What happened to Sinead O’Connor?

We got this picture via email with the question ‘Guess Who?’ and can admit that we had absolutely no idea. Initially we guessed Susan Boyle while some in the office guessed it was a boy – we could not have been more wrong.

The picture is of Sinead O’Connor – she of Nothing Compares 2 U and the singular tear.

This tattoo covered person really could not be further away from our memory of Sinead O’Connor with her ethereal beauty, perfect skin and green eyes. The elfin beauty we remember is long gone. In her place is an overweight woman with badly cut hair in an ill-fitting trouser suit.

The 44-year-old mother of four appeared at Manchester’s Pavilion Theatre last week after a difficult period in the background for the singer. O’Connor has gone through suicide attempts and bouts of mental illness in the interim period and is now attempting a comeback.

Before Nothing Compares 2 U, she was a moderately successful, relatively ‘niche’ artist, though well-respected in the industry. That single changed everything, and brought her A-list status overnight — something that never sat comfortably with her.

The last anyone in the office remembers of Sinead was her appearance on Saturday Night Live when she ripped up a photograph of the Pope in protest against the child sex abuse scandal in the Catholic Church. As we remember Irish born O’Connor then went on to become a female priest after deciding that she was, in fact, not a lesbian as she had originally thought.

Since then Sinead has had three husbands, four children to different fathers and a string of lovers, mostly other musicians.

Sinead’s comeback just makes for uncomfortable viewing – can she cope with it?