PaulySure:
Zombie, zombie, zombie-ie-ie! (That’s all I've got).
Null:
I was always somewhat ambivalent about The Cranberries. I do
remember hearing some of their radio hits on the radio. Dolores always sounded
like she could have been Sinead O’Conner’s little sister. This was not due to
where they came from, but due to the quality of their voices. I will always
have a soft spot for the song “Dreams,” as it reminds me of driving through the
Arizona desert as the clock creeped to midnight on my way to work. It had a
haunting and melancholy quality that seemed to be an ingredient in most of
their songs. Later in life, I worked for a lady that was Dolores’s second
cousin, which was sort of cool.
SoDak:
In 1994, I woke up to the radio playing “Zombie.” I thought
the voice was reminiscent of Sinead O’Connor, which would have been great since
it had been a long time since I had heard a new song by her that I liked. At
the end of the song, the DJ stated that the song was by The Cranberries. Not
too long after this, I bought Everybody
Else Is Doing It, So Why Can't We? (1993) and No Need to Argue (1994).
Dolores O’Riordan had a great voice, which peaked interest in the band.
Musically, The Cranberries were quite mainstream, but they also seemed to
incorporate various new-wave influences. I was quite partial to the moody,
dreamy songs, which sometimes had a vibe similar to the 10,000 Maniacs. I also liked
it when they rocked out a bit more, allowing for greater intensity in O’Riordan’s
voice. She seemed to be quite earnest. Through the years, I have listened to
the first three Cranberries records a lot, as my girlfriend loved them. Will
miss her voice.
Jack Rafferty:
As I sat in an
Irish tour bus, air stagnant with the breath of tourists, traversing the Dingle
Peninsula, I rested my head upon the window and gazed out at the gray-white
sky. The icy mist of the Atlantic, the grasses along the road, and the caves
and moss-coated, darkened rock of the coast rolled by. In the distance, the
Three Sisters loomed in the fog, waves of land rising and frozen to the
horizon. Upon turning inland, the sight of a large, elegant home among the
green hills seemed out of place. Its architecture was like some hodgepodge of a
church, a suburban house, and an old village cottage, all fallen together in
sharp contrast to the surrounding landscape. The driver announced that this was
the home of the recently deceased Dolores O’Riordin. The house stood, silent
and empty, in the Atlantic breeze. Above it, the clouds, dimly lit, rolled
onward.
Dolores
O’Riordin’s voice filled my mind as a child, and was lost to the obscurity of
time. When I rediscovered The Cranberries at a later age, it was like hearkening
back to some diluted, murky dream. A sudden realization of something forgotten
and left in the bog of one’s thought and memory. This seems appropriate to me
in a way, as Dolores’ voice is quite dreamlike, and it seems apt that it was
lost within them.
While a good deal
of their discography doesn’t appeal to me at this point in my life, I will
always enjoy the darker and more ethereal songs, almost exclusively a result of
Dolores’ eclectic and lovely voice. Songs like “Zombie,” though a cliché
example, really convey her ability to evoke sorrow and melancholy, and her
characteristic intonation. The section that proceeded the final chorus always
sounded to me much like weeping. The quietude and the soaring of her voice in
songs like “Put Me Down” will now always remind me of the silver winds of
Ireland’s southern coast. The austere gannets gliding in the sea-breeze.
It is very
unfortunate that Dolores is no longer here, and even though the material things
in her life, such as that strange home in the green hills near Sybil Point, are
left to be silent, her voice, that was dormant in the depths of my memory for
so long, will not be.
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