Photographs, clips, screenshots, film stills, each fragmented image is intended to say something about a life. News of her death spread quickly and the images arrived almost immediately.
It was as if the choice of a specific image was meant to solidify something about Sinéad that was at risk of being lost and forgotten. Between her Becket-inspired music video or defiant protests, she was radiantly beautiful; an artist in the purest sense; a voice cherished by many; a whipping post for a sick society; an activist who stood definitely against the Church and the state; she was everything at once, but also singularly an artist or political force depending on who you ask. Earlier photos of her seem to suggest something else, as if they hope to catch a glimpse of an unfiltered, unmediated Sinéad. She was a real person in a fake world.
I mostly heard lies about Sinéad throughout my life: she was unhinged, manic, somehow unserious, easily dismissed, and also equally dangerous, better off ignored, as if simply being the subject of discourse was itself a threat to public order. I never thought that much about her, other than to note the strange fixation others had. The backlash always felt oversized, and listing them now diminishes those set against her (Frank Sinatra once threatened to “kick her in the ass” and Joe Pesci said “I would have gave her such a smack”).
The single which truly made her famous, Nothing Compares 2 U, was released two years before I was born, and by the time I had encountered it, her music never felt like mine as if it had already been claimed by the previous generation. Yet like many other people my age, at some point I had my own rediscovery of her life and work. Perhaps a Youtube snippet from an interview would lead you to an extended Spotify session of her back catalogue. There are all the hits: All Apologies, You Made Me the Thief of Your Heart and so on. Her music is more and less than people claim; there are a lot of fun pop songs and country tracks alongside the rousing protest ballads.
Her most iconic moments, such as ripping up a photo of Pope John Paul II on SNL in 1992, precede a wider secularisation of Irish identity while also reflecting her lifelong political commitments by referencing an anti-war song by Bob Marley. Nearly a decade later the Catholic Church would admit to allegations of child sexual abuse she made then. Yet, she was not just a vocal critic of the injustices, at the earliest stages of her life she was the victim of them too, as if her life was history itself.
At a pinnacle screenshot of her tearing up the photograph, her face is obscured, as if foreshadowing what was to come. She would live through and be reduced to images. It’s the paradox of visibility that is granted to celebrities, particularly women who dare to flaunt taboo. Her relationship with fame was ambiguous, and even from the beginning she held the industry at arms length; just a year after her debut album was nominated for a grammy, she boycotted the awards with Public Enemy, but was always committed to being a popular artist, to connecting with a broad public, yet navigating the music industry and media was clearly a source of great personal suffering. But it would be wrong to diminish her agency. In an interview some years later, she’s surprisingly nonchalant about her experience from the SNL protest. “I don’t really remember… There was a mixed reaction to be honest. I’m an intelligent woman, I knew there would be an aftermath.”
She deserved better. A lot is being written about Sinéad right now, although what strikes me now is how many of the sentiments and suggestions being shared within obituaries and personal laments now have been in formation in recent years, rewriting what had come before it too. What is most captivating, most daring, is that she seems consistent despite it all: it was everyone else who bent and twisted around her.
Her death is sad, tragic. She was so young, yet seemed to have already lived more than most ever will. I hardly knew her; I miss her. I miss her; I hardly knew her.