“When You’re Gone” by Pillow Queens is the first single from the forthcoming tribute album “Salvation” inspired by The Cranberries for Pieta. The song was released today and is available on all streaming platforms now.

Pillow Queens will be performing  the song on “The Late Late Show” tonight from 9:35pm on RTÉ One (Irish TV).

Pillow Queens on Twitter,

The “Salvation” album is set for release 1st October 2021, full track listing as follows:

1. Sinead O’Connor – No Need To Argue
2. Irish Women in Harmony – Dreams
3. Pillow Queens – When You’re Gone
4. Moncrieff – Free To Decide
5. Wyvern Lingo – Salvation
6. Aimée – Linger
7. Walking On Cars – Promises
8. Kodaline with the RTE Orchestra featuring Noel Hogan – Zombie (Live)
9. The Cranberries – Chocolate Brown (Recorded Live for 2FM)
10. Kitt Philippa – Twenty One
11. Roe – I Can’t Be With You
12. True Tides – Ode To My Family
13. Kellie Lewis – Ridiculous Thoughts

You may note that “Dreams” by Irish Women In Harmony and “Zombie” by Kodaline+Noel+Orchestra were already known and released a few time ago and could be considered in fact as the real 1st singles of the album!

Two more things to notice, the album includes an unreleased Cranberries recording “Chocolate Brown” live for 2FM, and singer Lyra (who performed “Zombie” on “The Late Late Show” as tribute to Dolores last January) is not featured on the album.

CD and limited edition yellow vinyl are available to pre-order today (more or less €9.99 and €19.99). See your local shops for more details.

Sources: 2fm.rte.ie, umusic.ie

A rare and unique “Stars” test pressing signed by the remaining band members plus Dolores’ mother (!?) will be auctioned tomorrow for the White Label Auction in aid of The BRiT Trust.

The Cranberries just announced it tonight on their website and socials (Twitter, Facebook, Instagram).

Auction page here (lot #115)

UPDATE – MAY 5

Sold for £400 (+28% inc. VAT)

“To The Faithful Departed” turns 25 today.
Happy anniversary to this masterpiece released on 30 April 1996.

« To the faithful departed and those left behind, there is a light that never dies »

The Cranberries posted the following message on their socials (Twitter, Facebook, Instagram)

The Cranberries just announced on their socials (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram), the launch of their American-based online merchandise store which can now serve all American regions (north, central and south) more efficiently.

Link to the store: https://thecranberries.forwardmerch.com

A new 3CD boxset to be released by Spectrum (the record label who already released Dreams The Collection) and titled “The Essential Cranberries” or “Essential Cranberries” or maybe just “Essentials” has been spotted on Amazon.co.uk, wowhd.co.uk and merchbar.com recently.

According to Amazon, it is to be released on 30 April 2021 and according to other websites it is to be released on 7 May 2021. There is no tracklist information for now and artwork might be very uncertain as already seen before (for example on 606Musix).

Even though the 30th of April is the exact release date of the album “To The Faithful Departed”, this boxset has probably nothing to do with a 25th Anniversary Edition!

Special thanks to Dan for the links.

UPDATE – MAY 10

Nothing was released on May 7th.
Could be the usual mistake due to the American style of writing dates, which could mean to be released on July 5th!
To be continued…

UPDATE – JULY 20

This was never released in the end!
Don’t pay attention to the “OUT OF STOCK” mention on merchbar.com, it was never in stock!

The “Zombie” Music Video has hit another 100 Million views exactly a year after getting 1 billion views on YouTube. 100 Million views a year looks like its cruising speed!

iTunes made the song available for 69 cents. As a result, it got back on Billboard charts, not just arriving at its peak position on the hot alternative songs charts (#13) on 9 April 2021,

but hitting another #1 milestone (alternative digital sales charts), still on 9 April 2021.
Awesome!

Thanks to Seamus and Benjamin Alexander for the info and screenshots!

Watch Noel Hogan with Bronagh Gallagher perform “Crybaby” on The Late Late Show on RTÉ One tonight.
Replay available on YouTube

It seems that the STARS 2LP (transparent vinyl) will be available in many other countries than the UK as part of the Record Store Day 2021 second drop, due on July 17th.

Release was announced yesterday on:
– French “Disquaire Day” website here
– German “Record Store Day” website here
– “Record Store Day Ireland” website here
– “Record Store Day Italia” website here
– “Record Store Day NL” website here (apparently available in Belgium too)
– “Record Store Day w Polsce” website here
– Spanish “Record Store Day” website here

Let’s note German website features a negative version of the cover artwork when all other websites are showing the regular artwork; maybe just a mistake:

No sign of the release yet on the Australian, Canadian, Japanese and US Record Store Day websites.
We’ll keep you updated if this appears in the upcoming hours.

As announced today on the Record Story Day UK website, The Cranberries will be releasing a limited edition vinyl of their best of Stars to raise money for War Child:

The Cranberries – Stars: the best of 92-02 – UK stores only
Following on from the reissues of ‘Everybody Else is Doing it… ‘ and ‘No Need to Argue’ – and 30 years after their debut release – UMC are proud to issue for the first time on vinyl a special transparent edition of the band’s greatest-hits collection ‘Stars: The Best of 1992–2002’. The Cranberries rose to international fame in the 1990s with global smashes such as ‘Zombie’, ‘Dreams’ and ‘Linger’ – collected here alongside tracks from their five albums for Island – plus two tracks unavailable on other albums ‘New New York’ and ‘Stars’.

This vinyl shall only be available on the shelves of participating independent record shops on 17th July 2021 as part of the second Record Store Day UK Drop event.

Speaking on their involvement in the campaign, Fergal Lawler of The Cranberries said, “We are very honoured that Universal have chosen Stars as a special Vinyl release for Record Store Day.  The proceeds from sales are going to the War Child foundation, a charity that do incredible work to help vulnerable children in war-torn countries.”

Indeed the Record Store Day website recalls that, “War Child UK is the only specialist charity for children affected by conflict. They work to support children through their recovery – keeping them safe, helping them learn and cope with their experiences, as well as equipping them with skills for the future. They also campaign for changes to policies and practices to support children in conflict, working with children and young people themselves to demand their rights.“

Also announced by The Cranberries on their website and socials (Facebook, Instagram, Twitter)

The Cranberries posted a message on their Twitter and Facebook accounts today to mark Saint Patrick’s Day (in lockdown for the 2nd time in Ireland).

A rare behind the scenes photo (Polaroid) of the Zombie music video was recently re-shared by alexverveboy on his blog and Facebook. The photo was originally shared on hungertv.com (slide gallery) by director Samuel Bayer. Real gem!

Very rare photo of The Cranberries (well… Dolores and a bit of Mike behind in the shadow!) taken live in concert in Limerick, possibly at Savoy Top Floor in December 1991.

Special thanks to Rainer & Ralf Lindheim for sharing such a gem from their private collection.

Happy Milestone Birthday to our favorite drummer.
Wishing you a fabulous 50th, Ferg.
Sláinte!

Photo credit: “Something Else”

The “Ode To My Family” music video has recently hit 100 million views on YouTube.

For the occasion The Cranberries posted a message on their website and socials today.

Also to notice, the “When You’re Gone” music video has also just hit 100 million views on YouTube.
Congrats!

Another happy day for our fellow collectors as our researches led us to discover a 54:22 min audio recording of the concert The Cranberries performed on 9 August 1995 at Nissan Pavillon in Manassas, VA. The recording was uploaded in January 2018 as a tribute to Dolores on Mixcloud’s Jerry Hoyt Radio,

We were aware this show had been recorded and broadcast on a local radio back in the days but had never managed to lay our hands on this recording before.
Jerry Hoyt explains that the show was, “recorded by WHFS and played back on Thanksgiving Day, 1995″. He adds that he, “rescued [the recording] from an old reel to reel tape headed for the dumpster in 2009″. A small miracle that allows us to hope that the full show will one day surface.

That’s not all, though! Jerry Hoyt brings us some more treats as he also uploaded the WHFS radio interview of the band recorded on 28 April 1999 before the band’s performance at 9:30 Club on that same night in Washington.
The interview, as we know, also features live performances of “Shattered” and “Animal Instinct”. A lovely treasure not many of us had heard before.
How not to love Dolores offering the person who stole the band’s guitar at the National Sylvan Theater 4 years earlier to bring it back and come share a big bowl of ice cream with the band backstage after the show.

As announced earlier, Cork singer Lyra performed quite a stunning version of “Zombie” on “The Late Late Show” tonight as tribute to Dolores O’Riordan.

Ryan Tubridy, the host of the show, said the new album “Salvation” is expected to be released later this year with all profits going to Pieta Charity, confirmed the contribution of Sinead O’Connor, and unexpectedly announced that it would feature an unreleased recording from The Cranberries!!

Note that Lyra’s version of “Zombie” should not be part of the tribute album and was played for The Late Late Show exclusively.

The video is now available on YouTube

Special thanks to Kevin for the information, and for helping the CW team big time today!

The Cranberries posted a message and a never seen before photo of Dolores on their website and socials (Twitter, Facebook, Instagram).

Happy Birthday Noel
…and Merry Christmas to everyone.

Photo credit: “In The End”

New interview with Noel published yesterday on theoaklandpress.com
(due to legal restrictions, link might not work in every country, use VPN or click image below for pdf file)

New interview with Noel published today on cleveland.com

The winner of the artwork for the “Salvation” tribute album cover has been revealed on 2fm.rte.ie today. The media also published a shortlist of 12 other album covers.

Congrats to winner Sam Dermody… as well as all the other artists who sent their amazing artworks.

Album to be released in 2021.

Salvation – Artwork by Sam Dermody

40% off Black Friday sale will be live on The Cranberries Official UK store from 0.01am on Friday 27th until 6pm Monday 30th GMT

https://thecranberries.shopfirebrand.com/

Music video director Marty Callner posted on Instagram and Facebook, 2 rare behind the scenes photos taken in the Mojave desert for the “Free To Decide“ video along with a few words in memory of Dolores.

A new interview with Noel and Fergal was published today on pleasekillme.com
Special thanks to Robert for the link.

Almost the exact same title as the forbes.com interview from a few days ago, but new article/interview with Fergal and Noel posted yesterday on americansongwriter.com

New interview with Fergal and Noel published today on forbes.com

New interview with Noel Hogan on “What Goes On”. The almost 2-hour long podcast was published on YouTube today directly by What Goes On.

New interview with Fergal published today on analogue.io

New interview with Fergal and Noel published today on undertheradarmag.com

The NNTA 25th Anniversary Edition is out now. In fact the release is simply titled “Deluxe Edition” for the 2LP and 2CD versions and “2020 Remaster” for the 1CD version.

The Cranberries posted a message on their website and socials earlier today.

New interview with Noel and Fergal published today on spin.com

The Cranberries published the official video for “(They Long To Be) Close To You” on their YouTube account today. The video contains rare photos from the No Need To Argue photo session.

The audio (taken from the 25th Anniversary Edition of No Need To Argue – out Nov 13th) is also available on all streaming platforms.

Read the article directly on hotpress.com

A couple of weeks ago, in an interview with Kyle Meredith from Consequence of Sound, an anecdote from Fergal grabbed our attention (28:12 on the video) as he was mentioning owning an award that did not sound familiar to us, “There was an award we got actually once, which was like a mini couch, where the button holes would be at the back of the couch were two cds, for No Need To Argue it was.“

Time passed and we assumed Ferg was likely speaking of the US NNTA 5x platinum award, although the description did not quite exactly fit.

To our greatest delight and surprise, Mike shed light on this mystery a few days ago as he randomly came across his copy of the so called “mini couch” and shared a preview of this gem on Instagram (stories).

As you may have noticed, we’re not used to sharing the content of the lads’ personal social media accounts, but as a collector database, we decided to break our rule for once as this was much too exciting not to be shared! So here is the photo of Mike’s amazing trophy that was presented to the band members back in the 90s:

And this larger view makes us now realize years after that we already knew it before (without having understood what it was exactly) back in 2003… when Dolores’ shoes were throning on it!

We can easily imagine that we’re not the only ones today who wish we owned a mini Alf Garnett Suite… are we? 😀

That being said we trust our readers to show respect and common sense, and to refrain from trying to contact Mike who’s unlikely to sell/give his awards…

Special thanks to our favorite bass player for sharing this with fans!

As the Cranberries World team was investigating as to where exactly some scenes of the Just My Imagination video were filmed in order to add this information to the map section, we tried to get in touch with Rick Fuller, producer of the video, who very kindly shed light on this mystery for us and invited director Philip Harder to join in the discussion.

Rick explained that the video was filmed over two days, on 27 July 1999 in Poolbeg, Dublin in the area around the Pigeon House Hotel near the old Poolbeg Generator Plant, and on 28 July 1999 in the Ardmore Studios, Wicklow

The two of them went out of their way to answer our questions and sent us never seen before pictures of the making of the video, as well as pictures of the CD and the microphone used on set, even including the STORYBOARDS. We can’t thank these two gentlemen enough for their kindness and availability.

Do you know what the band’s expectations were for this music video?

Director Philip Harder – Dolores wanted a visual fantasy, where she can magically step out of a rough Irish setting and into a playful fantasy. But each time she goes there and loses herself in her imagination, she is interrupted by reality.

What was the inspiration behind the video for Phil Harder and yourself?

Director Philip Harder – My wife Isabelle told me a story of walking with a Walkman, listening to music and imagining a surreal world.

How was the location (Poolbeg Power Station, Pigeon House Hotel etc…) chosen for the shoot?

Director Philip Harder – Since the Cranberries are Irish, and I recently lived in Dublin, we knew these areas would offer great locations with an industrial edge, all within a few blocks of each other.

Why did you choose to use such old cars?

Director Philip Harder – The Citron that the guys drove was a very rare car that one of the crew members had access to. The microphone Dolores uses was designed for the video to match the shape of that car. The rest of the vehicles in the background were designed to make the video feel out of time which reminded me of Ireland in the early 1980’s, or perhaps a classic Cranberries-style music video like the vintage stock footage in Zombie.

How would you describe your collaboration with the band?

Director Philip Harder – I spoke with Dolores on the phone after she read the treatment which described her listening to music and falling into an imaginary world. Dolores was really excited to shoot the video with this concept in mind. Dolores is a pro. She made many videos before this. On the shoot we were very collaborative, discussing scenes in detail, including the settings and background actors as well as cameos by her band mates. Dolores seemed to love acting and playing a “character” in the video. She gave it her all to act out the part and always gave feedback on how she wanted to be portrayed. On set I followed her lead to make her feel comfortable in the role. As I recall we discussed in detail every scene we shot.

Philip & Dolores

How was the atmosphere on set? Dolores once explained she declined to shoot a scene where a car would have stopped right before hitting her [Interview for German NBC show GIGA].

Director Philip Harder – Dolores actually shot the car scene and I explained how to do it, (there’s a photo of me directing her for that scene) but for safety we used a long lens and editing to make the car appear closer than it was. Dolores really liked the fantasy we were creating and loved acting the part. She also really enjoyed working with cinematographer Matty Libatique, who shot films for Spike Lee, A Star Is Born and many other well known movies. Matty and Dolores really hit it off on set. At one point we were using an experimental, high contrast black and white film for the band performance. The film quality is either black or white with no gray scale. I was concerned the film would exaggerate Dolores’s freckles and could become black dots all over her face. I brought this up but she referred to Matty for advice. Dolores said that since she and I both have freckles I might be bias. Matty told Dolores her freckles were beautiful and we should exaggerate them. She in turn looked at me and winked, as if to say I told you so.

Philip & Dolores

DP Matthew Libatique

What’s the best memory you have from this experience working with The Cranberries?

Director Philip Harder – After the shoot Dolores invited my wife and I to her home in Limerick. When we arrived she showed us around her entire property. She was an amazing, gracious host. (I think it’s an Irish trait!) Later we drank Guinness in her private western bar, sitting on saddle bar stools. That night Dolores set us up in one of her guest cottages. In the morning she was leaving for a tour so called us from her helicopter to wake us and let us know there was a servant with breakfast waiting outside our door.

Philip Harder (center) and Rick Fuller (back) with the band

Do you know how the video was received by the band?

Director Philip Harder – The band loved it. We saw Dolores on tour in the states. After the show we met up again, Dolores went on and on about the fantasy world we created in the video. She could only imagine the imagery when we were shooting so she was very pleased what we were able to create through our fantasy images and experimental film techniques.

What does the song mean to you, and how does the imagery of the video represent that?

Director Philip Harder – I think the feeling comes not only comes from the lyrics but from Dolores’s unique vocal delivery. Even though this is more of a pop song, I felt the images needed a contrast between edgy or perhaps grungy industrial settings, smoke stacks, rough neighborhoods etc. which can magically disappear by just using your imagination. Reality transforms into animated fantasies of color.

Producers Seamus Byrne (left) and Rick Fuller (right)

All photos courtesy of Producer Rick Fuller.

A very heartfelt thank you to both Philip and Rick for providing us with all these materials and info, it was a pleasure to (re)discover all these gems!

Please note that none of the items shown above are for sale, we’d be grateful if our readers could behave well, show respect, and refrain from sending inquiries to these already very generous gentlemen.

Another interview with Noel and Fergal over Zoom video, this time on “Bringin’ it Backwards” and posted on YouTube today.

New interview with Fergal and Noel on “Paltrocast With Darren Paltrowitz” recorded on 19 October 2020 and published yesterday on the YouTube account of the host, Darren Paltrowitz.