TORONTO -- Petite and pretty Dolores O'Riordan, lead singer of Irish supergroup The Cranberries, has positioned herself about an inch from my face and is saying in her thick Irish brogue: "How's my cold sore, Jane? Can you see it?"
The blond, shaggy-haired O'Riordan, gearing up for a photo shoot with drummer Fergal Lawler in a Toronto hotel room leading up to Tuesday's release of the band's latest album, Bury The Hatchet, is a tiny ball of friendly energy. And about as in-your-face as an interview subject can get.
She speaks plainly and frankly about everything, including the aforementioned cold sore and, more importantly, the birth of her son, Taylor Baxter Burton, in Toronto in November, 1997. She and Toronto-born husband-tour manger Don Burton have a cottage near Peterborough in addition to a home near O'Riordan's native Limerick.
"I was looking down going, 'Oh, my God, it's an alien, it's beautiful, but what's going on with me downstairs!'' jokes O'Riordan of giving birth. "Stay away from me honey for a year!
"I was fine though," she continues. "It's amazing how quickly it repairs itself, ya know? 'Cause I think we're just made for it. And we're probably quite elastic-y down there or whatever, because the baby comes out, and the next thing, you're fine. You know you get your bit of stitch. You just mind yourself. About two or three weeks after, I was actually snowmobiling."
Thanks for the update.
O'Riordan and her husband moved to Toronto temporarily when she was about three months pregnant for "privacy reasons" (she's a frequent subject of the tabloids back in the U.K.), and divided their time between the Peterborough cottage and a Toronto residence.
"I loved it, because we got an apartment down near Yorkville where I had this really cool gynecologist I called Dr. Goldfinger," she says with a smile. "She was super and I saw her every month, and then towards the end, for the last two months, you see them every week. And she delivered the baby."
O'Riordan, 27, is among a recent spate of pop stars who have given birth, including Madonna and Liz Phair, but unlike them, she hasn't undergone a major transformation.
"I don't think I've become a completely different person. I just feel like I'm a really, really, happy person," she reports. "And I'm really, really, really in touch with the happy side of myself, and it has totally enhanced my life, ya know? You're not as worried about what people think about you."
Which, particularly in O'Riordan's case, is a good thing.
The Cranberries underwent a major crisis in the last few years following their quick rise to prominence after the success of their 1993 single, Linger, off their first album, Everybody Else Is Doing It, So Why Can't We?
Celebrity
They've sold 28 million albums since then, and O'Riordan became a bona fide celebrity. But there was a schedule from hell and lots of media attention, not always positive.
After the tour for their last album, 1996's To The Faithful Departed, Ireland's biggest musical export since U2 almost split up due to internal dissension, exhaustion, and O'Riordan's assorted physical problems (including rumoured anorexia and a blown-out knee from skiing that never really healed).
"It was just all the work -- too much -- and just the whole fame thing and stuff. It was just too much," explains drummer Lawler.
"We didn't take any breaks between recording albums and touring and we just did album, tour, album, tour, album, tour, and we just finally couldn't go on anymore. Everyone was exhausted and stressed out.
"We just said, 'We need to take some time off.' So we took about six months off, completely away from each other, and then gradually started just working again.
"It could been have been the end of the band. Everyone hated what they were doing, basically, and no one was having any fun."
Interjects O'Riordan: "We all loved each other, and we all loved what the band used to be -- which was fun -- but I think what happened to our personal lives ... People thought I was anorexic 'cause I was so thin."
Instead of calling it quits, however, the band regrouped much healthier and happier human beings for Hatchet. (During their time off, both Lawler and bassist Mike Hogan got married to their long-time girlfriends, while guitarist Noel Hogan opened a restaurant in Limerick.)
"It means to move on and let bygones be bygones, and I guess we were kind of ready to let the past be the past," explains O'Riordan of the new album's title. "To forget about how we kind of hit rock bottom a couple of years ago."
The demos for Hatchet were recorded at Toronto's Metalworks studio, while O'Riordan was about seven months pregnant. (The song, You And Me, specifically refers to her son in the chorus: "Eternally it will always be you and me, Taylor, Taylor, Taylor, Taylor.")
Co-produced
After Toronto, the band moved to Le Miravel, a chateau in the south of France, where they worked for two months, before winding up in London. Hatchet was co-produced by The Cranberries and Benedict Fenner.
Hatchet is no big surprise, and basically continues the group's trademark guitar-based, Celtic-tinged, atmospheric pop for which O'Riordan makes no apologies.
"Our fans -- they know we are what we are," she says.
They now plan to tour for about a year in support of Hatchet, playing Massey Hall on May 8 as part of a month-long club tour before they hit bigger venues.
"We're going to pace ourselves a bit better," insists Lawler. "Like do six weeks on, three weeks at home, 'cause it just makes it easier for everyone, and obviously for Dolores and the family thing as well."
Adds O'Riordan: "It's pretty cool, because before the band over-worked and over-did things, but we're kind of going along the pace of the baby, ultimately, because he's a baby and he's really the most important person.
"Every baby and child deserves a good childhood, so I mean we wouldn't like, I wouldn't like, totally overschedule things. If it wasn't working, then I'd stop doing it."
