Sinead O’Connor was the rebellious friend that you wanted to have in your life. The girl with the traits you wished you had the guts to grab by the balls and take on as your own. Somebody who you could admire and relate to and wish you could have her world view – although at the time, you didn’t quite know why.
She wasn’t just a singer.
She was an iconoclast.
She sang your pain.
She sang about the pain of generations.
From my cloistered little life in the late 1980s, there was a recognition that this woman spoke to you, and for you. Because as much as you wanted to, you would never shave your head or rave about the despair you were feeling. You were far too caught up in your parochial little world framed by a Methodist upbringing in a blindly conservative state, where women were advised to not drink beer in Front Bars, and it was a virtue to be nice.
The album, I Do Not Want What I Haven’t Got was required listening. I’ve listened to it thousands of times. Yes, there’s the 90’s standard, Nothing Compares 2 U, penned by Prince back in the day. It haunts everybody. But there are better songs on the album.
The mention of Sinead O’ Connor takes me back to a coffee shop off one of the Rundle Mall side streets, where the coffee was bottomless and the newspapers national – and free to read. Mariah and I would meet there regularly. I remember her telling me about how she understood one of the songs. She had just started a new relationship with a new bloke, a refugee, who’s stories were horrific. We didn’t know about horror. This was Adelaide in 1990. Other than the 17.5% interest rates and the unavailability of work, all we knew of was sunny days, studying while on the hill at the cricket and lazy evenings down the beach. Our innocence was blinding.
Sinead provided another view to this soon to be more complex world. I look at the lyrics of this song.
“England's not the mythical land of Madame George and roses
It's the home of police who kill black boys on mopeds
And I love my boy and that's why I'm leaving
I don't want him to be aware that there's
Any such thing as grieving..” (Black Boys on Mopeds)
We were innocents. Sinead was not. She was our gateway to the wider world.
Over the years we’ve watched her battle through life. Seemingly barking mad, she got up to all sorts of stuff, majorly pissing off all and sundry. She was one of the first people to publicly condemn the Catholic Church – and she could do this with the knowledge from within the Magdalene system of institutionalised punishment for those who didn't stay in their lane. She protested. She complained. She was out there. Her struggles with mental health were sizable and noted. She was ordained as a priest at Lourdes. She converted to Islam in 2018. A tortured soul, I could only admire her chutzpah.
"Everyone can see what's going on
They laugh 'cause they know they're untouchable
Not because what I said was wrong
Whatever it may bring
I will live by my own policies
I will sleep with a clear conscience
I will sleep in peace..." (The Emperors New Clothes)
And now, she’s no longer here. May she rest in power. May she rest in peace.
Me, I choose to remember her as the screaming banshee woman who sang for a generation. She provided the voice I didn’t know needed to be heard.
No comments:
Post a Comment