It’s about 9 p.m. on Thursday night, and I’m listen to The Cranberries on my Google Home. The late great Dolores O’Riordan is belting out her powerful and at times emotionally wrought lyrics.
The first song that comes on is 21, a classic from their megapopular No Need to Argue album. She’s got a soft lilting voice in this song, she’s almost humming or purring. The song is about wanting and desire, but that’s not really phasing me. It’s more the feel of the song and the beautiful soft chords, melodic drum beats, and the backup singer’s haunting cries into the night. Dolores keep saying 21-21-21, and you just want to hug her and be with her.
Next up is Zombie, one of their all-time classics about The Troubles, also known as the Northern Ireland conflict, and man, bang! The drum chords come in hard! There’s a lot of bass guitar wailing away.
Dolores once again starts in a soft lilting voice, but the lyrics are much more pointed this time. “And the violence caused such silence, who are we mistaking?”
“But, you see, it’s not me, it’s not my family, in your head, in your head, they are fighting With their tanks and their bombs and their bombs and their guns in your head in your head they are crying!”
And then the song’s namesake: “In your head, in your head, zombie zombie zombie!”
After the chorus we return to Dolores’s smooth lilting voice, but even though it sounds soft, she’s singing about about something deadly serious, the violence. “It’s the same old thing since 1916, in your head in your head they’re still fighting”
Her voice is angry, accusatory, and downright pissed. She’s had enough of this violence, she’s had enough of men killing other men in Northern Ireland. She wants it to end, and she wants it to end now.
At the close we ascend to a guitar crescendo of loud bass and heavy electric guitar, drums blasting, keyboard firing, and it builds and builds and builds.
Then it slows and it’s just a little bass and drums, slowing down, slowing down, slowing down, and then boom! A final drum beat and they’re gone. Dolores is gone too, but the conflict and her pain endures.
The next song is Dreams, and Dolores is in slow soft mode again, almost purring. “All
l my dreams, is never is quite as it seems, cuz you’re a dream to me”
It’s was their first major hit, and it’s a fantastic song. It’s about love, lust, self-discovery and dealing with the disappointment of dreams unreached. Delores absolutely Nails it, and she brings the pain home in a way that only she can.
But it’s not a depressing song, it’s not a really sad song, it’s just kind of melancholy. She’s reflecting on what could have been, what never happened, and what she wanted.
The next song that comes on is Everything I Said. It’s a powerful track. Dolores is in soft soulful mode again. “Everything I said, oh, well I meant it.”
“And if I die tonight would you hold my hand? Oh would you understand? And if I lied in spite, would you still be here, no, would you disappear?”
Her voice picks up intensity and volume during the chorus, and she lets it rip just a little, but not full out. She’s asking her lover about how far he would go for her. How far could she go and still have her lover stay with her? But then there’s “I’ll get over you” so if she’s going to get over him, maybe she’s moving on from him?
It’s a moving, soulful, smooth ballad, and Dolores pulls it off wonderfully. She has just the right mix of angst, intensity, ennui, and plain-spoken love and pain.
The next song that comes on is Icicle. It’s not my favorite, but it’s a pretty good song. It’s a very heavy topic, it’s about a young child who was killed by an adult. Dolores hums a lot in this song, and she says a lot of na na na’s.
“How could you hurt a child? Now foes this make you satisfied satisfied satisfied?”
“There’s a place for the baby that died, and there’s a time for the mother who cried, and she will hold him in her arm sometime, ‘cause 9 months is too long too long too long”
Wow! It really is a powerful song. I had forgotten how emotionally intense it is. Dolores gives just the right mix of everything that matters in this song. Love, passion, sadness, anger and life. She’s just incredible. What a Dynamo. The five foot three firestarter from Limerick, Ireland.
The next song that comes on is Disappointment. “But it won’t get any harder, and I hope you find your way again.” That one.
It’s a great song, but I’m too burned out on the Cranberries and Dolores’s emotionally resonant voice. I need a break to just chill out and process what I’ve heard. So I turn off the music for just a minute, and think about what I want to say.
One thing’s for sure. The Cranberries were, are, and always will be one of the greatest rock bands of all time. And Dolores O’Riordan was a force of nature that shone brightly through the night sky. She’ll be missed, and so will the band. They were true heroes, and they represented Ireland beautifully.
So farewell to Dolores and The Cranberries. You live on in our memories and dreams forever.
