MOTHER'S DAY SPECIALS! SHOW ME MORE
Adele Bertei was a founding member of musical insurrectionists No New York's Contortions and a personal assistant to Brian Eno. Bertei was lead singer for the Bloods, which is considered the first out, queer, all women-rock band. She has appeared in several indie films, most notably as a lead character Lizzie Borden’s Born in Flames. She has toured with, written songs for, and recorded as a backing vocalist for artists as diverse as Tears for Fears, Thomas Dolby, Sandra Bernhard, Culture Club, Scritti Politti, and Whitney Houston. Her duet with Thomas Dolby on “Hyperactive!” was a top-twenty hit in the UK, as was her single with Jellybean Benitez, “Just a Mirage.” She is the author of Peter and the Wolves (2020), Why Labelle Matters (2021), and Twist: Tales of a Queer Girlhood (2023).
This is a beautifully written and deeply personalised homage to one of O’Connor’s finest works, and it reads all the better for that. On the final page, Adele Bertei writes to Sinéad “I pray I’ve done right by you”. I’ve closed the book with a lump in my throat. * Blitzed Magazine * Adele Bertei examines Sinead O’Connor’s 1994 album Universal Mother, which came hard on the heels of her controversial, very public, statements about child abuse in the Catholic church, focussing on how the record managed to combine rage with empathy and grief, as well as mourning the loss of innocence of Sinead’s beloved Ireland. * Choice *
