Sinead O'Connor. Picture: Donal Moloney. Sinead O’Connor and Rufus Wainwright have been announced in the line-up for to the 2015 WOMAD festival in New Plymouth next March. Irish musician Sinead O’Connor has released 10 albums since 1987, and made plenty of headlines, as she has been outspoken on issues like women’s rights and religion. Her best-known work is her evocative cover of Prince’s Nothing Compares 2 U, but she has moved across many genres – from Irish folk to Jamaican roots music. O’Connor’s latest album I’m Not Bossy, I’m The Boss is full of pop songs about love. After the years of mixed messages, from saying she was a lesbian to being “a quarter gay”, O’Connor this year she explained to Pride Source that she doesn’t believe in labels. “If I fall in love with someone, I wouldn't give a shit if they were a man or a woman... What I'm trying to say is, I'm old enough not to be going by my dick.” Rufus Wainwright. Picture: Sean James. Gay musician Rufus Wainwright has had a varied career, ranging from pop albums to his Grammy-nominated recreation of Judy Garland's fabled Carnegie Hall concert and writing his own operas. He comes from a family of musicians, as the son of folk singers Loudon Wainwright III and Kate McGarrigle and the brother of Martha Wainwright. Wainwright has performed in New Zealand a number of times, most recently in 2012, the same year he married partner Jorn Weisbrodt in Long Island. The couple have a daughter together, whose mother is Leonard Cohen's daughter, Lorca Cohen. WOMAD returns to Brooklands Park and TSB Bowl of Brooklands from 13-15 March for its 11th birthday.
Credit: GayNZ.com Daily News staff
First published: Thursday, 23rd October 2014 - 7:22am