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If you're not a fan of Broadway or Hollywood musicals, you might have heard Gwen Stefani's current single, Wind It Up, and wondered: What's up with the yodeling?
Those in the know immediately recognized the reference to The Lonely Goatherd, a song from The Sound of Music. Stefani is a die-hard fan of the film version and its star, Julie Andrews.
Like Andrews' character, the fledgling nun-turned-governess-turned-wife and stepmother Maria von Trapp, "I'm a Catholic girl who sings and sews," says Stefani, 37. "So there's a lot about her that I can relate to."
That now includes maternal responsibilities. In May, Stefani and her husband, British rocker Gavin Rossdale, 41, welcomed Kingston James McGregor Rossdale, who has since bonded with the stylists, dancers and other creative types on his mother's sizable support staff.
"There's this huge team of us always hanging out together, so he gets to see the same people every day," Stefani says. "And he's this very cool, chilled-out little guy. He's just like another person, except that he's super-cute and super-entertaining."
Kingston was in the studio while his mother recorded her second solo CD, The Sweet Escape, which just entered the charts at No. 3. Though bested by R&B ingenue Ciara and a showcase for Eminem proteges, the album sold more copies in its first week than its predecessor, 2004's multi-platinum Love Angel Music Baby.
The No Doubt frontwoman hadn't initially planned on releasing a follow-up to Love so quickly, or returning to the road -- where she spent the first four and a half months of her pregnancy, "which was gnarly" -- next spring for another tour.
She attributes her energy to breast-feeding: "I'm still nursing, and I think it gives you superhuman powers."
Still, the singer was "much more relaxed" while working on Escape, which features collaborators such as Pharrell Williams, Akon, No Doubt's Tony Kanal and Keane's Tim Rice-Oxley.
"The last one was such a concept album, though I was trying to make something fun, nothing too deep or serious," Stefani says. "I was into the whole '80s dance thing, trying to be more creative than personal. And for me, it's really more natural to write personal songs."
Yet when Stefani started planning her Escape, "I didn't have any major direction. I don't feel like having the baby really shaped my intentions; he was just this magical thing that happened to me."
During her pregnancy, she acknowledges, "I wasn't writing much. I tried to, but I guess I was already creating too much -- I was on creative overload, you know? So I watched TV and ate."
After Kingston's birth, of course, Stefani was intent on whipping her lithesome frame back into standard sex-goddess proportions.
"That was one of the hardest things for me -- the pressure of, 'OK, I need to get into shape so that I can put this record out.' If I didn't have that pressure, I don't think I would have gotten the baby weight off so quickly."
Still, even with a CD to promote, a new concert to plan and, of course, her thriving fashion line, L.A.M.B., Stefani is already thinking about giving young Kingston a sibling.
"I pray that I can have another baby," she says. "I mean, it's such a miracle to have one. And there's so much I still want to do, because who knows? Things could be a lot harder a few years from now. I mean, I'm not at the beginning of my career. I'm on a ticking clock. And I don't want to miss anything."
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