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The catch? They'll be out on the amphitheater circuit for a mere month before Stefani heads back indoors to reload, since she's still got a long-aborning solo album to get done and released before year's end.

The tour, in fact, was never supposed to happen. The group had planned to be on hiatus all year, but current events were set in motion in early 2003 when the band initially decided to ''put a B-sides record out with a bunch of cool stuff for die-hard fans,'' Kanal says. Then came the bright idea to -- hey! -- throw in a disc's worth of A sides, along with a couple of DVDs, and make it a boxed set. The final result of this evolutionary process was two separate projects: ''Boom Box,'' a limited-edition set, and the single-CD ''Singles'' collection, which has moved almost 2 million copies.

''We just wanted to celebrate that we've been in a band as long as we have,'' says Stefani of the hits collection and commemorative tour. ''None of us were expecting to go out right now, but it's funner when you don't plan it and it just happens.''

Tony, your hair is so white!'' yells Stefani, commanding Kanal's attention from across a bank of lights at an outdoor photo shoot. This would seem to be a textbook case of the pot calling the kettle platinum, but she's right: Kanal is looking fair enough that you wonder if maybe HE'S the member Martin Scorsese should've picked to play Jean Harlow in ''The Aviator,'' the Howard Hughes biopic starring Leonardo DiCaprio (to be released in December). ''It's like a fluorescent bulb,'' she marvels, moving closer for a blonde-on-blonde comparison. ''Is my hair that white?''

Meanwhile, drummer Adrian Young has turned whiter than either dye job, thanks to a six-foot boa constrictor that has just been introduced to this circus-themed set. Young's performed live in nothing but a jockstrap, so it's clear he lacks any phobias about public nakedness, but he's got one about snakes, and his request to move to the farthest edge of the shot is granted. Stefani, for her part, digs the boa (though it proved too uncooperative to make the final photo). For a good half-hour she has it around her neck. Asked what 25 pounds of pure muscle coiling around your shoulders feels like, Stefani -- looking altogether too relaxed -- says, ''It's like...a massage.''

Maybe they could take the boa out on tour to help work out those post-thrashing neck cricks -- or, in Stefani's case, to relieve her daily noon pre-tour workouts. ''It's ruined my day,'' she complains. But perhaps this buff rock icon doth protest too much, since moments later she's telling her fellow band members, ''I want to be working out with you guys on the tour!'' The guys smile faintly, as if trying to replace the mental image of a StairMaster with a picture of Jim Beam.

Or it could be just the genuine smile of a recently acquired domesticity. Kanal, 33, will be bringing his girlfriend on tour. Guitarist Tom Dumont, 36, is newly engaged. (He's the one who, with his new bushy 'n' bearded look, might as well be a member of Phish. ''I'm the not-rock-star of the group,'' he says.) Young, 34, is married and has a 2-year-old son; he's also one of the few avid golfers to sport a full Mohawk, which helps ensure he gets accosted every time he leaves the house. (''I wear hats, every day, but it doesn't matter,'' he grumbles.) And as everyone probably knows, Stefani, 34, married her longtime beau, Bush-man Gavin Rossdale, in 2002.

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