RIP Dolores O’Riordan

Dolores O’Riordan of The Cranberries died today at the age of 46. No real details at this point, but what does it matter anyhow?

A few thoughts are going through my mind, memories mostly.

I have very vivid memories of listening to ‘Dreams’ on the dock at Angele’s house in Moonbeam, along with Carol.
I wasn’t into music until the mid-90s and that was the height of the Cranberries power over our brain, our ears and our heart. I remember hearing their music at friend’s houses, at parties…wherever you went, it was on.
I remember being in Carol’s basement trying to play guitar and I’m pretty sure I was trying to learn ‘Dreams’ on guitar. Even now I probably would have a hard time with the picking pattern!
I remember seeing them at the Molson Amphitheatre in 1999. Man, we had horrible seats, but it was still a great show. I remember it was back in the day of when I would write down the songs of the setlist as they were playing…so I always brought a piece of paper and a pen with me. That didn’t last too long. Kids reading this are probably asking “Why didn’t you just write it in a note section on your phone?”
I also remember Collective Soul opening up for them and they were touring their Dosage album. MAN, what a killer tour.
I remember the shock of the ending of ‘I Just Shot John Lennon’. Quite surprising the first time you hear that song.
To The Faithful Departed is still my favourite Cranberries album. They just brought a level of aggressiveness which was typical of most stuff coming out of the 90s.
I remember trying to get tickets to see them in Montreal last year. I didn’t manage to but I just found a few weeks ago that the tour had ended up being cancelled due to Dolores having back problems.
Will my kid ever have musicians that have an incredible force such as the Cranberries? I’m not sure! I feel that many musicians don’t have a lot of staying power these days.
Wow, she was only 46 years old? That’s only six years older than I am! When I was younger, even if you would have said to 15 year old me that Dolores was 21 years old, I would have thought that was so far in the future that I couldn’t even fathom being that old. Now? Damn, 6 years isn’t that far away!

RIP Dolores.

Bonus: I dug up the greatest photos of all time from the August 27, 1999 concert I was at. Collective Soul opened, Cranberries closed and as you can tell by the photos, we had the greatest seats in the house.