SamboraBlog

All of a sudden it's groovy to be a doting mum - even if you live in the land of rock'n'roll, Amy Cooper writes.

It could have been a photo from any family scrapbook: mum and her baby daughter having a day out to see daddy doing his job; mum beaming and bub wearing a pair of protective earmuffs to shield her delicate hearing from daddy's noisy workplace.

But this wasn't just any young family. The mother was movie star Gwyneth Paltrow, the baby her 15-month-old daughter Apple, and the noise was emanating from her father Chris Martin's band Coldplay and the thousands watching their Live 8 performance in London's Hyde Park.

For a lead singer's wife it was decidedly un-rock'n'roll behaviour. There was no nanny to discreetly remove the child while her parents partied backstage, no flamboyant designer baby clothes and no hovering Elton John, the celebrity parent's customary fairy godfather. If it wasn't for her famous features, Paltrow would have been indistinguishable from the other young mums in the crowd. She was dressed down, slightly dishevelled and had earlier been serving tea to VIP guests with Apple napping nearby.

While Paltrow's low-glam mothering style might surprise the likes of Sharon Osbourne, Pamela Anderson and other rock wives who follow the industry traditions of excess and outrage, it's typical of a new breed of conscientious rock mums. These women have achieved the seemingly impossible: marrying showbiz glitz with the everyday dagginess of parenthood. They're putting their husbands' careers before their own, taking motherhood seriously, and are keen to raise their children as normally as possible - whatever the consequences for their own fame.

Think movie "it" girl Kate Hudson, unrepentantly piling on the pounds during her pregnancy with son Ryder, stopping work for a year after marrying former Black Crowes singer Chris Robinson and taking the baby (now 19 months old) on tour to support his father's solo career. Or Hudson's pal, Liv Tyler, married to Spacehog's Royston Langdon, who's cut down on work to spend time with her now eight-month-old son, Milo.

Even Madonna, who built her own music career on attention grabbing, says these days she's content to play second fiddle to the hubby and her children, Lourdes and Rocco. She recently told a British magazine: "I'm the person who stands at the door when my husband comes home from work, waiting to rub his feet. And I'm the person who helps my kids with their homework and puts them to bed.

"Our whole life is based around the children. We get up with them in the morning. I get my daughter ready for school. I spend time with my son before he goes off to his day care."

"Madge" even published a book of children's stories - a far cry from the good old days of conical bras and soft-porn books.

Paltrow has been outspoken about her decision to put her career on hold while Apple is young. "There are certain women in this business who have children and I just think: 'You must never, literally never, see them'," she told W magazine soon after the baby's birth. "You can't do movies back-to-back and see your child if they go to school. I might not work for ages. Acting is a fantastic job, but it's not going to define my life, much to my agent's horror."

Hudson describes her choices more philosophically: "To bear children is the ultimate in femininity; it's beautiful. And if having kids is going to affect my career, then fine, let it. I don't really care. Because if that's what being a star is all about, I don't want it."

And as if to prove it, she was out and about with baby Ryder within weeks of his birth while still carrying all her extra pregnancy weight. While other celebrity mums - Victoria Beckham, take a bow - would have been hiding and exercising the excess baggage off at a frightening rate, Hudson appeared to revel in her size.

"I'm really enjoying being bigger," she said at the time. "I've never been voluptuous. I gained 60 pounds [27 kilograms], and every second of it was so much fun. I wouldn't change it for the world."

Somehow, these days, loving a rock star seems to magically transform prima donnas into doting mums and docile wives. Supermodel Heidi Klum, once known for flirting with Gisele Bundchen and Bill Clinton (not at the same time), wearing skin-tight PVC to parties, chasing Red Hot Chili Peppers' frontman Anthony Kiedis and smoking cigarettes, is now a poster girl for cosy motherhood. Rarely pictured without a sling or stroller containing her year-old daughter Leni, (to formula one team boss Flavio Briatore), Klum has been extolling the pleasures of parenthood since she started dating singer Seal last year. "It's the most amazing thing. For me, now I'm second. Before, I was always first. Now, my daughter's first."

Although homegrown singer-actor Natalie Imbruglia hasn't yet had children with her husband, Silverchair and Dissociatives star Daniel Johns, she's already proved herself a supportive wife, remaining at his side while he battled his painful health problems and flying with him to the US for his treatments. While she still works hard at her music career, her professional profile was definitely higher before marriage.

Heather Locklear, wife of Bon Jovi star Richie Sambora and mother of eight-year-old Ava Elizabeth (and who, coincidentally, made a movie called Rock'n'Roll Mom in 1988), used to party hard when she was dating Motley Crue bad boy Tommy Lee but now loves family time. She lives near her parents and they visit their granddaughter often.

Like Locklear, Hudson and Paltrow are close to their parents. And this, says MotherInc director Claudia Keech, probably influences their maternal style more than their rock star partners do.

"These women have had good upbringings and good parenting role models," says Keech. "They now seem to be trying to raise their children in as normal an environment as possible in what is an abnormal, rarefied world."

It doesn't hurt to learn about living with fame at an early age, either, she says. "Both Kate and Gwyneth come from celebrity families; they themselves were the children of stars. You tend to use your own childhood experiences to make decisions when you become a mum, and theirs have clearly helped them decide what they want for their own children."

Paltrow does credit her actor mother, Blythe Danner, with providing an example of maternal sacrifice. "My mother turned down every fantastic movie there was," she told W magazine last year. "She turned down these amazing things that would have made her a huge movie star."

Hudson has similar memories. "We grew up in this life, and we turned out pretty great," she told Vogue magazine. "Mom did something right, and she was a busy, busy, busy woman." Hawn, in the same interview, added: "I did not like leaving them when they were little or big. You have to have priorities regarding what you will allow to take you away from your kid."

Now it's time for Paltrow, Hudson and their fellow playing-it-straight rock mums to be role models themselves - whether they intend to be or not. And Claudia Keech thinks they're doing an outstanding job.

"I admire what they're doing and the example they're setting," she says. "It was terrific to see Apple with her earmuffs on, being taken to see where daddy works. It's a great thing for any mum to do. In the old days, a father would just disappear off somewhere every day and children would never see him in 'work mode'. Now we can give our children that experience and others that were never available."

She also appreciates Paltrow and Hudson's down-to-earth appearance. "When they're photographed with their kids, they're never posing or using the kids as props. Some celebrity mums seem to grab their children and carry them like handbags whenever there's a camera around - and you can tell. But their focus is on the baby, not who's watching."

Hudson's first post-baby film, Skeleton Key, is released on August 18.