hollaback Girl" also helped catapult the album sales to 350,000 copies in its first week, as it gloriously topped the US Pop 100 charts for four consecutive weeks, leading the album to also be certified platinum with 1,000,000 copies sold out after four weeks of sales.

Subsequently worked on her second effort, the fruit of her hard work finally was released on December 4, 2006 outside North America and in Canada, Mexico and the United States by the next day. For the set, dubbed "The Sweet Escape", Gwen collaborated with Tony Kanal, Linda Perry and The Neptunes on some tracks and also worked with Akon and Tim Rice-Oxley. The first single released from the album was lead track "Wind It Up", which Gwen premiered on her Harajuku Lovers Tour in 2005. Thanks to this song that the LP sold 243,000 copies during it's first week on sale in the USA, while at the same time debuted at number 3 on the Billboard 200, and a further 149,000 copies were shifted during week two. Two more singles were out from the album and gained equal success to the first. Title-track "The Sweet Escape" and "4 am in the Morning" were released on street and boosted the sale of the album that reached 2 million plus worldwide.

While Stefani promoted "The Sweet Escape", No Doubt began to work on a new album without her and planned to complete it after her "The Sweet Escape Tour" was finished. A few things, including Stefani's second pregnancy, slowed down the songwriting and recording process. The group continued to work on the album while embarking on tour. Initially set for release in 2010, the record titled "Push and Shove" finally came out in 2012. In October 2013, the band once again went on hiatus, but hinted that they would regroup in 2014.

That year, Stefani shifted her focus back to her solo career. In April, she joined "The Voice" as a coach, temporarily replacing Christina Aguilera. Later in the year, she said she was simultaneously working on a No Doubt album and a solo album. She reteamed with longtime collaborator and fellow "The Voice" coach Pharrell Williams for her solo project, which she previewed with "Baby Don't Lie" and "Spark the Fire".

Both songs, however, failed to attract listeners. She spent the rest of 2014 and majority of 2015 joining other artists on their respective projects. She's featured on albums by Maroon 5, Calvin Harris and even Snoop Dogg. She also recorded songs for the soundtracks of movies like "Paddington" and "Southpaw".

In late 2015, news broke that Stefani split from her husband of 13 years Gavin Rossdale. His alleged infidelity was reportedly the reason behind the break-up. She later put out the heartbreaking "Used to Love You" which was seemingly inspired by her ex. She quickly moved on, though. She found a new love on her other friend from "The Voice", Blake Shelton, who split from Miranda Lambert in the same year.

Her new relationship led to a new single "Make Me Like You", which has its music video premiered during a commercial break at the 2016 Grammy Awards in February. Along with "Used to Love You", the up-tempo feel-good song will appear on her new solo album, "This Is What the Truth Feels Like", which is due out March 18.