Troubled Cranberries star dies at 46
DOLORES O’Riordan, lead singer of Nineties rock band the Cranberries, was found dead in a London hotel yesterday.
The Irish singer, who was 46 and had suffered from bipolar disorder, was discovered in her room at the Hilton on Park Lane, Mayfair.
Detectives described her death as “unexplained” and said that inquiries were continuing.
O’Riordan, who was in London for a recording session, had three children with exhusband Don Burton, a former tour manager for Duran Duran to whom she was married for 21 years. Their son Taylor, 20, and daughters Molly, 16, and Dakota, 12, live with their father in Canada.
Renowned for her distinctive singing voice, O’Riordan was 18 when she successfully auditioned to be the lead singer of the Cranberries.
The Irish band went on to release five albums, selling more than 40 million copies worldwide, and were nominated for the best international group at the Brit Awards in 1995. In 1997 they won an Ivor Novello award for the controversial single Zombie, inspired by an IRA bombing that killed two children.
Despite huge success, O’Riordan had a troubled life. In 2013 she revealed she endured years of sexual abuse as a child.