Miley Cyrus has discussed her 2013 public argument with Sinéad O’Connor to mark her song ‘Wrecking Ball’ turning 10.
- READ MORE: Sinéad O’Connor, 1966-2023: an artist of integrity, intensity and honesty
Upon the song’s release a decade ago, O’Connor wrote an open letter to Cyrus after the pop-star cited the late Irish singer as an inspiration for her explicit video for ‘Wrecking Ball’.
In the letter, O’Connor warned Cyrus not to let the music industry make a “prostitute” out of her, with Cyrus then responding by posting photos of O’Connor in a fragile mental state and comparing her to the actress Amanda Bynes, who was hospitalised after a mental breakdown that same year.
Now, to mark the anniversary of ‘Wrecking Ball’, Cyrus has spoken to ABC about the reasons behind her messages to O’Connor and how she feels about it now.
On her new special Endless Summer Vacation: Continued (Backyard Sessions), Cyrus said of the reaction to ‘Wrecking Ball’: “I was expecting there to be controversy and backlash, but I don’t think I expected other women to put me down or turn on me, especially women that had been in my position before.
“This is when I’d received an open letter from Sinead O’Connor, and I had no idea about the fragile mental state that she was in, and I was also only 20 years old, so I could really only wrap my head around mental illness so much. All that I saw was that another woman had told me that this idea was not my idea.
She added: “Our younger childhood triggers and traumas come up in weird and odd ways, and I think I’d just been judged for so long for my own choices that I was just exhausted, and I was in this place where I finally was making my own choices and my own decisions, and to have that taken away from me deeply upset me. God bless Sinead O’Connor, for real, in all seriousness.”
O’Connor died at the age of 56 last month (July 26), after being found unresponsive in her London home.
This month, it was revealed that she was reportedly in talks over a biopic just weeks before her death. According to The Sun, a film based on her 2021 autobiography Rememberings, was being considered with three actresses including Demi Moore set to play the late artist in different stages of her life.
Cyrus, meanwhile, returned this week with new song and video ‘Used To Be Young’.
