No Doubt has filed suit against the video-game company Activision over the use of its band member’s avatars in the just-released Guitar Hero variant Band Hero, thanks to the ability for players to put Gwen Stefani through the paces of the hooker-glorifying “Honky Tonk Women.” Also, bassist Tony Kamal can be cross-dressed into singing “Just A Girl.” This usage of Stefani’s and Kamal’s likenesses, the suit claims, “transformed No Doubt band members into a virtual karaoke circus act.” Uh, hang on a second, I thought the utterly superfluous Talk Talk cover accomplished that task way back in 2003? [AP] MORE »
Posts Tagged ‘Gwen Stefani’
Lawsuits
No Doubt Are Not Feeling Hella Good About Their “Band Hero” Cameos
idolator's american idolatry
Five Female Pop Stars Who Should Definitely Not Fill Paula Abdul’s “American Idol” Chair
Fox today outlined its plans for replacing Paula Abdul at the American Idol judges’ table, and somewhat unfortunately, they involve retaining the four-judge panel that was instituted on the show last year. The show is going to bring in guest judges! “Our intention is to have guest judges be female pop stars, female performers,” Fox Entertainment chair Peter Rice said. Signed for next season so far: A & R expert Katy Perry and tabloid fixture Victoria Beckham. Even though Beckham is more known for her stick-thin figure and the clothes she hangs on it these days, she was a Spice Girl, right? Uh, sure. Any Idol watcher knows that Fox will likely make some sort of misstep in selecting other people to round out the panel; as a sort of pre-emptive strike against that, we offer up five female pop stars whose presence would make the new-look Idol judges’ table even more farcical than it already is. MORE »
the biz
Will “Vinyl Saturday” Drag People Back To The Record Stores?
The people behind the one-day indie-music-retail blowout Record Store Day are hoping so; they’ve declared the third Saturday of every month Vinyl Saturday, on which limited-edition vinyl releases will be available at participating indie shops. The first installment is Saturday, June 20, and there will be four special releases on shelves that day: MORE »
listening station
Chrisette Michele Knows You’re Real Good
R & B singer Chrisette Michele tackles No Doubt’s power ballad “Don’t Speak” in the above clip, and accompanied by only a piano, she does quite a bangup job on what she claims is one of her favorite songs ever. (I wonder if the Long Island native had a preset on her stereo locked in to WDRE back in the day?) Two minor complaints: one, maybe she should have avoided the key change in the bridge; and two, using the backdrops behind her to sync the original video to her singing is kinda silly, and it only serves to distract from her otherwise lovely effort. [Yahoo! Music via Backstage Pass] MORE »
the new model
This Just In: Artists Who Don’t Sell Many Records Even Less Likely To Sell Lots Of Clothing
Ad Age reports that celebrities trying to earn some extra scratch from their name’s wattage might want to start looking somewhere that isn’t a fashion “partnership” with a retail outlet, what with the economy continuing its long, slow swoon and chains all over the country struggling to keep their lights on. Tough break, musicians who want to avenge those rejected FIT applications! MORE »
reunions
No Doubt Get Ready To Bring Their Nannies On Tour
Through a half-cute, half-”get to the point” fake… MORE »
The Gwen Stefani Paper Doll Tool: For When You Want Your Own Entourage Of Two-Dimensional Girls
Gwen Stefani is the linchpin in a $300 million ad campaign for Hewlett-Packard, in which the pop star’s image and clothes stylings will be used to lure people into “better use the web to custom-produce everything from invitations and greeting cards to concert souvenir books”–and print out those… MORE »
Complaints from Malaysian college students have forced Gwen Stefani to hide her shame during an upcoming tour, as the Muslim young folks have demanded that she “not jump with/or hug and kiss members of the audience” or wear anything “offensive.” MORE »
videodrone
Akon Hates Us All
Akon has told the NME that he wants to hook up with Fall Out Boy, Blink 182, Good Charlotte, Beyonce, Gwen Stefani, and Akon, if he has the time. We’ve already heard the spoiled fruits of an Akon/Stefani collaboration, and a song with Beyonce should guarantee a few million units sold, if nothing else. But while Fall Out Boy have proven themselves to be hip-hop and R&B friendly, the mind reels at the terrifying results if and when Akon hitches his autotuner to a Warped Tour bus. In the interview, the inescapable Senegalese sensation also addresses getting booted from Stefani’s tour and his feelings on YouTube: MORE »
Gwen Stefani To “Orange County Register” Critic: Don’t Speak
Ben Wener probably had a lot of column space to fill when he realized that his scathing put-down of The Sweet Escape resulted in him–and, actually, anyone representing his paper, the Orange County Register–getting locked out of a recent Gwen Stefani show, so he decided to devote a huge chunk of prose to an examination of why, exactly, he didn’t make the guestlist cut:
I even liked Gwen’s first solo album for what it was - a perfectly plastic homage to a plastic pop era, the one in which we both came of age. But I could tell I had ruffled Gwen’s feathers when we spoke before the disc came out. It was the first time I took her to task for disingenuousness - for being ungodly rich yet still singing, “If I were a rich girl … .”
“What do you mean by that?” she snapped. I said the song could be seen as absurd, even untrue. She explained its lyrics were about when she was just an Orange County girl - ah, that troubling phrase! - dreaming of such wealth.
