Quotes from Dolores O'Riordan

The writing became a hobby in the background: it took a back seat to parenthood and being a person and being a human being.

I enjoyed living in Canada, where my husband comes from, because I was treated like any ordinary person. I became a volunteer at my children's school; I went into the classroom. It was very grounding. I got sick of being famous.

People don't look at you singing. They go within themselves and listen. Music is about listening, not looking. That's why I wore these huge baggy dresses on stage with The Cranberries.

I remember when MTV first put 'Linger' in heavy rotation, every time I walked into a diner or a hotel lobby, it was like, 'Jesus, man, here I am again.'

Not everybody wanted a female to be the front face of a big band, you know... You had to be three times better than a man had to be.

To me, life is a bit of everything. I have the band, I have my kids. Life is a big picture. It's not just your career.

We have a certain bond that we don't have with anyone else on the planet. You just have that bond, that journey when you are in a band together.

There's always a party in my bus.

When The Cranberries got really big in Ireland, it became difficult for me to be there with all the photographers and paparazzi.

Everyone at school knew I wanted to be a singer. I'd always be banging on the piano playing my new song. The teacher would gather us round, and the whole class would listen.

It was different to what everyone else was doing. It was very hard to pigeonhole The Cranberries. And we were just huge; it was just sensational.

I was so young when I got so famous, and then I kind of put up a wall around myself. I didn't really want to show people any fragilities or fears; I was trying to be this tough person that I felt was expected of me.

I love performing, and I love the idea of people buying records. I don't particularly like the idea of people knowing me or thinking they do, but that's a part of what I choose. I choose not to go to college; I choose to be a singer.

It's important to take time off because it's a long journey this life, and I want to be singing in 30 years' time. You see a lot of artists who get caught up in the here and now, and they just burn themselves out, and I kind of did that myself with my third album.

I guess all bands get to that point where they run out of inspiration and just get bored with the chemistry.

People often ask me why I sing with a strong Irish accent. I suppose when I was five years old, I spoke with a strong Irish accent, so I sang with one, too.

I've come to the conclusion that life is for the taking and just too short to dwell on the negative.

You want to be in control of a lot. You grow up. You sink or swim. I suppose I swam.

I lived in buses. I didn't really have anything else. I didn't feel like a female, and I ended up really kind of isolated. Everybody thinks you're so happy and so wealthy and such a big star, but you're really kind of lonely and don't know how to stop it.

I missed a lot of family weddings and funerals because we were out on the road and had these big gigs, and you can't pull out of these gigs at the last minute because too many people are counting on it. It got to the point where I was consumed with that.

My parents were in the local church choir, and I used to go along and sing and play the organ at all the weddings and christenings.

When I was about 14, I got a tacky keyboard for 250 pounds and put on a drum machine and found I could write a song.

I was raised Catholic and I have a lot of respect for the good in the Catholic Church. But I don't go to church.

When the Greatest Hits came out and we did that tour, I just felt I wanted to take a break, totally. Probably because, as well, I was so young when I got famous. I did album, tour, album, tour, album, tour, then I had a public nervous breakdown where I just lost tons of weight.