No Doubt & The Power of Pop Music

My Blackberry captures No Doubt performing "One More Summer" on Saturday night.

Quite often during live performances, I get all misty and choked up. I don't usually cry but my emotions do regularly swell. Marc Maron talked about this on an episode of "WTF" (I think it might have been the Adam Scott interview), saying he gets choked up at live performances because of how vulnerable the performers are.

I don't know why I find myself on the verge of tears at concerts, plays and the like, I think it might be a recognition of the talent and hard work that have gotten those performers on that stage. When No Doubt hit the Gibson Amphitheatre stage Saturday night, I think it was that sense of homecoming, the triumphant return of the conquering heroes, that blurred my vision.

For someone growing up in Southern California, No Doubt has an incredible story. A group of music-loving high school kids gets together to form a band, works and scrapes and struggles for nearly a decade, then, boom, becomes the biggest thing on the planet. So many people in these parts have personal stories about the band, went to school with them, worked with their parents or, like the guy who talked to my brother and I before the show, grew up on Beacon St. across from the famous house where the band got its start.

Those stories add to the experience, but the power of No Doubt, the reason the band became as big as it did, the reason we all waited 10 years for "Push & Shove," its latest release, is the music. No Doubt makes catchy, fun, energetic, genre-bending, goofy, beautiful, personal, meaningful pop songs and is damn good at it.

Early on in Saturday's show, I took in the capacity crowd, seemingly every audience member on their feet, arms in the air, signing along with everything they had. I saw a wide range of people, 40-somethings who came up with the band, people my age and a little younger who were in school when the band broke, and kids as young as six who've grown up on No Doubt, feeling for the band and its music probably the way I feel for The Beatles and its music, like these people are family and their music is essential to your chemical makeup.

Each song the band played has a story for me, for the more than 6,000 other people at the show with me. I thought about Gwen riding a toppling amp down the ramp when No Doubt opened for U2 in 2001 and debuted "Rock Steady" tracks. I thought about the times I crazily sped down the freeway blasting "Just a Girl." I thought about mending my aching heart to "New" and "Ex-Girlfriend." I thought about the first time I cried listening to "Simple Kind of Life," its words at last ringing true.

"Pop Music" is a massive term, holding within it everything from The Beatles to Justin Bieber. Some pop music is horrifying (I'll let you insert your own examples here) but so much more of it is comforting, inspiring, invigorating and just plain great. The best of pop music can unify strangers, stop fights, cement memories, inspire grand gestures, accompany journeys and get you through your toughest times.

On Saturday night, No Doubt was the very best of pop music, sparkly and gritty, personal and silly, low-key and thrashing. With each song, the band, that fantastic band, pulled so much out of us and gave back even more. Nights like that are why I go to concerts, why I keep buying music, why I like to write about music and why I'm a music fan.

Here's Saturday night's set list, courtesy of the Orange County Register:
Push and Shove
It's My Life
Hella Good
Underneath It All
Ex-Girlfriend
Hey Baby
New
Hey You!
Sparkle
Simple Kind of Life
One More Summer
Sunday Morning
Happy Now?
Settle Down
Don't Speak
Just a Girl
Looking Hot
Total Hate
Spiderwebs

You can read The Register's review, written by my old boss Ben Wener, here. You can read the Los Angeles Times' review here.

No Doubt is playing a total of seven shows at the Gibson Amphitheatre, the second of which gets underway in a few hours. If you're going to any of the remaining shows, I'm definitely jealous. I'm already picturing an outdoor show sometime next summer, the band taking the stage just after sunset, throwing one of the best parties around.