Why is she lingering?
“No thanks”
“Shit sandwich”
‘A video of a monkey drinking its own piss.’
These are three of the greatest music reviews of all time and said more about a bad album than a million words ever could. Sure, we have a minimum words content to contend with at R13, which is fair enough, we don’t want to get too lazy but sometimes, too much is....well too much.
Yes, the Happy Mondays ‘Yes Please’ album was not appreciated by the NME, Spinal Tap pondered if it was legal to print such a music review and the Pitchfork site took full advantage of the online capabilities with their simian urine response to one of Jet’s offerings and we have to take all of that into consideration when reviewing the new album by Dolores O’Riordan. Some of you may know her as the girl from the Cranberries, more of you may know her as that talentless girl who shrieked a lot in the 1990s and thankfully, many more of you may not know her at all. If this is indeed the case then you people are the luckiest of them all.
Time has never been too kind on Dolores, after all, this is the girl whose band released a single whingeing about the troubles in Ireland just when the Good Friday agreement was causing people to look forward and hope for a better future. That bloody awful single may have the peace process back to the 1970s with its diabolical screeching and its trailing about the tanks and the guns but although it made an impact on the radio, it failed to seep into the consciousness of people too much, which was great news, as the people of Ireland had suffered enough by that point.
‘No baggage’ is the name of the album, supposedly showcasing a happier O’Riordan, one now at peace with herself, motherhood and life in general. Which is great for her, I don’t think you should begrudge anyone happiness but if she is so content with herself, why does she feel the need to negatively impact on others with piercing dire vocals. There is one song that manages to capture the nails on a blackboard screech of ‘Zombie’ but in a much worse way because its clear that people haven’t learned from it, with ‘Zombie’ being the name of the song to avoid. Or track down and listen to if you have some perverse dire to torture yourself.
Utter tosh and although this music reviewing lark is a hoot most of the time, drivel like this ensures there is a price to pay at times. Part of the reason I’m struggling to like it is because I really don’t see where its going to fit in and I’d really struggle to see an up and coming artist being given the time or the backing to release an album of such unlikable features. It says a lot for the music industry that it is so much easier to stick by an tried and tested artist whose name alone will grab publicity and some sales but do absolutely nothing on consequence or note than to try and promote something new and interesting.