Ireland in 50 Albums, No 21: Sinéad O'Connor, I Do Not Want What I Haven’t Got
Sinead O'Connor, I Do Not Want What I Haven't Got.
Sinéad O’Connor was at the height of her fame. It was the early 1990s. She was in New York, sitting at the bar in a diner full of white people eating at their booths. A homeless black man walked in, but he was quickly ushered out again by the manager of the diner. He wasn’t fit company for the other patrons. About five minutes later, he returned. He stood about six feet inside the restaurant, opened his arms, and said, “Can I get a hug? Can I just get a hug?”
O’Connor ran towards him and leapt into his arms, wrapping her legs around his waist. She hung onto him for an age. There was something special about O’Connor – her humanity, her fierce intelligence and bravery, her vulnerability. She was like an envoy sent from another land when she broke through in the late 1980s.
