Rock Steady

by

No Doubt

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No Doubt is my all-time favorite band, and has been for awhile now. My favorite CD is Tragic Kingdom. I picked up Rock Steady today, a little bit iffy on how it was going to sound. I liked Hey Baby, but not as much as their older stuff. I was blown away by the CD. I loved it. It was like 80sdiscorockpoptechnotrancereggaeskadancehall. Heh. Anyways, it was a big risk for No Doubt to add all of this new flavor into their sound but I think it turned out great.

I know all of the die-hard old school No Doubt fans are probably (...) off. To be honest, I was a little at first. I mean, their old stuff...her words are so powerful and the sound was something I don't think anyone else had. But listen...before Tragic Kingdom, No Doubt had been a band for 9 years doing ska-type music. And how many years ago did Tragic Kingdom come out? 1995...so um...6..almost 7 years or so. Gwen was fifteen when she

started, she's now 32. Your music tastes change. The band has evolved and each album you can hear the change. This is another evolution of No Doubt. You can say "Oh, it's pop music...blah blah...". But I don't think the average pop album has what Rock Steady has. This is the exact same thing people said when the new Garbage album came out. Beautifulgarbage, as it is titled, is a wonderful CD. Sure, they aren't as hard or loud as in the past but it is still a great CD. I think No Doubt has gone though the same thing. If you compare the lyrics between Tragic Kingdom and Rock Steady, the lyrics have no less depth, you wouldn't be able to tell them apart without hearing the song. When people say that No Doubt has sold out, I look at it as taking a big risk. Hello? They had already sold over 10 million copies of Tragic Kingdom alone...they are already a "hit" band. They wanted to experiment with some new sounds, and I applaud them for it.

I think Tragic Kingdom is still my favorite ND CD (I have all 5 of their albums), but I would have to go with Rock Steady as my second favorite. I mean...how boring would it be if they repeated almost the same type of song over and over from album to album? You've got to change somewhere to keep people interested in you. I love this new CD and I urge everyone who is mad that they've changed their style a bit to re-listen to it. It really is a great CD. I think my favorite track right now is Hella Good. Maybe I'll change my mind, I don't know.