No Doubt (No Doubt album)

No Doubt
Studio album by No Doubt
Released	March 17, 1992
Recorded	January 1990–January 1992
Genre	Ska pop[1]
Length	46:08
Label	Interscope
Producer	Dito Godwin No Doubt
No Doubt chronology
No Doubt (1992) The Beacon Street Collection (1995)
Singles from No Doubt
"Trapped in a Box" Released: February 25, 1992

No Doubt is the debut

The album was released during a period of popularity for grunge music, an aggressive rock style which contrasted with No Doubt's upbeat, commercial sound. Despite strong audience reaction to the band's tours, album sales under-performed expectations and sold about 30,000 copies, and received mixed reviews. Interscope refused to fund the release of a single from the album, so No Doubt released the single "Trapped in a Box" independently.

The band independently released their second album The Beacon Street Collection in 1995, which had a better commercial performance, selling 100,000 copies. Interscope then financed and supported their third album Tragic Kingdom (1995).

Background

Impressed by the presence of stage diving at ska concerts and Gwen's on-stage presence, Tony Ferguson signed the band to a multi-album deal with the newly created Interscope Records in 1991.^[4]

Music

Production

In 1991, No Doubt were signed to Interscope Records, which was then a new label. The band had just finished recording an indie CD that they were going to release themselves. When they were signed by the record label, they decided to accept the offer to re-record the CD in a professional studio. However, they weren't receiving any support that they expected:

"And we thought we were recording in a really good studio," "But looking back, we were naive. It was almost like an independent release, anyway – there was no push for the record [by Interscope] and no kind of support at all. Everything we did on that record, we did ourselves.^[7]

The band spent less than $13,000 recording their debut album, featuring both songs written as long ago as 1987 and new songs written specifically for the disc. All of the band members continued going to school to finish their education while recording their debut album in a Los Angeles studio.^[5]

To promote their album, in the summer of 1992 the band went on two two-week tours of the Western area of the United States. In the fall, they embarked on a two-and-a-half month national tour. Because the album underperformed commercially, Interscope refused to support the tour, leaving the band to finance it themselves.

"Trapped in a Box" (1992)

A sample from the only single released from the album.

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After the disappointing sales of No Doubt, Interscope declined to finance the release of a

Within the booklet from The Singles 1992–2003 is a blurb on each song. The short paragraph on "Trapped in a Box" states:

The oldest track in this collection, "Trapped in a Box" is the sole representative of No Doubt's eponymous major label debut and a good barometer for their development. Beginning as a poem Tom wrote for school, bandleader at the time Eric Stefani then shaped the arrangement with everyone contributing lyrics. Together for six years when recorded, the band had moved beyond their ska roots. The horn section and quasi-ska rhythms remain inspired by those early Madness/Fishbone influences, while the emerging sense of flow and pop bounce makes the track a benchmark for the time and a notable milestone today. Ostensibly their first official single, "Trapped" was admittedly too out there for the radio of the time. It wasn't aggressively promoted and largely fell upon deaf ears in a world enthralled with an "alternative revolution" mainly centered on male aggression. That changed soon enough.^[9]

The song is based on a poem that guitarist

Reception

Professional ratings

Review scores
Source	Rating
Rhapsody	Favorable[13]
Rolling Stone	[16]

Significance

The group's ska sound contrasted greatly with the popular music genre in the USA at the time, grunge music.^[15] The album was a commercial failure, with only 30,000 copies sold.^[3][5] In the words of the program director of KROQ, a Californian radio station on which it was one of the band's driving ambitions to be played: "It would take an act of God for this band to get on the radio."^[5][17]

The lack of record company support^[7][18] frustrated the band and led the band to self-produce their next album, The Beacon Street Collection, in a home-made studio, causing them to abandon the slick pop sound desired by Interscope for a more punk style.^[19] Their independence shocked their record company representative Tony Ferguson^[20] and the album sold over 100,000 copies^[5] in 1995, the year of its release, over three times as many as No Doubt sold. To capitalize on this success, Interscope offered the band extensive help with their third album, Tragic Kingdom,^[7] under the division Trauma Records to which the band was signed.^[20]

The success of their third album, Tragic Kingdom, led to fans becoming interested in the band's earlier albums, No Doubt and The Beacon Street Collection, and many more copies of them were manufactured and sold. The Beacon Street Collection was re-released in October 1997 as part of the band's back catalog and, by the summer of 1997, No Doubt had sold 250,000 copies.^[5]

Critical

• Gwen Stefani – vocals
• Eric Stefani – keyboard, vocals
• Tom Dumont – guitar
• Tony Kanal – bass
• Adrian Young – percussion, drums

Additional musicians

• Eric Carpenter – saxophone
• Don Hammerstedt – trumpet
• Alex Henderson – trombone

Production

• Producers: No Doubt, Dito Godwin
• Engineer: Michael Carnevale
• Dave Collins – Mastering
• Arrangers: No Doubt
• Horn arrangements: Don Hammerstedt
• Art direction: Kimberly Holt
• Design: Kimberly Holt
• Photography: Chris Cuffaro

Charts

Certifications

Release history

All information is from the