| "Zombie" | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
 Standard artwork (CD and vinyl edition pictured) | ||||
| Single by The Cranberries | ||||
| from the album No Need to Argue | ||||
| Released | 19 September 1994 | |||
| Format | ||||
| Recorded | 1994 at Windmill Lane Studios | |||
| Genre | ||||
| Length |
| |||
| Label | Island | |||
| Songwriter(s) | Dolores O'Riordan | |||
| Producer(s) | Stephen Street | |||
| The Cranberries singles chronology | ||||
| ||||
| Music video | ||||
| "Zombie" on YouTube | ||||
| Audio sample | ||||
Zombie | ||||
"Zombie" is a protest song by Irish alternative rock[4] band The Cranberries, written about the 1993 IRA bombing in Warrington, and in memory of two young victims, Johnathan Ball and Tim Parry. It was released in September 1994 as the lead single from their second studio album, No Need to Argue (1994). It preceded the release of No Need to Argue by two weeks.
The song was written by the band's lead singer Dolores O'Riordan and reached No. 1 on the charts of Australia, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany and Iceland, as well as on the US Billboard Modern Rock Tracks chart. It won the "Best Song" award at the 1995 MTV Europe Music Awards.[5] The song was voted by Triple J listeners as No. 1 on the Triple J Hottest 100, 1994 chart.[6][7]
In 2017, the song was released as an acoustic, stripped-down version on the band's Something Else album.[8]
Contents
Composition
The Cranberries former manager Alan Kovac stated that Island Records urged them not to release the "politically urgent" song as a single, and that O'Riordan had ripped up a $1 million cheque the label offered her to work on another song. “Dolores was a very small, fragile person, but very opinionated,” said Kovac. “Her belief was that she was an international artist and she wanted to break the rest of the world, and ‘Zombie’ was part of that evolution. She felt the need to expand beyond ‘I love you, you love me’ and write about what was happening in Ireland at the time.”[9]
The lyrics and chords of "Zombie" were written in Ireland by Dolores O'Riordan during the Cranberries' English Tour in 1993, and recorded at Windmill Lane Studios in Dublin in 1994. The song was written in response to the death of Johnathan Ball, 3, and Tim Parry, 12, who had been killed in the IRA bombing in Warrington earlier that year.
The protest is in the pre-chorus, in the words of Dolores O'Riordan: "The IRA are not me. I'm not the IRA. The Cranberries are not the IRA. My family are not. ... When it says in the song, 'It's not me, it's not my family,' that's what I'm saying. It's not Ireland."[10]
Dolores O'Riordan pours her pain and rage into The Cranberries' "Zombie". The mezzo soprano is not lilting when she does that sharp break from chest register to head register / falsetto in the second syllable of the word “Zombie.” She’s actually yodeling.[11][12]
Music video
"Zombie" was released with a music video in October 1994. The video was directed by Samuel Bayer, and produced by Doug Friedman and H.S.I. Productions.
The music video was filmed by Samuel Bayer in Belfast, Northern Ireland, during The Troubles with real footage. In the video, Dolores O'Riordan is covered in gold makeup and appears in front of a cross with a group of boys also covered in silver makeup. The video also includes clips of children playing war games, a performance by The Cranberries, and of British soldiers from the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders (as evident from their thin red line tactical recognition flashes) on patrol in Northern Ireland. It also features shots of various murals (IRA, UDA, UFF, UVF, Bobby Sands, Corporals killings, ...). The Zombie music video was banned by the BBC at the time of the release of the song. What brought to an edited version instead, which focuses on color performance images, filmed on a sound stage in Los Angeles over a period of 6 days[13].
The official "Zombie" music video is to be permuted into a newly remastered 4K HD version when the views hit one billion.[14]
On October 23, 2019. The Cranberries "Zombie" is ranked No. 5 on a definitive list of the world's most-viewed rock music videos, released by Vevo (source: Vevo's Internal Analytics).[15]
Track listings
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UK and European CD1 single
| No. | Title | Writer(s) | Length |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1. | "Zombie" (Album version) | Dolores O'Riordan | 5:06 |
| 2. | "Away" (Previously unreleased; later included on the soundtrack of the 1995 film Clueless) | Dolores O'Riordan | 2:39 |
| 3. | "I Don't Need" (Previously unreleased) |
| 3:31 |
UK and European CD2 single
| No. | Title | Length |
|---|---|---|
| 1. | "Zombie" (Album version) | 5:06 |
| 2. | "Waltzing Back" (Live at the Fleadh Festival, 11 June 1994) | 3:45 |
| 3. | "Linger" (Live at the Fleadh Festival, 11 June 1994) | 5:25 |
UK and European 7" single
| No. | Title | Length |
|---|---|---|
| 1. | "Zombie" (Radio edit) | 4:10 |
| 2. | "Away" (Previously unreleased) | 2:39 |
US two-track promo CD (PRCD 6857-2)
| No. | Title | Length |
|---|---|---|
| 1. | "Zombie" (Edit) | 3:52 |
| 2. | "Zombie" | 5:06 |
UK VHS single (PRCD 6857-2)
| No. | Title | Length |
|---|---|---|
| 1. | "Zombie" (Video version) | 5:11 |
Charts and sales
Weekly charts
|
Year-end charts
Certifications
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Bad Wolves cover
| "Zombie" | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
.jpg) | ||||
| Single by Bad Wolves | ||||
| from the album Disobey | ||||
| Released | January 18, 2018 | |||
| Genre | ||||
| Length | 4:15 | |||
| Label | Eleven Seven | |||
| Songwriter(s) | Dolores O'Riordan | |||
| Bad Wolves singles chronology | ||||
| ||||
Bad Wolves released a cover on January 19, 2018 as the second single from their debut album Disobey.[71][72] The night of her death, on January 15, 2018, Dolores O'Riordan left a voice message to her friend, Managing Director of E7LG-Europe, Dan Waite, where she offered to "sing on it", on the cover that Waite had previously given O'Riordan to listen to and accredit. TMZ published this voice message on April 05, 2018.[73] The cover was released without her vocals as a tribute. Bad Wolves slightly altered the lyrics, inserting a reference to drones and replacing "since 1916" Easter Rising in Dublin, with "in 2018" which also refers to the release date of their debut album Disobey.[72] Bad Wolves also added two extra stanzas to the end of the song which were not present in the original song. The band's cover topped the US Billboard Mainstream Rock chart in May 2018 for three weeks. It peaked at number 54 on the Hot 100.[74] In June 2018, at a concert in New York City, Bad Wolves donated $250,000 to O'Riordan's children.[75]
In an interview, bassist Kyle Konkiel shared his thoughts on the new cover's sound: [76]
[Our version] is kind of a darker more melodic feel than the original, which had a lot of heavy guitars and that legendary bassline and more focus on the actual instruments than the lyrics themselves
— Kyle Konkiel
Music video
The song's music video was directed by Wayne Isham and was released on January 18, 2018, the day before the band released the song as a single.[77]
The video begins with text discussing the cover's background and the passing of O'Riordan. The video then cuts to shots of the band performing the song in a black room, wearing black clothing and playing black instruments interspersed with close-up scenes of a woman being covered in gold paint. The video then cuts in between shots of the band performing and the woman interacting with vocalist Tommy Vext which mainly involves her smearing gold paint on a glass pane between the two of them. After the guitar solo, she etches "1-15-18", the date of O'Riordan's death, into the paint. The woman's appearance (gold body paint, gold dress, and gold beaded headdress) is nearly identical to that of O'Riordan in The Cranberries' original Zombie music video. The video ends with a quote by Vext.
Track listing
| No. | Title | Length |
|---|---|---|
| 1. | "Zombie" | 4:15 |
Charts and sales
Weekly charts
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Year-end charts
Certifications
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Other cover versions
- In late 1994, a cover version by Spanish mákina group Ororo was released in conjunction with the original version. This version reached No. 1 in Spain and No. 16 in Austria.[93][94]
- In 1995, a Eurodance cover version by Italian quartet A.D.A.M. featuring Amy reached No. 16 in the UK Singles Chart,[95] No. 65 in Australia,[96] No. 20 in France, No. 9 in Italy, and No. 35 in Belgium.[97]
- In 2009, Breed 77 covered the song, replacing the line "It's the same old theme since 1916" with "the same thing we done in 2001"
- In 2011, Christina Parie covered the song on The X Factor Australia. After her performance, the song re-entered the ARIA Charts Top 100 at No. 69.[citation needed]
- In 2012, The Crying Spell covered the song on their album Disgraceland.
- In 2015, American electronic duo Missio released a cover. Unique in it's slow sorrowful tone the Austin, Texas natives bring it to life with outstanding emotion.
- In 2019, Vic Mensa covered the song with his band 93PUNX.
- In 2019, the Argentinian band The Lyons also covered the song, delivering a beautiful acoustic version of it.[98]
Reception
The Rough Guide to Rock identified the album No Need to Argue as "more of the same" as the Cranberries' debut album, except for the song "Zombie", which had an "angry grunge" sound and "aggressive" lyrics.[99] The Cranberries played the song on their appearance on the U.S. show Saturday Night Live in 1995 in a performance that British author Dave Thompson calls "one of the most powerful performances that the show has ever seen".[100]
AllMusic said the song "trivialized" the events of the Troubles, and that the "heavy rock trudge" of the song did not play to the band's strengths.[101]
The Billboard of August 5, 1995, stated at the time that No Need To Argue was the largest seller of albums since its release, with 5.1 million copies sold in six months.[102] It sold 17.8 million copies worldwide.
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Bibliography
- Fonseca A. J. «Zombie» (song) // Encyclopedia of the Zombie: The Walking Dead in Popular Culture and Myth: The Walking Dead in Popular Culture and Myth / eds. J. Pulliam, A. J. Fonseca. — ABC-CLIO, 2014. — 381 p. — ISBN 9781440803895. — ISBN 1440803897.