Sinead O'Connor: C/D?

A heroic figure. rip.

I play the lion and the cobra all the time. Very few albums go as hard as that one.

“And you should’ve let the light onnnnn” fuck I’m so depressed

Fiercely honest and sweet and funny, she was talented in ways I’m not sure she completely understood.

oh fuck you Billy Corgan

― the dreaded dependent claus (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Wednesday, July 26, 2023 9:48 PM (twenty-seven minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

He was not talented in ways i'm sure he never understood at all.

lol

don't know what to write at all, just chiming in to say how saddened i am by this just like all of you. the lion and the cobra was such an important record for me in the first year that i started caring about music. a friend of mine and i would write various lyrics from it on notes that we would pass to each other in school. just straight out writing the lyrics down. why? it felt powerful somehow to write the words she sang. her songs were like incantations. spells. and they worked! they summoned these feelings from deep down inside me. they still do. i'm scared of her records. i don't put them on much. i can't handle the rawness, how i know i'm going to feel when i listen to them.

oh man no. I'd been thinking about her this week.

mum saw her at the Port Fairy Folk Festival in Australia a few/many years back - i remember mum just complained that she “talked too much” between songs and “why can’t she just sing”

hmm yes but also counterpoint why can’t YOU stay home & listen to the album if you’d prefer not to engage w a human performer its such a dilemma roll my damn eyes all the way back forever to my own grave lol

She deserved better from the world. RIP

this is just heartbreaking. rest in peace, Sinead.

I've been playing a lot of her 'featured artist' singles this evening - no slur on her own work, once you've written Troy you have nothing to prove, but a) they are her own work too and b) I loved how generous she was with her amazing voice, and how she would lend it to often nakedly political stuff. I won't bombard you with YouTubes, but consider visiting or revisiting 1000 Mirrors (with Asian Dub Foundation), A Prayer for England (with Massive Attack), Empire (with Bomb The Bass and Benjamin Zephaniah) and from 1991 Visions of You with Jah Wobble:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AuG1JN_pIUU
(also Haunted with Shane McGowan, just because I love a soppy love song)

"A Prayer for England" is an imprecation whispered in the ear of every prime minister.

I also really really love this version of "Haunted," with Trevor Horn production and a video all optimistically designed to make it a hit. It should've been!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_q7307IWwr4

Her final live performance was February 12, 2020 in Santa Cruz, CA at a small theater.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rwluxHHP1vU

https://www.setlist.fm/setlist/sinead-oconnor/2020/rio-theatre-santa-cruz-ca-6b98362a.html

I'm also upset. Just chiming in to say that when I heard the Lion and the Cobra at 13 years old, I was astounded. I'll admit that it informed my vision of a future girlfriend. The shaved head and passion. And I guess she was really pretty. It sounds dumb, but I'm just channeling 13-year-old me.

she absolutely deserved so much better

the lion and the cobra is such a fantastic album, one of a kind

RIP. She was a force to be reckoned with. One of a kind.

I'm also upset. Just chiming in to say that when I heard the Lion and the Cobra at 13 years old, I was astounded. I'll admit that it informed my vision of a future girlfriend. The shaved head and passion. And I guess she was really pretty. It sounds dumb, but I'm just channeling 13-year-old me.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n14lwdpYkAA

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=318ZDSy3zn4

Black Boys on Mopeds certainly made me lose it today.

this is it for me

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xcO0fEabWHI

Listening to I Do Not Want right now — which I don't actually listen to that much, Lion & Cobra is kind of my Sinead go-to — and it is so good. The songs are great, the arrangements are great, and she is such an amazingly present singer. So vibrant and intimate. And I've heard this album hundreds of times, I know all that, but it doesn't fade with familiarity.

Heartbreaking. I haven't even looked at the news yet, but given her struggles over many years, I imagine it's what's been feared for a very long time. Absolutely love her music, and it was wonderful to see something like a resurgence over the past decade as people re-discovered her work or re-evaluated what they overlooked. (There was a stretch in the '00s where I felt like no one I knew ever talked about her, much less put on her records, which was remarkable for someone who had been a household name not too long ago.)

She was probably my favorite singer of the past 40 years, for that amazing voice and for the way she could get inside a song and make it sound like her own thoughts and words, but she's so much more than her records. She never let popularity re-define what she should be or what she should say through her work, and she spoke up LOUDLY for a lot of children who needed it when the world refused to listen. I wish that brought her enough solace, but it meant a hell of a lot to so many people.

Re: Gospel Oak, I especially like this one (though it was released elsewhere too):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2GDT-3pARec

Faith and Courage is probably worth revisiting too. "Jealous," "No Man's Woman" and "Daddy I'm Fine" are favorites.

Beth Orton’s Instagram post will burn you.

https://www.instagram.com/p/CvLU4kxNd9Q/

Was looking for video from those that went with all the tracks on Red Hot & Blue, but this keeps turning up, from I Do Not Want..., hopefully the same take:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PK9dtZSIj-U

Terrific tribute by Dave Holmes: https://www.esquire.com/entertainment/music/a44655422/sinead-oconnor-death-tribute/

no words yet. I can’t.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7LhIkAKJzs8

Don't argue amongst yourselves
Because of the loss of me
I haven't gone anywhere
But out of my body
Reach out and you'll touch me
Make effort to speak to me
Call out and you'll hear me
Be happy for me
Reach out and you'll touch me
Make effort to speak to me
Call out and you'll hear me
Be happy for me

Listening to “I Feel Different” this evening broke me

like being swamped by an emotional wave

great anecdote..."oh, it's you, Russell"

Last year, working in Ireland, having a pint in the cold outside a Dalkey pub with some new friends, a woman with purpose strode past us. Puffy parker zipped to the nape and her bowed head covered in a scarf. One of my new friends muttered an exclamation, jumped up

— Russell Crowe (@russellcrowe) July 26, 2023

Beth Orton’s post echoes my heart. I was rooting so hard for Sinead, especially the last ten years with her “”embarrassing”” admissions of personal crises, which others saw as fodder for clicks and titters, I felt deeply moved by the bravery of her admissions. I wanted old age and Joni Jam for Sinead, a moment when she could just rest and bask and no longer needed to be in a state of artistic and personal struggle. I am so sad that this never came for her when she was alive but I feel grateful for her incredible works nonetheless

Missed it but KEXP apparently did a great tribute today - FWIW, here's a link to the playlist:

https://www.kexp.org/playlist/?month=July&day=26&year=2023&hour=2%3A00&m=PM&offset=0

That KEXP link mentioned some recent tweets - turns out she opened a new account this month, and it's heartbreaking to read. It's like she was trying to restart her life - she mentions moving back to London for the first time in decades, posts a video of herself and announces a new album close to completion - but also still in mourning over her son.

https://twitter.com/786OmShahid

I didn't realize there was a video to that song she did with Terry Hall. Love how she smiles in the background when he takes his first verse.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sqk4qzmRpS0

Speaking of playlists, one of those tweets links to a playlist by her: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/4tJNA0rDI3sdlO5fF2f4jW?si=b5e44c459e7b4847

Looks excellent. Tons of reggae, assorted other things. I'm going to put it on.

Thanks for pointing that out! FWIW here's her playlists in general, including one called "Songs I Wanna Cover 2023":

https://open.spotify.com/user/jahismykeeper

wow at that Terry Hall duet, lovely vid that <3

Thanks for pointing that out! FWIW here's her playlists in general, including one called "Songs I Wanna Cover 2023":

https://open.spotify.com/user/jahismykeeper🕸

“Here But I’m Gone” by Curtis Mayfield as the final song in her covers wishlist is particularly heartbreaking.

...and to think what she could have done with "Sign Your Name"!

Heartbreaking loss. The ilx community does provide some solace for which I’m thankful.

Adding a live solo version of Danny Boy from 1993. Just Sinead and her haunting voice.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PweUGhCZNiM

Letterman's official account has uploaded all of her appearances today in tribute.

I haven't seen this put up here, so here's her U.S. television debut from Late Night with David Letterman:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qnUI4a7BKpE

I mentioned this for her on the Schaffer/Letterman thread, but that a snippet of that "Mandinka" performance was included in a "Musical Guests" clip package during his 10th(?) Anniversary Primetime special (filmed in the same of the notorious SNL appearance in '92) , and the fucking audience booed and the goddamn network left it in.

'for her'="over" & 'in the same of'="in the wake of" damn phone.

Seemingly against many odds this works

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wJy77VV4okk

The Chieftains, Van Morrison & Sinead

I’d forgotten she’d done this, though I wish her voice was more prominent:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_KX05v4dpss

Angry. I feel like all of us let her down