Sinéad O'Connor, an Irish singer/songwriter, was born in Glenageary in County Dublin in 1966. She rose to fame in the late 1980s with her debut album The Lion and the Cobra and achieved worldwide success in 1990 with a cover of the song "Nothing Compares 2 U".

Since then, she has occasionally encountered controversy, partly due to her forthright statements and gestures, ordination as a priest, and expressed strong views while still maintaining a singing career. Her body of work includes a number of collaborations with other artists and appearances at charity fundraising concerts, in addition to her own solo albums.The Lion and the Cobra was not embraced by the pop mainstream on a large-scale basis, but the album did eventually hit gold record status and earned a Grammy nomination for Best Female Rock Vocal Performance .

The single "Mandinka" was a big college radio hit. In her first US network television appearance, O'Connor sang "Mandinka" on Late Night with David Letterman in 1988.In January 2010, O'Connor performed a duet with R&B singer Mary J. Blige produced by former A Tribe Called Quest member Ali Shaheed Muhammad entitled "This Is To Mother You". The proceeds of the song's sales were donated to the organization GEMS (Girls Educational and Mentoring Services). O'Connor announced she was working with Marco Pirroni and John Reynolds on recording a new album, described as "a guitar based electric album with songs about love".