The Cranberries are opening up about the sessions for their final album, In the End, which will feature vocals from late singer Dolores O’Riordan. In a lengthy note posted on Friday (Jan. 11), the band — drummer Fergal Lawler, guitarist Noel Hogan and bassist Michael Hogan — described getting together in early 2017 to rehearse with O’Riordan for their planned Something Else tour and discussing how fun it would be to write and work on new material for what would be their seventh studio album of original songs.
“‘Something Else’ was an album of acoustic versions of some of our best known older songs which we had reworked with a quartet from the Irish Chamber Orchestra, with just a couple of new songs, and the prospect of writing and working on new material for a new album was very exciting,” they wrote. “Over the following months the task of working on what would become ‘In the End’ began. By December 2017, Dolores had completed and recorded the vocals to final demo stage on the eleven songs which feature on this recording, and we had planned to go into the studio to complete the album in early 2018.”
Those plans were devastatingly cut short on Jan. 15, 2018, when O’Riordan, 46, was found dead in a London hotel room in what the Westminster Coroner’s Court determined was an accidental drowning in a bathtub due to alcohol intoxication. After taking some time to collect themselves, the band said they pondered the best way to honor their good friend and bandmate. “This was a very painful process,” they said. “We remembered how Dolores had been so energised by the prospect of making this record and getting back out on the road to play the songs live, and realised that the most meaningful thing to do was to finish the album we had started with her. We felt that this is what she would want. We spoke with Dolores’ family and they agreed.”
Working with long-time producer Stephen Street, they completed the album in April and May of 2018 in what they said was a “very emotional process… knowing that we would never get to play these songs live made it even more difficult. There was an overwhelming sense of finality knowing that this was the last time that we would be in the same studio together working on a Cranberries album.”
The trio thanked the friends and fans who’ve supported them for three decades and O’Riordan’s family, dedicating In The End to their late leader. “She will always be with us in her music.” The first single from the album, “All Over Now,” dropped on Tuesday morning (Jan. 15). Click here to pre-order the album, which will be released on Apr. 26 on BMG.
In a statement, O’Riordan’s mother, Eileen O’Riordan, wrote, “I miss her awfully, specially today, as does the entire family. That said I can’t think of a more fitting way to commemorate the first anniversary of her passing and to celebrate her life than to announce to the world the release of her final album with the band. She was very excited about this new album and was really looking forward to its release. I have no doubt that she is happy now and would be delighted with today’s announcement.”
Track listing for In the End:
“All Over Now”
“Lost”
“Wake Me When It’s Over”
“A Place I Know”
“Catch Me If You Can”
“Got It”
“Illusion”
“Crazy Heart”
“Summer Song”
“The Pressure”
“In The End”
Check out the full note below.
