The Bite Magazine - Issue 11

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Sitting at the back of a bus on the top deck donning a clerical
collar (apparently she was ordained a priest), sleek leather
trousers and boots, Irish singer-songwriter Sinead O’Connor
sings ‘bout the bullet and the red light’ as she watches the
happenings going on in front of her. From school girls giggling
and then helping a fellow passenger when her shopping falls out
of her bag to a man constantly watching a young girl who has
just got on the bus, who returns his stare with suspicion, you
can’t help but think that something is amiss here. But as the girl
glances at him for the last time before getting off the bus and
finally smiles and he returns the smile, perhaps we were too
hasty in our thinking. In the video for her new single, ‘8 Good
Reasons’, taken from her 10th studio album I’m Not Bossy, I’mThe
Boss and shot in her home town in Dublin, Sinead sings about
being ‘not from this place / I’m from a different time, different
space’ but yet has eight good reasons to stick around or perhaps
nine but doesn’t exactly reveal what those eight or nine good
reasons are.
She does however appear to be talking about her experience
in the music industry as she declares, ‘You know I love to make
music / But my head got wrecked by the business / Everybody
wanting something from me / They rarely ever wanna just know
me’. This may explain her long absence from music that saw
her at her most prominent in the ‘90s. A very interesting video
that keeps you engaged and gets you thinking, ‘8 Good Reasons’
has a nice easy beat with Sinead’s Irish sound shining through and
her signature shaved head that brings to mind the video to her
much-remembered signature smash hit ‘Nothing Compares To
You’. It is indeed an emotive and beautiful song that represents
the very best of Sinead’s song-writing,with her ever-powerful and
moving vocals set to a gorgeous and uplifting chorus produced
by long-term collaborator John Reynolds.
Sinead O’Connor