Nothing Compares

[BetterButter]

[AAEBoiler]

I thought this was fantastic! Sinead was really ahead of her time!

[Bastet]

On 10/11/2022 at 10:11 AM, AAEBoiler said:

Sinead was really ahead of her time!

I loved seeing how she spoke out not just against the patriarchy, Irish government, and Catholic Church (systems that were oppressing her personally), but racism as well.

I just watched this recently, and wish I'd done so before she died.  I knew she had a beautiful voice - singing and speaking - and stood up for all the right things, but it was great to get the details.  As Kathleen Hanna said, she's not a martyr, as she's three-dimensional; she makes mistakes, she's a weirdo, she's great. 

I liked the clip of her calling out a reporter's attempt at a false equivalency, pointing to her having had a baby at a young age -- she fired back that being 20, living in London, as part of a couple, and able to afford a nanny, is worlds away from being a pregnant teenager in Ireland.

It was horrifyingly unsurprising to learn the band's label pressured her to abort, and I loved her saying she didn't submit to the church or her father, and she'd defied the label by shaving her head, so she certainly wasn't going to cave to them on something like this.

I agree with whoever said regarding the people who booed her at the Bob Dylan tribute a couple of weeks after her SNL performance: What the hell are these people doing at a Bob Dylan show?  Good on Kris Kristofferson giving her that big hug.

(Also, I had forgot the first controversy, when she didn't want the national anthem played at her show.  The DJs and listeners misrepresenting forced nationalism as patriotism was quite the precursor to The Chicks, complete with being told to "shut up and sing".)

The montage of those who mocked her or worse was eye-opening; you expect something as horrible as "In the case of Sinéad O'Connor, child abuse was justified" out of someone like Camille Paglia, but there were some clips in there I wasn't expecting.

As strong as she was, she was still young and the rage was so intense, she suffered for ten years after the SNL furor.  It's good to hear she regretted only being so wounded by it, as it was the proudest thing she'd ever done as an artist.  It was interesting hearing how Irish artists have a long history as agitators and activists, which is what she wanted, not this UK/US pop star veneer.  My ears particularly perked up when she said she hadn't wanted to be a pop star because she wanted to write and scream as therapy; my absolute favorite song of hers is "Daddy I'm Fine" which fits that mold perfectly. 

That song came out in 2000, and I blasted it in my car constantly; many friends were surprised Sinéad was still recording.  I like that this showed she had been all along -- while she "disappeared unless you looked for her" as it was described, if you did look for her, you found her making great music.