Niall Quinn was the first lead-singer of The Cranberry Saw Us, or better known as The Cranberries. He left the male band and recommended a shy and nice girl: Dolores O’Riordan.
What would have happened if Niall had remained with them? Read the exclusive interview to the guy who didn’t want to become in a famous rock-star.
– How did your music passion begin?
– I’d imagine pretty much the same as anyone else of my generation, taping the songs you like off the radio and trying to learn them.
When I was a small kid I really liked Abba, Boomtown Rats, Village People. Later it’d have been Madness, The Police, Lizzy, Quo. I’d discovered New Order and The Smiths through my brothers before I’d hit my teens as well as stuff like The Housemartins and Half Man Half Biscuit.
Got my first electric guitar and started writing songs just as I was discovering older punk-rock stuff like The Clash and The Sex Pistols. But it was drums I really wanted to play so my dad bought me a set and I’d thrash them in the shed listening to The Who, Deep Purple, Hendrix.
I’d form bands with friends but, a couple of false starts and cover bands aside, The Hitchers were the first original band I played with who kept going and did more than one show. The Hitchers did their first show in early 89 when I’d have been 15.
– How was the process of forming The Cranberries (or The Cranberry Saw Us) at last of 80s?
– The three guys came to gig one night where my band The Hitchers were on the bill. I knew them to see but we didn’t hang out together at that stage. They told me they were trying to put a band together but didn’t have a singer. I think I volunteered to give it a try. This would be August 1989.
We met up, we practiced and played together and we did a handful of gigs between November 89 and March 90 and did one demo in January. After I left I said I’d keep an eye out for someone else who could sing with them. I think I might’ve recommended two other guys or discussed them at least. Then Noel or Mike mentioned they were thinking of looking for a girl singer. I happened to mention this to a friend of mine who recommended Dolores and got me her telephone number. So I gave her a call and she came along to a rehearsal. She played a song on her electric piano and I think everyone was pretty impressed.
– Did you think in that age The Cranberries could have become in a famous pop-rock band?
– The day of the first meeting -No. But I was at their very first show which could only have been weeks or a couple of months later, summer 1990, and they already had a couple of the songs they’re most famous for ‘Linger’ and ‘Sunday’ nailed down and those sounded very promising. Even by Christmas that year it was obvious there was a lot of interest in them and that they’d the right sound at the right time. By spring 91, I’d say the record companies were lining up to sign them. But I don’t think anyone guessed, themselves included, that they’d be as successful as they went on to become.
– Why did you choose to let them and form «The Hitchers»?
– I was already playing drums with The Hitchers before I was involved in TCSU. I was a drummer first and anything else thereafter back then. I just wasn’t that happy being a singer in a band. I did it to try it out and it either didn’t suit me or I wasn’t ready.
– Did you meet Dolores O’Riordan then? What was your first impression of her?
– Dolores was very nice. She was a little quiet but I wouldn’t have thought she was shy exactly either. But again as I wasn’t in the band at the same time as her I wouldn’t have really gotten to know her all that well. But she was always very friendly though.
– Have you ever thought you shouldn’t have left the band or if it was a mistake?
– But if I stayed there’d have been no opening for Dolores -and what made The Cranberries the right band at the right time with the right sound is that combination of Dolores vocals and the three guys sound. We know what the three guys more someone else sounds like and it probably wouldn’t have succeeded. Similarily, Dolores was very lucky with the three guys she hooked up with because they’d the right sound to back her and I’m far from certain it’d have gone as well
at that point and time for her if she had a different crew of writers and musicians involved. I remember at the time you’d occasionally hear people putting them down, this is the three guys I’m talking about, saying they weren’t good enough musicians. You’d hear people or read journalists calling the band ‘Dolly & the Passengers’ and that kind
of thing. To my mind all it showed was that the people saying those things fundamentally failed to understand where the bands sound had come from in terms of its influences, whether that be The Cure or Cocteau Twins or whoever else and why it clicked.
So as for my involvement. I did the right thing and haven’t had cause to regret anything really. Even if you were to try and imagine a Cranberries line-up that includes both Dolores and me, and that kind of screws around with the time-line anyway, then the chemistry would be all wrong -or missing. I’d have soured the milk because I’d have been pulling in a different direction. I was just into different things musically.
I was starting to listen to metal and hardcore and I was into the heavier, punk-based indie stuff like Therapy? and The Wedding Present. Besides, which of the three guys would you have wanted me to shoot? I can’t play bass so Mike is safe. Another guitarist? Not needed. And I was a lousy guitarist anyway so Noel lives too. Yeah, I’m a drummer but I’d a very different style to Fergal and if Fergal had left the band for whatever reason way back then there’d have been at least a dozen local drummers in the queue ahead of me to get that job. So we’re just about out of options. Keyboard player? Sorry, I can’t play piano. I’m not being modest or putting myself down there. Trust me, you don’t keep making music for 20 years despite the utter indifference of the world unless you’ve an overblown sense of your own importance or ability on some level.
– Don’t you think if you had stayed with them, you had become in a famous lead singer maybe? If so, did you felt upset, sad or disappointed sometimes?
– No. It’s impossible to tell if TCSU would have come to much at all but I have reasonable doubts. We were only together a few months, so there isn’t a lot of evidence to go on, but I suspect it’d have fizzled out and we’d all have moved on to other things.
– Do you keep a good relationship with The Cranberries members until now?
– Yes, I do. I mean I haven’t seen Dolores in years. I think she lives in Canada now, but I see Noel and Mike about town every now and again and Fergal sometimes too. I mean we’re all family men these days so it’s not like any of us are out on the town too often I wouldn’t think. I know I’m not anyway.
Actually, the most recent time I spoke with Noel we were both pushing shopping trolleys around a grocery store on a saturday afternoon and trying to keep kids where we could see them. So you see whether you’re a world famous musician or totally unknown one -you still get stuck with household chores at the weekend.
– What about «The Hitchers»? Have you felt comfortable and happy with them in all these years?
– The Hitchers was great and is great because we still get to hook up every once in a while to do a show. They’re my best friends and great musicians as well. We had a good run, we made some very fine records and had a lot of good times even if we didn’t sell a lot of records ultimately.
I sometimes think it’s a pity we didn’t get just a little farther as I really think there was a career in music there for the rest of the lads. They’re great players with great ideas and creativity and would compliment any bands line-up. But nobody died, we’re all still mates and we hook up once a year to do a show at home in Limerick. So we’ve been very lucky –and you know what –as this interview is primarily about The Cranberries I should say I think we partly owe it to them that we stuck at it as long as we did. They were an example of what could be achieved.
– Nowadays, what are you working in?
– I’m still writing and recording. It all happens a little more slowly these days as there’s life stuff and bills to pay.
But I’ve been working on an album, two albums actually, for some time now at home. I released ‘Rose’ the first single under the name ‘Theme Tune Boy last year. The follow up single was supposed to come out in spring but I moved house and that threw everything up in the air so it’s well behind schedule. But the second single ‘Tailrace’ is nearly there now. I’m working on the Theme Tune Boy album with my friends Cooper, a very fine punk band from The Netherlands playing as the ‘official backing band’, so the versions on the LP will be quite different to the singles where it’s all me.
Melomanía Congénita 