August 1999 - James DeCamp Photography

Dolores Mary Eileen O’Riordan belts out a song at Polaris Amphitheater Tuesday night, August 31, 1999 as the Cranberries played to a large crowd.

The Cranberries are an Irish rock band formed in Limerick in 1989 by lead singer Dolores O’Riordan, guitarist Noel Hogan, bassist Mike Hogan, and drummer Fergal Lawler. Although widely associated with alternative rock, the band’s sound also incorporates indie pop, post-punk, Irish folk, and pop rock elements.

The Cranberries rose to international fame in the 1990s with their debut album, Everybody Else Is Doing It, So Why Can’t We?, which became a commercial success. The Cranberries are one of the most successful rock acts of the ’90s and have sold over 40 million records worldwide. The band has achieved four top 20 albums on the Billboard 200 chart (Everybody Else Is Doing It, So Why Can’t We?; No Need to Argue, To the Faithful Departed and Bury the Hatchet)and eight top 20 singles on the Modern Rock Tracks chart (“Linger“, “Dreams“, “Zombie“, “Ode to My Family“, “Ridiculous Thoughts“, “Salvation“, “Free to Decide“, and “Promises“).

In early 2009, after a six-year hiatus, the Cranberries reunited and began a North American tour, followed by shows in Latin America and Europe. The band recorded their sixth album Roses in May 2011, and released it in February 2012. Something Else, an album covering earlier songs together with the Irish Chamber Orchestra, was released in April 2017.

Dolores Mary Eileen O’Riordan was an Irish musician and singer-songwriter. She led the rock band The Cranberries for 13 years before the band took a break starting in 2003, reuniting in 2009.

Her first solo album, Are You Listening?, was released in May 2007 and was followed up by No Baggage in 2009. O’Riordan was known for her lilting mezzo-soprano voice, for yodeling and for her strong Limerick accent. She appeared as a judge on RTÉ‘s The Voice of Ireland during the 2013–14 season. In April 2014, O’Riordan joined Jetlag(later called D.A.R.K.) and began recording new material. In May 2017, Dolores declared that she had been diagnosed with bipolar disorder.

The Germain Amphitheater (originally the Polaris Amphitheater) was a 20,000-seat outdoor entertainment venue located in Columbus, Ohio, near the suburb of Westerville. The venue opened as part of a large development venture off of Interstate Highway I-71. There were 6,700 seats in an open-air pavilion—much of it under cover—and room for another 13,300 people on general admission lawn seating. The concert season began mid-May, continuing through early October and featured 20-30 concerts per year. At the time it opened, it was the largest and most suitable venue for concerts in central Ohio.

A relative unknown at the time, Britney Spears performs in concert at the Veterans Memorial Auditorium to a sell out crowd Wednesday night, August 18, 1999.

Unlike her second concert in 2001 at Nationwide Arena, this venue had a limited space (2500 seats).

Britney Spears performs in concert at the Veterans Memorial Auditorium to a sell out crowd Wednesday night, August 18, 1999. (© James D. DeCamp | http://www.JamesDeCamp.com | 614-367-6366) [Photographed with Canon EOS D2000 cameras in RAW mode with L series lenses.]

Britney Jean Spears is an American singer, dancer, and actress. Born in McComb, Mississippi, and raised in Kentwood, Louisiana, she performed acting roles in stage productions and television shows as a child, before signing with Jive Records in 1997. Spears’s first two studio albums, …Baby One More Time (1999) and Oops!… I Did It Again (2000), were global successes and made her the best-selling teenage artist of all time. Referred to as the “Princess of Pop“, Spears was credited with influencing the revival of teen pop, during the late 1990s and the early 2000s.

Spears adopted more mature and provocative themes for her next two studio albums, Britney (2001) and In the Zone (2003). She also ventured into acting with her starring role in the 2002 film Crossroads. However, her much-publicized personal issues sent her career into hiatus. Despite being released while her personal struggles were ongoing, Blackout (2007), is often critically referred to as her best work. Her unusual behavior and hospitalizations placed her under a still ongoing conservatorship.

Spears returned to the top of record charts with her sixth and seventh albums, Circus (2008) and Femme Fatale (2011). In 2012, Forbes reported that Spears was the highest paid female musician of the year, with earnings of $58 million, having last topped the list in 2002. During the promotion of her eighth and ninth studio albums, Britney Jean (2013) and Glory (2016), Spears embarked on the four-year concert residency, Britney: Piece of Me, at Planet Hollywood Resort & Casino in Las Vegas.

Five of Spears’ singles have reached number one in the United States: “…Baby One More Time“, “Womanizer“, “3“, “Hold It Against Me” and “S&M“. Other singles, “Oops!… I Did It Again” and “Toxic“, topped the Australian and Canadian charts. Spears has earned numerous awards and accolades, including a Grammy Award, six MTV Video Music Awards, including the Video Vanguard Award, seven BillboardMusic Awards, including the Millennium Award and a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Billboard ranked her as the eighth biggest artist of the 2000s decade. One of the world’s best-selling music artists, Spears has sold over 100 million records worldwide. In the United States, Spears remains the fourth best-selling female album artist of the Nielsen SoundScan era, as well as the best-selling female albums artist of the 2000s. In 2004, she launched a perfume brand with Elizabeth Arden, Inc., from which sales exceeded US$1.5 billion as of 2012.

The Cranberries

Britney Spears

Recent Posts

Pages

About James

Contact James