IRELAND
Refinery 29 (blog)
September 16, 2018
By Tara Murtha
Every song is a prayer pulled from her throat.
Sinéad O’Connor’s breakthrough record I Do Not Want What I Haven’t Got opens with a recitation of the Serenity Prayer, and ends with the titular poem, performed like a chant:
“I’m walking through the desert / And I am not frightened although it’s hot / I have all that I requested / And I do not want what I haven’t got.”
**
Two years after the concert in Santiago, O’Connor was the musical guest on a now-notorious episode of Saturday Night Live. She sang an a capella version of Bob Marley’s “War,” updating lyrics referencing apartheid and colonialism in Africa to address child abuse, ye-AH. O’Connor ends the chant: “We know we will win. We have confidence in the victory of good over evil.”
While chanting the word “evil,” O’Connor holds up a photograph of Pope John Paul II and rips it in half, then into pieces, then tosses the pieces at the camera and says, “Fight the real enemy!”
[Includes link to SNL clip]
The backlash was swift and brutal. Frank Sinatra called her a “stupid broad” said he’d kick her ass if she was a guy. Actor Joe Pesci, who hosted SNL the following week, made a joke about smacking O’Connor in the face, and the audience laughed and clapped. A Catholic cardinal was pretty sure it was “voodoo.” Even Madonna was aghast, or pretended to be.
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