CRANBERRIES Members Felt BAD WOLVES' 'Zombie' Cover Was Released 'Too Soon'

January 30, 2020

BAD WOLVES (pictured) released their cover of THE CRANBERRIES' "Zombie" only four days after the January 2018 passing of the latter band's frontwoman Dolores O'Riordan, with all proceeds from track donated to her three children. THE CRANBERRIES' singer was set to record her vocals on the song the day of her tragic death.

The surviving members of THE CRANBERRIES — whose 2019 album "In The End" featured posthumous vocals from O'Riordan — told ABC New Radio that they didn't care for BAD WOLVES' version of "Zombie".

"[I] didn't really like it," drummer Fergal Lawler said. "It wasn't my cup of tea."

Compounding matters, guitarist Noel Hogan said that he felt BAD WOLVES' cover was released "a bit too soon. For my liking, anyway," he explained.

"The whole thing seemed insensitive or something," Lawler added.

When BAD WOLVES' cover was first released, singer Tommy Vext said that he was inspired by Dolores's "lyrics, confronting the collateral damage of political unrest," which "capture the same sentiment we wanted to express a quarter century later."

Vext addressed BAD WOLVES' decision to release the song so soon after Delores's death in an interview with Consequence Of Sound. He said: "At first, we were thinking we were going into the studio to record 'Zombie' with Dolores, so we were on this real high and excited about that. It came down to the night before, and as everyone knows, she tragically passed away. So, it was this really tragic, sad situation, and the song almost didn't come out. We were going to shelve the song, and then we talked with our label about releasing the song and donating all of the proceeds to Dolores's children. So, we released the song as a tribute. We honestly had no idea what would happen. We didn't know if anybody would care. The only reason we felt confident in our rendition of the song is because she loved it so much. It turned into this viral moment, and it's been this crazy whirlwind ever since. We just wanted to do something good with the song. There's so much negativity in this world, so we thought, 'Let's do something positive.'"

Originally released in 1994 following the IRA bombing of Warrington, THE CRANBERRIES' "Zombie" hit No. 1 across the globe, including on the Billboard Alternative Songs chart. The song returned to the Top 10 on the U.S. Rock chart shortly after news of Dolores's passing was announced.

BAD WOLVES was formed in 2017, comprised of former members of DEVILDRIVER, GOD FORBID, DIVINE HERESY and IN THIS MOMENT.

"Zombie" surfaced on BAD WOLVES' debut album, "Disobey", which came out in May 2018.

Find more on Bad wolves

Prev More News Next

Comments Disclaimer And Information

BLABBERMOUTH.NET uses the Facebook Comments plugin to let people comment on content on the site using their Facebook account. The comments reside on Facebook servers and are not stored on BLABBERMOUTH.NET. To comment on a BLABBERMOUTH.NET story or review, you must be logged in to an active personal account on Facebook. Once you're logged in, you will be able to comment. User comments or postings do not reflect the viewpoint of BLABBERMOUTH.NET and BLABBERMOUTH.NET does not endorse, or guarantee the accuracy of, any user comment. To report spam or any abusive, obscene, defamatory, racist, homophobic or threatening comments, or anything that may violate any applicable laws, use the "Report to Facebook" and "Mark as spam" links that appear next to the comments themselves. To do so, click the downward arrow on the top-right corner of the Facebook comment (the arrow is invisible until you roll over it) and select the appropriate action. You can also send an e-mail to blabbermouthinbox(@)gmail.com with pertinent details. BLABBERMOUTH.NET reserves the right to "hide" comments that may be considered offensive, illegal or inappropriate and to "ban" users that violate the site's Terms Of Service. Hidden comments will still appear to the user and to the user's Facebook friends. If a new comment is published from a "banned" user or contains a blacklisted word, this comment will automatically have limited visibility (the "banned" user's comments will only be visible to the user and the user's Facebook friends).