CLEVELAND, Ohio -- It’s been an odd and arduous two and a half years for the Cranberries.
Since the surprise death of singer Dolores O’Riordan on Jan. 15, 2018, at the age of 46, the Irish group has been far busier than you might expect in the wake of a tragedy. The three remaining band members -- brothers Noel and Mike Hogan (guitar and bass, respectively) and drummer Fergal Lawler -- finished off the album the group has been working on at the time, releasing “In the End” during April of 2019 and snagging the Cranberries’ first-ever Grammy Awards nomination, for Best Rock Album.
Prior to that the band had released an expanded box set edition of its five-times-platinum 1993 debut “Everybody Else Is Doing It, So Why Can’t We?,” and last month it followed with a similar treatment for its sophomore effort, 1994′s “No Need To Argue,” which was certified seven-time platinum and held the hits “Zombie” and “Ode to My Family.”
The Cranberries these days are in a fuzzy place of archival existence, but Noel Hogan says by phone from Ireland that’s better than not existing at all...
After “In the End” and two archival box sets, has the emotion of perpetuating the Cranberries changing at all?
Hogan: Yeah, it is. To be honest it’s mixed, but it’s more on the kind of happier memory side than it was. We were never sad doing these things, but they brought back memories that you’d get upset about. Now you tend to remember the good, funny stuff more.
Dolores can’t help but be a presence in the projects, even if she’s not here.
Hogan: It’s a pity. You wonder what Dolores would make of it all. That’s probably just natural. It’s not as kind of gut-wrenching as I think it was. When we finished up recording (“In The End”) and went to Abbey Road to listen to it, that was one of the hardest times I went through. Dolores wasn’t gone that long at that point, and to hear her voice -- especially going from (“In The End”) into another reissue, she does sound different on those earlier albums, ‘cause your voice changes, and your style of singing. But it was just nice this time; Stephen Street (producer) found about an hour and a half of video we took during the recording (of “No Need to Argue”) and it was really funny to see it again -- to see how funny we were, how young we were, the stuff we were getting into. You wonder how we even got the album done, ‘cause there was so much mucking about.
What’s the experience like of immersing yourself in all the old recordings and outtakes and things people haven’t heard?
Hogan: Y’know, you haven’t listened to it in so long it’s almost surprising -- like, “Wow, this is really good!” As a fan of music, I’ll put on albums here at the house that I would’ve loved at one time and now you’re like, “Hmm, not so good,” and you start to wonder if your own stuff is like that. Then you put it back on, and it’s probably the first time I would’ve listened to the album from start to finish since we recorded it, and it’s a genuine feeling of surprise. And I don’t say that in an arrogant way. It’s just, I actually get why people liked it, as bizarre as that sounds.
What kind of pressure did the band feel making “No Need to Argue” after the success of “Everybody Else is Doing It...”?
Hogan: This was the funny thing; We were so oblivious about it all in so many ways. To us, big bands came from New York or L.A. or London. We looked at, like, Bon Jovi or U2, even -- to us they were these big bands that had all this pressure, whereas we were just four kids that kind of loved guitar, indie music. And because it took (“Everybody Else is Doing It...”) a little while to get started, the first album rolled into the second album, like one long session. I personally felt more pressure after this album, going into our third album.
“Zombie” surprised a lot people when it was released; It was much heavier than we’d heard from the Cranberries before. What was that song’s story?
Hogan: “Zombie” was around for a long time. When we were getting all the stuff together for the first album (reissue) we had some cassettes of early live gigs from here in Limerick, and “Zombie” was on the set list. I had forgotten how old that song was. We were going to go with it maybe as the second single because it’s so far removed from what we were known for, from “Linger” and “Dreams” at that point. Coming out with something a lot heavier might not have seemed wise, but we’d seen the reaction to that song live for a long time, and we felt if that live reaction would translate into radio play, everyone was gonna be happy. And we were right.
Are you surprised “No Need to Argue” is the Cranberries’ best-seller?
Hogan: No -- and, again, that’s not being arrogant about it. It’s a strong album. There’s not really anything on there I would think was a filler. We picked the right songs. We just worked to a point of, “Yeah, this is it. It’s ready to come out” as opposed to sometimes you might think, “Oh, we’re short one or two songs” and you pick songs you think are OK but maybe you would’ve been better waiting or not putting them on. This album wasn’t like that at all.
Any thoughts yet about what’s next? Obviously (1996′s) “To the Faithful Departed” follows in the rotation?
Hogan: Not yet, but the last time it was like that as well; At some point the record company came back and said, “Do you want to have a look at the next one?” At the end of the day it’s them that makes the decision on it. My only worry each time we go to do this is there’s less and less stuff to find. You begin with the first album and there’s so much there, and this time it was harder to find bits. There’s just not as much stuff around or left behind. We became more efficient. So, it will be interesting to see what we do with the future (reissues).
For “In the End” there was some talk about the three of you maybe doing something live again. Did that ever go anywhere?
Hogan: No. We went to the Grammys back in February and then came home and were gonna take a break from each other for a little bit, then sit down and talk about what was gonna be next. Unfortunately, we never did because the (pandemic) hit and everybody’s been sitting at home kinda doing nothing since then. It’s impossible to make any plans at the moment. It’s still a discussion to be had. I don’t know what will happen, but it’s a conversation, I guess, for when the world gets back to some kind of normal.