THE GOSPEL OAK INTERVIEW

    Lucy O'Brien's interview with Sinéad O'Connor on the 10th of April.

I JUST WANT TO ASK ABOUT THE EP. WHY IS IT CALLED 'GOSPEL OAK'?
I guess it's called gospel oak because the songs are hymns, really, hymns /
lullabies which I dedicated to the idea of God which existed before
'religion', in inverted commas, came along. It was basically the idea of
God being a feminine principal, God the mother, which was symbolized by the
oak because it's such an ancient, ancient, tradition. Also the worship of
God the mother used to take place in what they would call sacred oak groves
- - so that's basically why.

THAT'S NOTHING TO DO WITH THE FACT YOU MIGHT BE MOVING TO GOSPEL OAK IN LONDON?
Well I guess it has other personal significance too, it has a lot of
personal significance for me too - the place in London, but that's
something that's obviously very personal... But also I like it obviously
because of the significance of what I am trying to do with the music, which
is I am trying to write in some way, hymns, modern hymns, inspiring things
that provide the things that hymns provide, in this case mothering,
hopefully.

SO TELL ME ABOUT THE FIRST SONG, THIS IS TO MOTHER YOU. I WAS INTRIGUED BY THE LINE ' I WILL DO WHAT YOUR OWN MOTHER DIDN'T DO, WICH IS TO MOTHER YOU'. WERE YOU SINGING TO YOURSELF?
Yeah, I guess. I mean all the songs are written to myself in the first
place. I'd say definitely every song I've ever written has been to myself,
so I guess the simplest answer is 'yes'.

AND WHAT INSPIRED THAT ONE?
I suppose the same that inspired all of them really, the need for soothing,
in the first place to soothe myself, in the second place because of my own
experience, the awareness outside me that the world needs soothing and
mothering as much as I do. I guess that was the inspiration - the need for
mothering and soothing in myself.

I SUPPOSE THAT SORT OF EXPLAINES THE NEXT SONG "I'M ENOUGH FOR MYSELF". WHAT'S BEHIND THAT ?
Well that's an affirmation that song, it's like prayer. Affirmation is
another word for prayer where you use the power of the spoken word, if you
name a thing or say a thing it will happen. If you say, you know "I am
Sinéad, I am deserving", I am whatever, you look at yourself in the mirror
and you say these things they eventually become true, so the song is very
much an affirmation. That is my saying what I want to be, that these are
the things that I intend to happen.

PETIT POULET, THIS SONG SOUNDS LIKE A FRENCH NURSERY RHYME.
No, it's not. This song is a couple of things really, mixed up in the song
but mainly it started off as my response to the Rwandan situation, what I
saw happening in Rwanda a couple of years ago. They speak French there, so
you know I guess I wanted to in some way write something which would be
comforting to the children that went through the evil that happened there.
I don't speak much French, so I guess I said as much as I could say in that
language and then continued on and what it means, it just says, Little
chicken. In Ireland you call babies 'Chicken' you know, so it said little
chicken, everything is OK now, that kind of thing. Its just trying to do
something I guess to provide some kind of shooting again. But then, this
song goes on again- like I said, they're all hymns - and it goes on and
talk about how you know there is no answer to the question nobody has an
explanation for why these things happen or why we are on earth and anyone
who says they do have an explanation is a liar really. And then the song
goes on to say that this does not mean that God doesn't exist, or that
there isn't a God, but that there is a God which responds to the human
voice so that if really we wanted to stop all these terrible things that we
see on television and going on around us, we could, simply by using our
voices. Which religion kind encourages us not to do. So I guess that's what
this song is about really.

I SUPPOSE IN GOSPEL MUSIC THOUGH THEY USE THERE VOICE REALLY STRONGLY...
Yeah...yeah.. but I mean just ordinary human beings walking around the
planet, if we really did want to stop the kind of horror that we do live in
really - as well as all the good things- if we really did want to fix the
things that needed fixing we could fix them overnight simply by asking.
There is somebody out there which responds to the human voice, I know that.
I don't know what it is and I don't believe it's a man, or a woman
necessarily. I don't believe it has a body, but I do believe there is a
God, in inverted commas, which responds to the human voice. And I think
religion, actually takes people away from God, because it tells them God is
outside them, as such, and not responsive, you know.

DO YOU FEEL - IT'S A BIT DIFFICULT TO KNOW HOW TO PHRASE THIS BECAUSE OF ALL THE CONNOTATIONS OF RELIGION-, BUT DO YOU FEEL IN A WAY THAT YOU ARE LIKE A MODERN NUN IN A SENSE. DO YOU FEEL LIKE YOU'VE GOT A VOCATION?
Yeah, yeah. I was thinking about it, definitely yeah. I would be a nun
except I would not want to give up sex! I would say in the old days I would
have been a priestess, because of the Goddess worship ,and the worship of
the mother was a very sensually, expressive religion, so I think I would
have fitted in there definitely. I guess that is very much how I see myself
and how I want to be, definitely, but with the sex...When I was a kid I
used to pray to God to never make me want to be a nun, because I was afraid
would wake up one morning with this mad desire to incarnate myself in some
building and never have sex again, you know.

AND GO FOR MEN WHO LOOK LIKE JESUS?
Yeah, well I do anyway obviously, Bob Marley, you know.? Yeah that's
exactly how I would try to classify myself, that's what I would be aiming
for. Priestess I prefer.

HIGH PRIESTESS?
Not a high one, just a priestess. I don't have to be the queen, you know,
but just to be the servant.

ROCK AND ROLL IS NOT KNOWN FOR BEING PARTICULARLY SPIRITUAL...
Yeah but the music that I'm into is. Reggae, rasta music is for example,
Bob Dylan is, the records that I first heard were "Slow Train Coming" for
example. Bob Dylan's record, which is a very religious and sexual record.
And also Bob Marley. I like spiritual kind of music, which doesn't separate
itself from sexuality, you know. I guess pop music isn't and rock music
isn't, but then it is underground. All the black music is, but it's kept
very underground even though the rock and roll and pop has stolen from it
really, you know. It's like the virgin Mary really, pop music is the same
as the idea of the Virgin Mary, this woman who doesn't have sex, where as
the real Mary is the Magdalen which is the black music you know.

'FOR MY LOVE'. WHAT INSPIRED THAT SONG
I guess it's a love song really, so I suppose it was inspired by love and
then it goes on to talk about Ireland. I see this also as very much as an
Irish record and I see it as a little album or CD really. I see it very
much as an Irish album and I guess this song would be the kind of
classification of that. In the first place it's a love song but it also is
a love song about Ireland and talks about the notion of the Irish having
the right to govern their own country, being valid in that, but it's not
worth necessarily killing anyone for, especially when doing so is going to
stop the truth from actually being allowed to take place. I guess it's
a....I don't know what the right word is...republican...would be the wrong
word because it's misunderstood so commonly but I guess it's a republican
song really...a non violent republican song.

DO YOU THINK IRELAND HAS OPENED UP A LOT MORE IN TERMS OF THE TABOO SOCIAL ISSUES LIKE CHILD ABUSE, DIVORCE AND ABORTION?
Yes and no. I think it's only the very beginning, so it opened up
definitely but there is an awful lot more to come out and I think it will
be some years before it's quite healed. But yes, it's definitely opened.
Absolutely, to talk about taboo issues. I mean if you look at what's going
on in the church there it's been pretty phenomenal. I don't know if there
is any other government in the world which has actually collapsed over the
issue of child abuse, so that's a thing to be quite proud of really.

DO YOU FEEL YOU HAVE HELPED IN A WAY TOWARDS THAT PROCESS?
Yeah, I do. I do feel that I was part of staring off the discussions,
absolutely. I think in many ways I may have been the one who publicly
opened the discussions a couple of years before the rest came out.

DO YOU FEEL YOU WERE PUNISHED FOR THAT IN SOME WAY?
I don't know if punish is the right word. No I guess I don't feel punished.
I expected not to be understood for a while. I knew it was a long term
thing. I knew things would be difficult. I don't think I was punished. I
think I was, whatever the word is - reviled - in certain places and
applauded in other places but I would not say punish was the right word. I
don't know what the right word is. I guess I went through the mill a bit
but that's just part of it. Anybody that introduces any kind of new idea or
emotion can only expect to go through a certain amount of being called a
liar. I guess that was the worst thing. It was not a punishment as such but
that was the worst thing to be told that you were lying and crazy. I kind
of went through that, people treating me as if I was a nutcase. 'how could
you say that priests would abuse children'?, that kind of thing. But in the
end, no I wouldn't say 'punish' because eventually it came out I wasn't
talking shit, as it happens.

JUST A BIT MORE ABOUT THE EP. DID YOU DRAW ON IRISH LULLABIES OR....
The Irish tradition, yeah. I feel close to the whole Irish traditional
music scene and very much wanted to write an Irish record and yeah, I have
been particularly influenced in the last few years by a woman called Noreen
Irene, an Irish singer. She is a sort of priestess as well, really, you'd
think she was a nun when you heard her records but she is actually a quite
sexually wild woman, you know. But I've been very influenced by her, she
sings very very ancient Irish traditional religious music, which is all
very mathematically designed to do things by people by the notes. She is a
sort of a master of that and I guess I have been very influenced by that
and I guess I would like to be a sort of a modern day version of her if
possible. I have not studied the whole science of it but that's what I'm
aiming at. Religious traditional Irish music. A lot of the songs are very
Irish traditional I think, especially "4 my love" and "petit poulet" as
well. It's so in me because I am Irish, that I don't know how to talk about
it as such. Because it's so subconscious in me, do you know what I mean? I
am not conscious enough ever to talk about it. Yeah I am very called to
that whole traditional Irish thing and I think it's naturally in me and in
my singing and always has been so.

ONE THING THAT YOU DO IS QUITE INTERESTING, IT'S NOT STRAIGHT FORWARD TRADITIONAL BECAUSE YOU MIX UP HIP HOP BEATS AND DANCE BEATS WITH THAT, AND THAT'S QUITE UNUSUAL.
It's modern day traditional, it's 1997 traditional Irish music.

WHY DO YOU THINK THE TWO MIX SO WELL, THAT AMERICAN STYLE HIP HOP BEAT WITH A CELTIC UNDERTONE?
I guess it's just a common kind of humanity that all music fits well with
all other music. It's not that if you tried something else with it it would
not work, do you know what I mean? All music fits with all music like all
voices fit with all voices, so all traditions really slot in. They all have
likenesses.

IT'S BEEN TWO YEARS, THREE YEARS SINCE 'UNIVERSAL MOTHER'...
Two years yeah, not quite two years. A year and nine months probably.

WHAT HAVE YOU BEEN DOING SINCE?
Well I was pregnant for nine months and then I had a baby who was one year
old yesterday, so I was pregnant and feeding my baby.

WHAT'S HER NAME?
Roisin, well her name is Bridgeteen Roisin Waters, but we call her Roisin.
The Bridgeteen is more of a title, again its a pagan thing. Bridgeteen is
named after our Goddess in Ireland who's called Bridget. So she's
Bridgeteen Roisin Waters...because I said a prayer basically to have a
little girl and if I did I'd call her that.

HAS SHE BEEN QUITE AN INSPIRATION FOR THIS MUSIC YOUR WORKING ON NOW?
Yeah, but my son has always been a big inspiration as well. But she's
definitely brought out a very feminine side in me, you know, which was long
overdue. She's brought out a sort of compassionate feeling, and a much more
positive optimistic feeling, yeah.

WHERE YOU SCARED ABOUT HAVING A GIRL?
Years ago, I was at first. I really was, absolutely, but at the same time I
wanted a girl because I wanted to bring a girl up to feel proud to be a
girl. At the same time I got over it and I think that's what also makes me
a great mother for a girl because I give her all the things I know a girl
should have.

WHAT SHOULD A GIRL HAVE?
I guess pride being a girl. You should never tell a girl, for example, not
to sit with her legs open you know. That's one thing I will never say to my
daughter, that kind of thing. Just a pride and a sense of not being afraid
of their sexuality, of their womanhood or of their power over other people
because of the fact they're a woman. Not to feel guilty about being a woman
and I guess to be comfortable in our skin. That would be the best way to
put it, not to be afraid to be beautiful.

YOUR LITTLE BOY, HOW OLD IS HE NOW?
He's nine, he'll be ten in July.

WHAT'S HIS NAME?
Jake. Jake Joseph Reynolds.

DOES HE GET OK WITH ROISIN?
Oh yeah he's great.

I SUPPOSE THERE'S ENOUGH OF AN AGE GAP ISN'T THERE?
Yeah, and I think its handy that she's a girl and you know if she was a boy
he might be more jealous. She's good for his self esteem too, because she
just adores him and thinks he's the funniest thing and whatever he does
it's hilarious so that makes him feel good about himself. It's not great to
be an only child you know, but yeah, I think when they're younger it's more
difficult if you have a baby so I don't think it's really fair.

SO ARE YOU BRINGING UP BOTH TWO ON YOUR OWN AT THE MOMENT?
Both their fathers are extremely involved in their lives, I would not want
to mislead anybody and it would not be fair to them either, but yeah, I
live with the children and I basically bring them up. But my son's father
(Reynolds) lives only down the road from us and is in and out all the time
and my daughters father is in Dublin but he comes over every ten days or
so, they're both very involved and we're all great friends

IT'S LIKE A BIG EXTENDED FAMILY?
Yeah, it's a kind of unconventional family you know. Yesterday at Roisin's
birthday, we did this thing I've always wanted to do, get a really kind of
traditional family photo of the two dads and two kids. It's like Africa,
the wrong way round, it's great. I really like it so I guess it's a kind of
model for the future kind of family that you can be. It's not necessarily
that if you are not with the fathers of your children that you should all
be horrible and mean and not friends and not in and out of each others
houses. It's important that kids can see that you don't have a live
together to be happy or be friends. It's hard to do but you've got to do
it.

ONE THING I THOUGHT, IS IT HARD BEING A SINGLE MOTHER IN THE MUSIC BUSINESS, IS IT DIFFICULT, IT DOES NOT SEEM TO BE AN EASY INDUSTRY TO WORK IN?
I think it's very, very hard to be a working mother whether you're married
or single and whether you work in the music business or whether you work at
Tescos. I think it's a head trip. Maybe slightly less though when you're a
single mother because you haven't got a husband earning the bread for you
to stay at home so you basically have to go out and earn the money. But
it's a head trip because you do feel guilty and blah, blah but as much as
possible now - in fact I always work my work schedule around my son's
school schedule and I'm never away when he's at school and stuff like that.
So if you can do it like that, which I am lucky enough to be able to do
because I've made a living already then you're laughing, but if not it's
difficult, definitely, because you do miss out and the kids definitely miss
out as well. I wouldn't say the music business was any more difficult then
any other, in fact it's probably easier than most.

YEAH IT IS ACTUALLY.
You can bring your kids with you and stuff, they like it and they get to
meet Mark Morrison, and they're happy.

GOING BACK TO ROUNF THE EARLY '90S. IT WAS QUITE A DIFFICULT PERIOD FOR YOU, WASN'T IT, WHAT WITH THE PICTURE OF THE POPE THAT YOU TORE UP AND THEN ALL THE CONTROVERSY ABOUT THE STAR SPANGLED BANNER.
No, that was before the pope.

AND THEN THE DUBLIN PEACE TOGETHER CONCERT AND PULLING OUT OF THAT AND THEN YOUR POEM IN THE IRISH TIMES. IS THERE ANY OF THAT PERIOD THAT YOU REGRET?
No, not at all. It was all very relevant for the moment and I have to me
and I'm very glad that I was. I couldn't be someone else.

IT WAS INTRESTING AT THE TIME I NOTICED SUZANNE MOORE SAYING NAME ME ANOTHER WOMAN WHO CAN GENERATE THIS KIND OF PUBLICITY WITHOUT TAKING HER CLOTHES OF.
Yeah, I'm quite proud of that actually, that's one thing that's always
stuck in my head. I'm (as I said) quite proud of that - but you never know
I might take them off one day anyway.

IT WAS NICE ACTUALLY TO SEE HOW MUCH SUPPORT YOU DID GET AT THAT TIME, LIKE ANNIE LENNNOX WRITING TO THE INDEPENDENT.
Yeah, and I actually got a lot of support in Ireland as well and funnily
enough I got an awful lot of support from priests and nuns, especially over
the poem incident, that whole piece together. Really, I got such a lot of
letters from priests and nuns and old people and stuff like that. It was
amazing but it doesn't bear out what the papers would say about stuff as
usual..

WHAT SORT OF THINGS ARE THEY SAYING, THE OLDER PEOPLE?
Some old ladies are very, very sweet - because I had said, look, kindly
leave me alone if you wouldn't mind, just give me a break - because I had
pulled out of the show really because I wasn't well and I needed to sort
some stuff out with my family, in truth, and I was getting a lot of hassle
because I'd pulled out and all these people had written these very
disrespectful articles in Ireland really, about possible reasons why I may
have pulled out of the show, people I may have been shagging for example
and all this kind of shit. So I had kind of said in this thing that I was
going through a hard time and obviously needed a bit of mothering or
whatever (without saying that word) but obviously all these old ladies
picked up on it so I get these letters from ladies saying if you want to
come for a cup of tea or come and stay - it was really sweet. Or priests
and nuns saying that before they had read this poem they hadn't understood
what I was on about with the pope thing and all that kind of crap, and once
they read it they did understand and they could see that what I was saying
was making sense and that they were sorry basically that there was any shit
coming from it.

WHAT WAS IT THAT MADE THEM UNDERSTAND?
That I said I was in pain and that I said that I knew what I was talking
about and that I had the right to talk about child abuse having through it
myself and that I had a right to talk about the healing process and how
important it is to talk about it and be open and be an open wound. If that
is what you are it's a very brave thing to be. So I guess that0s what they
liked. And a lot of therapists, including priests who were therapists sent
me letters too saying that they had this thing up on the wall of their
office now, that it encouraged other young people coming in there to talk
about what happened to them; which is a very hard thing to do. So basically
that's what they understood that I hadn't been just some angry girl trying
to get attention and stuff like that, that there was actually some
substance to it. Which was, pretty important in terms of children and all
that and God and people misuse of God and unfortunately the word I believe
wouldn't be such a shit hole if people did believe in God. Basically if the
world wasn't so evil all these terrible things wouldn't be happening. Like
you wouldn't have in England for example the state of emergency that we
seem to have now with children being murdered every week. So I guess they
understood that too that they within the church they do. A lot of people
wrote saying that they were very grateful that someone could speak because
they are not allowed to speak, that when they take a vow of being a priest
they have to promise that they will never say anything that will bring the
church in disrepute so they were saying, Thanks for saying it to us,
because it's more than our job is worth. But the offers from old ladies
were very sweet, lovely, and they send me little Mary cards, you know,
stuff like that.

DID YOU TAKE UP ANY OF THE OFFERS?
No I didn't but I kept a lot of the little things because I value old
people an awful lot and especially old ladies, so I kept a lot of the
little cards. And there was one letter I got which I did reply to, I got a
lovely letter from a girl who actually lived across the road from me at the
time this little 13 year old girl send me a lovely letter. So I wrote back
to her because she was so sweet.

AROUND THAT TIME DID YOU GET THERAPY YOURSELF?
Later I got therapy I didn't really go then, I probably ought to have and
if I had I probably wouldn't have been in all that trouble in the first
place. But later I did, yeah.

DID YOU FIND THAT HELPFULL; WHAT DID YOU LEARN FROM THAT?
I guess that I wasn't such a piece of shit after all and I wasn't the piece
of shit I thought I was, or that I had been led to believe I was, shall I
say

BECAUSE THERE'S AN ARGUMENT THAT ONCE YOU DO THERAPY AND GET CALMER AND SORT YOURSELF OUT THAT AFFECTS YOUR ART AND YOUR ART WILL BE LESS GOOD
I feel it's affected my art ion a very positive way. I feel more creative
than I've ever been and more confident about my creativity, my singing is
open and my songs are more joyous. I feel it's actually pout me in tough
with my creativity. In fact in other areas too, like painting loads of
pictures and flogging them and things, and generally being creative, if
being creative means being miserable all your life. I didn't go through all
that therapy for nothing. And besides it cost a lot of money as well.

WELL, I PERSONALLY THINK A LOT OF THAT CREATIVITY COMES IN SPITE OF MIREABLENESS.
Yeah, well it come to help you through it a bit as well. It doesn't do the
job. Like someone was saying to me recently "oh don't talk about therapy
but say that the creative process is healing", but I was saying that's a
lie. It isn't the only way to heal but it's certainly a help, it's soothes
you along, it's not necessarily despite the thing because you can't
separate you from the thing, but it's certainly a way of soothing yourself
through the whole healing process.

IT'S PROBABLY BEEN AROUND 10 YEARS NOW SINCE THE LION AND THE COBRA. LOOKING BACK HOW DO YOU THINK THE MUSIC BUSINESS HAS CHANGED, PARTICULARLY FOR WOMEN SUCH AS YOURSELF?
I don't know if it has really. I think it's always been the way it is now.
There's always been, as far back as - not very far really it's kind of
Debbie Harry'ish. I didn't hear Patti Smith for example until I left
Ireland when I was 18, I'd never heard of her, but I mean even her -
there's been very very strong women figures around in music always. And
then there's always also been the boobie type - I don't think things are
any different now than they ever were for girls. I don't notice any kind of
extra sex thing, I think there's always little phases, it's much more of a
boy thing now I think, boy band thing going on, which is a new thing
really, they're kind of obvious and the stripping off of men on television
it's a pretty new thing. I think it's changed in that way, like the Bay
City Rollers never took their clothes off.

HOW DO YOU THINK THAT YOU'VE CHANGED SINCE THEN?
Since 1987?

HOW OLD WHERE YOU THEN ?
I was twenty when my first album came out, just turned 20. How have I
changed? I guess millions and millions of ways. I suppose I know myself
better and I've more of an idea of what I'm about, which I guess I didn't
really then. Very hard to say. I guess I'm ten years older, a lot has
changed. I guess I just know myself better, that would be the best way to
describe it, I'm more familiar with how I operate inside.

THAT'S A TOUGH THING TO DO REALLY, GROW UP IN PUBLIC.
It's a tough thing to grow up anywhere, even in private it's a tough thing
to grow up. It's definitely tough to do it in public but I wouldn't carry
on about it because at the same time I kind of made my own bed for want a
better phrase. I wouldn't have any gripes about it because I created my own
life and so it's not like anybody did anything or whatever.

WHAT ABOUT YOUR FAMILY, HAVE YOU RE-ESTABLISHED CONTACT WITH THEM?
I think really for their sake it's better that I give up discussing them in
public. It's not really very considerate to them or their feelings.

THE ALBUM THAT YOU ARE WORKING ON NOW; WHAT ARE THE PLANS FOR THAT?
Well the truth is that I'm not really working on a new album now, this EP I
see as an mini album. I've got two children so I don't know when I'm going
to put another album out because I want to put my children first and by the
time I write enough songs for an album it could be two years from now
really, in reality. I could have waited and not put this EP stuff out and
wait until I have an album but that would have been then next year or so.
I'm putting this out really so that I can work in the summer which is the
only time I can work because I've got children. So it's a really situation
of creating so that I can work in the summer, but honest I couldn't tell
you when I'm going to have an album out.

FOR YOU, THE SONG WRITING PROCESS, DOES IT TAKE QUITE A LONG TIME?
It does and it doesn't. I don't write songs very often, I wouldn't be very
prolific but when I do write songs it's very quick, they just kind of
happen but it would be maybe every three or four or five months I would
write a song. But like I say, when I do write them it's very quick. I'm so
busy most of the time that I don't have the time to listen and see what's
going on. Because kids are hard work. Once I can hear them then they come
quickly.

AND YOU'RE DOING SOME DATES THIS SUMMER, WHAT WILL THE SHOW BE LIKE?
It will be a very joyous, almost religious experience, infact it will be a
religious experience hopefully, that's the intention of the whole thing. It
will be a very soothing and hypnotic and transforming, almost sexual
experience.

GOING BACK TO WHAT WE WERE MENTIONING EARLIER, HAVE A LOT OF YOUR IDEAS BEEN COMING THROUGH PAGANISM, IS IT SOMETHING THAT YOU'RE QUITE INTERESTED IN?
Oh yeah, I mean I think I've always been a pagan by virtue of the fact that
I'm an Irish woman and it's in my blood for centuries back. It's not
something that's a new influence, I've always been a religious person. My
first album was called The Lion And The Cobra and it's full of religion, so
I've always been a very spiritual person in the pagan tradition, so yeah,
it's nothing new. You can't grow up in Ireland and not be.

WHY DO YOU THINK GOOD THE MOTHER BECAME GOD THE FATHER AND BECAME A DIFFERENT KIND OF GOD?
Why, it's a good question, I've always wondered. I don't think I can answer
that, I don't know the answer. I don't know at what point in time who came
and whispered what into whose ears. I guess violence, it had the power of
violence, it won because it literally build it's churches upon the oak
groves, that's what they literally did. They stamped it out. So that's why
it won really. I don't know why it wanted to. I don't know why it wanted to
get rid of the mother, I guess fear. It doesn't have any logic to me why
anybody would want to shut out the feminine principle within them. I guess
fear being out of control of sexuality really, of the power that women have
to make men feel out of control. And sometimes men like to be in control.
It was also a foreign culture, it was a Roman kind of culture and was
appalled by the dirt and savagery of it all and what is amazing considering
the kind of sexual stuff that they were into. We were basically into
ordinary, natural sex and they were into putting babies on their penises,
The ruler of the Roman empire used to put newborn babies on their penises
that's what they used to do, so I don't know why they were so shocked when
they got to Ireland. There was never any of that going on there, but there
is now, as a consequence of Christianity being there. I couldn't tell you
why they would be so afraid but I know why they succeeded, it was because
of the violence.

LOOKING BACK OVER YOUR ALBUMS IS THERE ANYTHING THAT YOU'VE RECORDED THAT YOU DON'T LIKE OR YOU FEEL A BIT EMBARRASSED BY?
Yeah, loads, especially on my first album because some of the songs I wrote
when I was 15. Drink before the war - I think is especially embarrassing.
Some people really like it for some reason but I hate it basically.

WHY?
Because it's like when you read your diary, when you're 15 you think you
are being really deep and meaningful and actually you're just talking a lot
of bullocks. It's just embarrassing.

DONT CRY FOR ME ARGENTINA. SHOULD YOU HAVE BEEN IN ALAN PARKER'S FILM?
Oh, not at all. I'm not an actor. I mean I've done some little bits of
acting and I still do tiny bits but I would never want to carry the whole
movie. I would hate to be in that business, it's an horrible job. I love
that song but I haven't heard any of the other songs in it. No not at all I
have the desire to be a movie star. No.

HAVE YOU SEEN 'EVITA'?.
No, but that song I just always loved anyway and in fact that song is
really how I started to make my living. I used to go round Dublin singing
that song and would make money out of talent competitions. If you sang that
song you couldn't lose because all the women loved it, there'd be all the
ladies in this thing. I owe my living to it, really.,

WHAT OTHER SONGS WENT DOWN REALLY WELL?
Really that one. That was my part piece at home and anywhere I went that
was really the one. There was one other, in Ireland they really like the
soppy awful songs like Annie song. Things like that. American pie and
blowing in the wind and that kind of shit. Embarrassing stuff.

STRONG FOLK BASIS.
Yeah, very, especially when I was growing up, there was a huge kind of folk
tradition in Ireland, the 70's where a very folky kind of time in Ireland.
Lots of folk artists, a guy called Freddie White I used to be into it,
Barry Moore people like that, Christy Moore. I mean there still is a very
acoustic tradition. I mean Irish singing is traditionally a'capelle with no
music so you can't get much more folky than that really.

WHO ARE YOU LISTENING TO NOW; ANY PARTICULAIR ARTISTS YOU LIKE?
Well again, my personal kind of thing is that floats my boat is roots,
that's all I like, I like Bob Marley obviously especially and I like a guy
called Little Roy and there's another guy called Sizzler whose got a great
song out at the moment called 'Look who's laughing' and Camelot and Buju
Banton I like a lot

DESPITE ALL THE CONTROVERSY ABOUT HIM BEING ANTI-GAY?
Well I've got so many friend and people I know in life who I don't
necessarily agree with everything they think or do or so but if I was going
to shut out them because I don't agree something they think or do or say,
then I would miss all the things that I might learn from them. It's just
part of the Jamaican culture to be very anti-gay and I don't agree with it
and the same as I don't agree with not being around women when they have
their periods, but at the same time I respect that he's a great song
writer. And maybe he had to just go through that, he's just a young geezer
you know. He's got a great song and it's called "Untold Stories" which I
don't know if you've heard it, it's amazing, he's got an album out actually
called "Lil' Shilo", his latest album and he's got this one song on it
called "Untold Stories" which is just absolutely amazing, very, very
tender, delicate song. I guess that's a thing young guys go through
especially black guys I mean it's a very kind of hard thing to be gay and
black, it's a big, big no. So you have to very much assert your
anti-gayness, so as to be proved a man. It's just young men.

ANYONE ELSE YOU'VE BEEEN LISTENING TO?
I don't really listen to a lot of new music other than roots stuff if it
comes out so I'm in to all the things that I've always ever been into Ella
Fitzgerald I'm into Noreen Irene, I'm into Courtney love and Van Morrison
I'm into obviously.

DO YOU SEE PARALLELS WITH YOUR EXPERIENCE AND COURTNEY LOVE'S EXPERIENCE?
I do and I don't. There are probably more than anyone outside of the two of
us might realize. The parallel is not in her experience vis a vis Kurt
Corbain it's in that she was also very severely abused when she was a child
as he was very, very horrifically abused when he was a child. So there are
parallels in there definitely but not in what's happened to her. I guess in
terms of pain but again I've never been through something like that. I've
never been married to a guy who killed himself.

I GUESS IN TERMS OF BEING OUTSPOKEN AND NOT YOUR TRADITIONAL MALLEABLE FEMALE POP STAR ?
I guess. I suppose our parallel - I see her physically in my mind and I
can't see a parallel because we look so different but yeah we are obviously
very alike and I think she's probably got in to a less trouble than I do
because it's a bit more acceptable, because I really was I think one of the
first women to really come along and be that outspoken and subsequently
there are a lot of women like me, not that they're like me as such, but in
that tradition. But I think really I was one of the first people to come
along and open that up.

IN A WAY THAT WASN'T JUST A GIMMICK.
Yeah I was the first very odd looking woman to come along for example, no
hair on and being tough and rejecting the whole idea of stardom and awards
all that kind of shit, behaving like a geezer really, not just looking like
one but actually acting like one. I think there are models that are then
similar to that but they're no necessarily that they're a version of it.
Which is not to sound like I don't think anyone's original because they're
but I just mean that it's a different kind of kettle of fish now. I love
Courtney Love though, I think she's really a genius.

VERY BRIGHT WOMAN.
Yeah extremely.

I THINK THAT'S THE OTHER THING - NOT HIDING HOW BRIGHT SHE IS, HER INTELLIGENCE.
Well you couldn't, you couldn't hide that kind of intelligence. Yeah she
is, but that's why people are so freaked out by her as well. They'd really
love if she was really stupid but she's got more talent in her little
finger then her husband ever had really. When you listen to her songs, I
can't wait to hear her next album, that should be a real hum dinger.

SHE DOES A GREAT PERFORMANCE IN LARRY FLINT. I WAS JUST THINKING WHEN YOU WERE TALKING ABOUT YOUR LIVE PERFORMANCE BEING A RELIGIOUS EXPERIENCE I REMEMBER PATTI SMITH SAYING A SIMILAR THING IN A WAY, THAT ROCK 'N ROLL TO
HER WAS A RELIGIOUS EXPERIENCE. DO YOU WANT TO TALK A BIT ABOUT THAT?
Well again, like I said, I didn't hear Patti Smith until I left Ireland and
I suppose she would probably have been the first woman to come along and
really be quite outspoken about things I think and there was the other one
that died, Janis Joplin, I guess she was outspoken in the way of being out
of her head and not really saying anything whereas Patti Smith was really
saying Nigger which is a big word for a woman to say. You want me to say
how I feel about Rock 'n Roll in general being a religious experience? Well
I guess it can be, it is very sexual. Religion and sex aren't really the
same thing to me so I guess it can be but again it depends on what you
think Rock 'n Roll is. I mean Patti Smith may well be a sexual experience,
you know, the Spice Girls are not, to me. And the Rolling Stones equally
wouldn't be. I guess it wouldn't be right to label it like that. I think
that there are elements of music like the whole roots thing for example
which is a religious experience and the Noreen Irene kind of Irish
tradition or whatever and the whole Pakistani tradition. But I wouldn't say
rock 'n Roll as in The Rolling Stones and that kind of thing is a religious
experience for me.

I SUPPOSE IN THE WAY THAT IT CAN TRANSFORM A CROWD OR AFFECT A CROWD.
Yeah, well I mean Hitler transformed crowds as well, it's very easy to
manipulate people, if you start going like this (clapping) you can make
people clap very easily it doesn't mean that your music is any good or
having any kind of spiritual effect on people it's just that people are
like sheep really. It doesn't necessarily mean they're having a religious
experience, but I know what you mean. But I don't think it's religious. I
think sometimes it's a kind of psychotic experience in many ways but I
guess you could say that it's religious too. But it's a kind of madness I
think, especially the whole American kind of tradition of hurling yourself
into the audience and all that stuff. It's just general madness basically I
think, a suicidal experience, a collective suicidal feeling. As expressed
by Kurt Corbain on behalf of the rest of America.

HAVE YOU BEEN BACK TO AMERICA RECENTLY?
Not since I did Lollapalooza, I was there two years ago.

WHAT WAS LOLLAPALOOZA LIKE?
It was great, it was brilliant but I was very pregnant and very sick, I
couldn't handle it, I was throwing up - I couldn't sing really I was so ill
- so I came home. But it was brilliant. And Courtney Love's...., that's why
I really wanted to go so I'd get to see Courtney Love and she's amazing.

SO DID YOU GET TO MEET HER AND HANG OUT TOGETHER?
Yeah.

WORKING CLOSELY WITH JOHN, YOU WERE MARRIED TO HIM - IS THAT QUITE DIFFICULT WORKING WITH SOMEONE YOU WERE ALSO ROMANTICALLY INVOLVED WITH ?
No not at all because again like I was saying earlier on about the kind of
unconventional family thing, it's unconventional in that we've always been
best, best friends and we didn't break up because of any kind aggro between
us we really broke up because I just didn't like being married, it just
freaked me out. But we've been always really brilliant friends and loved
each other a lot. And more than that we loved the music. We understand each
other very well, and he understands me very well so I don't really work
with anyone else and I've never actually liked the music as much when I
have worked with anyone else. No, not at all because there isn't any of
that sort of cliché stuff going on because we're all good friends.

DID IT TAKE A WHILE TO WORK THROUGH TO GET THAT POINT?
No, never with the work. It might sometimes take a while if - it obviously
is painful for people when you break up or whatever - it might take a while
to really get around to kind of being very, very happy and comfortable with
each other but even through that it would never interfere with the work
because we both would put the work above all of that. We both loved the
music so much. No, never was a problem.

THE FATHER OF ROISIN HE'S A JOURNALIST ISN'T HE?
Yeah, he's a writer. I mean he writes for the Irish Times but he also
writes plays and radio plays and stuff. John Walters his name is.
Practically everyone I ever go out with is called John, it's very strange.

WHAT IS IT ABOUT THE NAME JOHN?
I haven't a clue, it's really weird. I should be very careful with people
called John, avoid them.

WELL THAT'S SEAN IN IRISH ISN'T IT?
Yeah, my father was called John, I have a brother called John, Sinead is
the female equivalent of John as well and practically everyone I've ever
gone out with was called John.

                                  END