To the Faithful Departed
album by The Cranberries
To the Faithful Departed is the third studio album by Irish alternative rock band the Cranberries, released on 29 April 1996. The album was made in memory of Denny Cordell, who signed the band to Island Records, and Joe O'Riordan (vocalist Dolores O'Riordan's grandfather), who had both died that year. The album reached number one in four countries and became the band's highest-charting album on the US Billboard 200, where it peaked at number four.
Packaging
The album sleeve photo session was made up of two parts, the first being the original design for the front cover, a naked baby boy (supplied by their press officer Smash at Island Records) lying on his back, which was shot in photographer Andy Earl's new studio on Shad Thames in London, and the band seated in a yellow room. At the last minute, at Dolores O'Riordan's request, the two were swapped and the yellow room became the front cover.
The yellow room was designed to be an echo of the previous two album sleeves. It was built in London and transported to the Lake District and erected in a forest near Loughrigg Holme. Snow fell on the day of the photoshoot, and the band spent as little time as possible on the shoot clad, as they were wearing new purple Dolce & Gabbana outfits.
A new logo and typeface were decided upon signifying the band's desire to move on from the strict repetition of the previous album sleeves. Incidental studio photos were included, taken by Cally in the band's studio in Vancouver, Canada.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “To the Faithful Departed” as album by The Cranberries. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
Why this record matters
The subject matters to the arts & letters register because the source frames it as album by The Cranberries. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.
Object files, edition statements, performance records and contemporary criticism preserve different stages of the work’s history. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 25, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1930617. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1996.
Rights, attribution and provenance may remain disputed even when a general reference summary presents a stable account. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
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This entry incorporates text from “To the Faithful Departed” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.