【译】Pitchfork叉婊Gwen Stefani 2006年专辑《The Sweet Escape》（甜蜜出关）
Is there another mainstream pop star who flits between lights-on likeability and pouty-lipped empty vesseldom as dramatically or frequently as Gwen Stefani? In the three years since abandoning the MTV rock ghetto she inhabited with No Doubt, and her subsequent self-reinvention as a certifiable pop celeb and fashionplate mogul, she's been doing wind sprints between these two incompatible personae.
乐坛里是否还有像Gwen Stefani那样的主流流行歌星，能在聚光下频繁做出标志性的噘嘴动作，美丽与戏剧荒诞的化身？在离开她在“No Doubt”乐队时所在的MTV摇滚区，以及随后她作为一个公认的流行歌星和时尚大亨，在自我重塑之后的三年里，她一直在这两个互不相容的角色之间风驰电掣。
Nonetheless, since going solo with 2004's patchy but single-rich Love.Angel.Music.Baby., Stefani's remained above the fray of the ongoing clusterfuck between commerce and art-- and she's done it by brand-building in both the abstract sense (via her quest for pop cultural memes) and in the more traditional sense (with her clothing line L.A.M.B. scoring bonus cross-promotional hits with every in-song mention).
尽管如此，自2004年歌曲质量参差不齐 但单曲热度爆棚的首专起，鸡瘟就不去关注商业和艺术之间不断碰撞的影响，她通过抽象意义上的品牌建设（通过她对流行文化模因的探索）和更传统意义上的品牌建设（通过在歌中提及她的服装系列L.A.M.B.，每一首歌都会获得额外的点击率）。
Of course, Stefani also deserves credit for her gutsy musical choices. The spazzy, overcaffeinated electro of past singles like "What You Waiting For?" and the sparse drumline squibbles of "Hollaback Girl" suggest she's not content to merely rack up hits; she also wants her game to be the freshest around.
当然，Gwen Stefani在音乐上勇敢的选择也值得称赞。像“What You Waiting For”这样怪诞，令人high爆的电音 和《Hollaback Girl》中稀疏的鼓点皆暗示着 她不仅仅满足于追求点击率；她还希望自己的事业是最新鲜的。
That's a desirable instinct in a pop star, and despite her predilection for hijacking what feels like every single empty space on The Sweet Escape to play her own hypegirl ("How sick is this?" she beams in the intro to "Breakin' Up",)
对于一个流行歌星来说，这是一种令人向往的本能，尽管她喜欢在二专中的每一空白处见缝插针的展现鸡瘟式的大肆炒作（“How sick is this？”她在“Breakin' Up”的前奏中唱道）
minutes before declaring "Don't Get It Twisted" "the most craziest shit ever"), her single-minded interest in smuggling the weirdest sounds onto TRL results in some of The Sweet Escape's finest moments.
几分钟后，她宣布“Dont get it twisted”“The most crazist shit ever”)她执意地把这最奇怪的声音偷偷的加到TRL上,成就了《The Sweet Escape》最佳时刻。
Case in point: Lead single "Wind It Up", which wraps a "Lonely Goatherd" yodel sample from Stefani's beloved The Sound of Music around a wriggly Neptunes beat. As mainstream singles go, it's an absurd-sounding concoction that skates perilously close to the edge of utter ridiculousness, but something about the sheer nerviness of the idea ultimately sees it through.
例如：首单《Wind It Up》在鸡瘟钟爱的电影《Sound Of Music》中采样了《The lonely Goatherd》的尤德尔歌曲，歌曲《Wind It Up》的旋律围绕着一个令人舞动的The Neptune式的节拍展开。作为主打单曲，听起来像荒谬的混合物，触手可及到完全荒谬的境地，但单曲中前卫的极具弹性的想法终看穿了它。
If I had to guess at a single from this year that eventually ingratiated itself to the highest number of first-time haters, this would probably be it, and in Stefani's world, that's like the Holy Grail. Unlike most pop singers, Stefani aims to win you over with oddity. (There's a reason Alice in Wonderland was her last album's most recurrant theme.)
如果硬要猜测今年哪一首单曲有最多的黑转粉，这可能就是它，在鸡瘟的世界里，这就像圣杯。不像大多数流行歌手，鸡瘟的目标是用怪诞来赢得你的芳心。（这也是首专中的爱丽丝梦游仙境主题反复出现的原因）
It's a high-risk, high-reward strategy, but most of The Sweet Escape's other gonzo pop songs yield some degree of payout. "Now That You Got It" surfs on a loping hip-hop beat and a staccato piano sample while Stefani splits wailing time with a chorus of alarms.
这是一种高风险高回报的战略，但二专中其他怪诞的流行歌曲可以带来一定程度的回报。"Now That You Got It" 以一种轻快的嘻哈节奏和断奏的节奏登场，而鸡瘟则用放大的警报声来分割哭声。
The Neptunes-produced "Yummy" earns Best Song status by moving from a skeletal rhythmic backbone and resounding "Milkshake"-pinching triangle hit into a spiralling melody line that sounds like a Sherman Brothers outtake.
由The Neptunes制作的"Yummy"在我们看来是本专的最佳歌曲，"Yummy"以梗概的强节奏支撑歌曲，将响亮的"Milkshake"（如三角形般挤压的热单）转变成一条螺旋上升的旋律线，这也听起来像The Sherman Brothers的弃曲。
Also, "Don't Get It Twisted" sounds like reggaeton-polka.
还有 "Don't Get It Twisted"听起来像雷佳顿-波尔卡舞曲
Thing is, it takes real time to wring genius out of the obscure and unseemly, and time is not a luxury that Stefani the entrepreneur affords herself. As such, most of The Sweet Escape's problems arise as a result of her schedule-dicated slog back towards middle ground.
问题是，从默默无闻与难以发掘的普通人中寻找出天才很是费时间，而时间不是鸡瘟（专辑的创造者）可以负担的奢饰品，例如，这张专辑的大多数问题产生于 她按照紧张固定的时间表 艰难地做出了张中规中矩的专辑。
With the exception of the spazzy, Akon-produced doo-wop track "The Sweet Escape" and the Keane-penned "Early Winter"
但Akon制作的杜沃普摇滚乐歌曲"The Sweet Escape" 和Keane乐队写的歌曲"Early Winter"是例外。
-- which proves that Stefani still has the ability to elevate an otherwise ordinary rock song to another level-- everything else here has the vague whiff of tossed-off album fattener.
两首单曲都证明了鸡瘟依然有能力将普通的摇滚乐提升至更高的境界。而专辑的其他歌曲隐隐约约感觉是上张专辑留下的烂东西。
The unofficial sequel to "What You Waiting For?", "Orange County Girl" boasts another self-writing lyric ("Don't know what I'm doing back in the studio/ Getting greedy cause he said he had another sick flow/ So I had to hollaback cause I didn't get enough/ Still feel the Wonderland, Alice and the tick tock")
非官方的"What You Waiting For?"续集歌曲, "Orange County Girl" 中自吹自擂的歌词又对应了另一首也是鸡瘟自己写的歌曲的歌词 (对照："Don't know what I'm doing back in the studio/ Getting greedy cause he said he had another sick flow/ So I had to hollaback cause I didn't get enough/ Still feel the Wonderland, Alice and the tick tock")
that, in a Charle Kaufman-aping stylee, mistakes meta for content. Elsewhere, "4 in the Morning" and "U Started It" exhume the ghosts of S Club and Debbie Gibson respectively, in turn destroying the mallpop cred that Stefani accrued with L.A.M.B.'s impeccable "Cool".
歌曲"Orange County Girl" 一种 Charle Kaufman-aping的风格，将原先模仿歌曲的精髓用错了地方。其他单曲4 in the Morning"和 "U Started It" 皆分别挖掘了S Club 和Debbie Gibson的灵魂，进而摧毁了 鸡瘟在完美毫无瑕疵的单曲Cool上积累大街小巷的好感.
By now you get the point. One step forward, three steps sideways, one step back, The Sweet Escape continues in Stefani's proud tradition of being caught somewhere between the vanguard and the insipid. Considering this is the same person who once rolled out "Hollaback Girl" and the Harajuku girls in one fell swoop, it's not the least bit surprising, but the pockets of brilliance here are compelling enough to warrant holding out hope that Stefani's best as a boundary-pushing pop singer still lies ahead.
到这里你就差不多懂了吧，向前走一步，靠边走三步，向后退一步。二专延续了鸡瘟引以为豪的在前卫先锋与无趣乏味并存的传统。考虑到鸡瘟是可以同时发行出 "Hollaback Girl" 和Harajuku girls 的女人，这一点都不奇怪，这不是一点惊喜都没有，但同时期待鸡瘟最好的一面，作为一个前卫先锋的歌手继续前行，取得辉煌的成就。
网易云音乐专栏：2020.2.12
Bilibili：2020.2.13
翻译人：网易云网友@Jaychen-_2020 和我【GwenStefaniLOVE】
