Overview

With Universal Mother, Sinead O’Connor explores childhood trauma and her experiences as a woman, mother, target of scorn, and ultimate phoenix. Released in the winter of 1994, Universal Mother was the first recorded work from O’Connor since her duo of protests in 1992 (Saturday Night Live, Madison Square Garden). The sadistic blowback she faced for publicly outing the child abuse of the Catholic Church and its cover-up would have destroyed most. Where Sinead might go next, or if she’d ever record again, was the question. It’s a testament to her integrity and extraordinary courage that she was able to resurrect with this extraordinary album. The album takes us on a deeply personal, yet universal journey of womanhood, from the archetypal bad mother to the good and the kind. A feminist statement from Germaine Greer sets the tone, followed by O’Connor letting loose a storm of rage against her abusive mother in “Fire on Bablyon”—a salvo so explosive, it need not be repeated. Other than a song called “Red Football” and a call-out of the truth behind the Irish potato famine, O’Connor is not interested in rage or revenge. With Universal Mother, she offers us a tender, evocative collection of grief and empathy in song. Her miraculous voice is the vessel—the broken, sacred voice of Mother Ireland.

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Reviews

This is a beautifully written and deeply personalised homage to one of O’Connor’s finest works, and it reads all the better for that. On the final page, Adele Bertei writes to Sinéad “I pray I’ve done right by you”. I’ve closed the book with a lump in my throat. * Blitzed Magazine * Adele Bertei examines Sinead O’Connor’s 1994 album Universal Mother, which came hard on the heels of her controversial, very public, statements about child abuse in the Catholic church, focussing on how the record managed to combine rage with empathy and grief, as well as mourning the loss of innocence of Sinead’s beloved Ireland. * Choice *

Author Information

Adele Bertei was a founding member of musical insurrectionists No New York's Contortions and a personal assistant to Brian Eno. Bertei was lead singer for the Bloods, which is considered the first out, queer, all women-rock band. She has appeared in several indie films, most notably as a lead character Lizzie Borden’s Born in Flames. She has toured with, written songs for, and recorded as a backing vocalist for artists as diverse as Tears for Fears, Thomas Dolby, Sandra Bernhard, Culture Club, Scritti Politti, and Whitney Houston. Her duet with Thomas Dolby on “Hyperactive!” was a top-twenty hit in the UK, as was her single with Jellybean Benitez, “Just a Mirage.” She is the author of Peter and the Wolves (2020), Why Labelle Matters (2021), and Twist: Tales of a Queer Girlhood (2023).

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