Pop Music Review : O’Riordan Breaks Out, Still Needs Substance

Dolores O’Riordan of the Cranberries probably blew all her alternative-rock credentials Thursday night at the Irvine Meadows Amphitheatre, setting aside contemporary conventions of cool and eagerly hoofing it like a trouper in the Joey Heatherton/Ann-Margret tradition, a surprising development given the hit Irish band’s reputation for shyness. And there certainly was nothing shy about the costume changes that left O’Riordan clad in progressively skimpier outfits.

Some of her stagecraft was contrived and repetitive, but eventually O’Riordan’s old-fashioned showmanship brought the Cranberries out of a bog of sound-alike ballads and mid-tempo tunes.

The highlights, all in the last half-hour of the 100-minute tour-ending concert, came sporadically. But they were truly special peaks powered by the tiny singer’s cavorting--a mixture of joyful release (including a bit of high-flying Irish step-dancing) and sly nods to show-biz traditions.

O’Riordan was in fine voice, and the concert reconfirmed her standing as one of the most striking young singing talents in rock. With that winning voice and her growing ability to command a stage, O’Riordan would seem to have a chance at greatness.

Unfortunately, her lyrics are mainly clumsy and pedestrian: bland, fragmentary declarations that aim for the wise simplicity of a child but fall into the strained naivete of a grown-up who is trying to sound childlike. Until she backs it up with greater substance, her talent, large as it is, will go unfulfilled.