Today our guest is the outspoken and iconic Irish singer/songwriter Sinead O’Connor. Sinead approaches singing with complete emotional freedom and embraced the ugly and the aggressive as well as the hauntingly beautiful and fragile. When her management emailed to confirm the interview, we were curious about the woman who embraces this contradiction so readily both in her music and in her life. In this episode, Beth chats to Sinead about how music impacts society, why she reverted to Islam and how the youth are making a better world.
““I would only write songs if I had something niggling at me that I couldn’t find a different way to express””
Podcast Episode Highlights:
01.58 - What is Sinead O’Connor’s worst ever job?
03.40 - What has driven Sinead? Why does she write?
04.38 - Does Sinead agree with an article that says she has a voice of ‘pain and faith’?
05.12 - Sinead speaks about the influence of John Lennon’s Death on music
07.28 - Heroes appear when the world needs them. Greta Thunberg and how young people find a way to be part of a revolution, even if it’s not through music
09.12 - Does Sinead O’Connor care about what other people think about her? And how has that changed as she’s got older?
09.49 - Beth Roars asks Sinead if she has advice for young people wanting to enter the music industry
12.05 - Does Sinead think certain personality types are attracted to the music industry?
12.45 - Quickfire Round
13.48 - Fun Fact
14.38 - Beth speaks with Sinead about her decision to revert to Islam
16.58 - What does Sinead consider to be her biggest achievement and her greatest challenge
18.34 - Has Sinead ever doubted herself? Does she think she’s talented?
Key Points:
Sing from your heart and with feeling
People seek to perform to get the adoration from others that they have missed
Islam is a community Sinead loves to be a part of
Sinead wouldn’t advise people to enter the music industry because of a lack of agency
Quotes
“Even when I made my first record, all I was doing really was I had shit to get off my chest, I wasn’t thinking about whether I’d sell records”
Sinead O’Connor
“I always feel you should only make a record if you’re going to go crazy if you don’t”
Sinead O’Connor
“There was a reason in the 70’s for going into music that was not just entertainment, it was changing things”
Sinead O’Connor
“If you notice what happens when John (Lennon) dies, music becomes electronic. Immediately you have Duran Duran and all of these types of bands where nobody’s playing any real instruments and nobody’s singing about anything but love”
Sinead O’Connor
“Music was very, very dangerous because it was so spiritualised”
Sinead O’Connor
“The day the music died, as the song talks about, as far as I’m concerned is the day John Lennon died”
Sinead O’Connor
“Heroes appear when the world needs them”
Sinead O’Connor
“As women get older and become grandmothers, you get less concerned with what anyone thinks, you’ll just tell anybody what you really think”
Sinead O’Connor
“You’ve got to be slightly mental to get into the music business”
Sinead O’Connor
“If it were my children, I would really plead with them not to go into it” (the music business)
Sinead O’Connor
“Every musician on earth ended up in rehab at some point, it’s not an easy job”
Sinead O’Connor
“I think everyone’s greatest challenge is their self-esteem”
Sinead O’Connor
“When it comes to being an artist, I’m just me and I’m the best me I can be, if people like what I do that’s great, but I don’t sit around thinking about it”
Sinead O’Connor
“My father brought me up to be extremely humble so I like to keep that humility about what I do. If you get cocky on stage and start thinking you’re great, that’s when you’re doing your worst job”
Sinead O’Connor
Resources Mentioned:
