ARTiST.... Gwen Stefani

     TiTLE..... The Sweet Escape

     LABEL..... Interscope

     GENRE..... Alt. Rock

     RiP.DATE.. 2011-06-03

     STOREDATE. 2006-12-05

     SOURCE.... CD

     QUALiTY... 243 kbps / 4410kHz / Joint Stereo

     TRACKS.... 12  / 46:57

     SIZE...... 86.06    MB

     RIPPER.... EAC Secure with LAME 3.98.4

     URL.......





NR. TRACKNAME                                  TiME



1   Wind It Up                                  3:09

2   The Sweet Escape                            4:06

3   Orange County Girl                          3:23

4   Early Winter                                4:44

5   Now That You Got It                         2:59

6   4 in the Morning                            4:51

7   Yummy                                       4:57

8   Fluorescent                                 4:18

9   Breakin' Up                                 3:47

10  Don't Get It Twisted                        3:37

11  U Started It                                3:08

12  Wonderful Life                              3:58

---------------------------------------------------------



                                  TOTAL TiME: 46:57 MIN

                                  TOTAL SIZE: 86.06  MB





                                     RELEASE NOTES



 Awkward and alluring in equal measures, Gwen

 Stefani's 2004 solo debut,

 Love.Angel.Music.Baby., did its job: it made Gwen

 a bigger star on her own than she was as the lead

 singer of No Doubt. With that established and her

 long-desired wish for a baby finally fulfilled,

 there was no rush for Gwen to get back to her

 regular gig, so she made another solo album, The

 Sweet Escape, which expanded on what really sold

 her debut: her tenuous connections to Californian

 club culture. There was always a sense of

 artifice behind the turn-of-the-century makeover

 that brought Gwen from a ska-punk sweetheart to a

 dance club queen, but that doesn't mean it didn't

 work at least on occasion, most spectacularly so

 on the gloriously dumb marching-band rap of

 "Hollaback Girl," the Neptunes production that

 turned L.A.M.B. into a blockbuster. There, as on

 her duet with Eve on "Let Me Blow Ya Mind," Gwen

 made the transition into a modern-day material

 girl with ease, but when she tried to shoehorn

 this ghetto-fabulous persona into her original

 new wave girl character, it felt forced, nowhere

 more so than on the Linda Perry written and

 produced "What You Waiting For." Gwen doesn't

 make that mistake again on The Sweet Escape -- by

 and large, she keeps these two sides of her

 personality separate, favoring the streets and

 nightclubs to the comfort of her new wave home.

 Just because she wants to run in the streets

 doesn't mean she belongs there; she continues to

 sound far more comfortable mining new wave pop,

 as only a child of the '80s could. As always,

 it's those celebrations of cool synths and

 stylish pop hooks that work the best for Stefani,

 whether she's approximating the chilliness of

 early-MTV new romantics on "Wonderful Life,"

 mashing Prince and Madonna on "Fluorescent," or

 lying back on the coolly sensual "4 in the

 Morning."



 Only once on the album is she able to bring this

 style and popcraft to a heavy dance track, and

 that's on the irresistible Akon-produced title

 track, driven by a giddy "wee-oh!" hook and

 supported by a nearly anthemic summertime chorus.

 Tellingly, the Neptunes, the architects of her

 best dance cuts on L.A.M.B., did not produce this

 track, but they do have a huge presence on The

 Sweet Escape, helming five of the 12 songs, all

 but one being tracks that weigh down the album

 considerably. The exception is "U Started It," a

 light and nifty evocation of mid-period Prince,

 with its lilting melody, silken harmonies, and

 pizzicato strings. It sounds effortless and

 effervescent, two words that do not apply to

 their other four productions, all skeletal,

 rhythm-heavy tracks that fail to click.

 Sometimes, they're merely leaden, as on the

 stumbling autobiographical rap "Orange County

 Girl"; sometimes, they're cloying and crass, as

 on the rather embarrassing "Yummy"; sometimes

 they have an interesting idea executed poorly, as

 on "Breakin' Up," a breakup song built on a dying

 cell phone metaphor that's interesting in theory

 but its stuttering, static rhythms and repetitive

 chorus are irritating in practice. Also

 interesting in theory is the truly bizarre lead

 single, "Wind It Up," where the Neptunes force

 fanfares and samples from The Sound of Music's

 "The Lonely Goatherd" into one of their typical

 minimalist tracks, over which Gwen spouts off

 clumsy material-minded lyrics touting her fashion

 line and her shape. Nothing in this track really

 works, but it's hard not to listen to it in

 wonder, since its unwieldy rhythms and rhymes

 capture everything that's currently wrong about

 Stefani.



 From the stilted production to the fashion

 fetish, all the way down to her decision to rap

 on far too much of the album, all the dance-pop

 here seems like a pose, creating the impression

 that she's a glamour girl slumming on a weekend

 night -- something that her self-proclaimed

 Michelle Pfieffer in Scarface "coke whore"

 makeover showcased on the album's cover doesn't

 do much to dissuade. If the dance production on

 The Sweet Escape were better, these hipster

 affectations would be easier to forgive, but

 they're not: they're canned and bland, which only

 accentuates Stefani's stiffness. These misfires

 are so grand they overshadow the many good

 moments on The Sweet Escape, which are invariably

 those songs that stay true to her long-standing

 love of new wave pop (not coincidentally, these

 include every production from her No Doubt

 bandmate Tony Kanal). These are the moments that

 give The Sweet Escape its sweetness, and while

 they may require a little effort to dig out,

 they're worth the effort, since it proves that

 beneath the layers of bling, Gwen remains the

 SoCal sweetheart that has always been as spunky

 and likeable as she has been sexy.