Tears for Fears, named after a phrase found in Arthur Janov's book Prisoners of Pain, are a British pop/rock outfit formed in 1981 in Bath, England, by
Roland Orzabal (2) and
Curt Smith, two school friends and ex-members of
Graduate. Initially associated with new wave and the new romantic movements, the duo's earliest work (through 1983's The Hurting) was explicitly based around the confusion and angst of adolescence.
Read more Though top forty regulars on both sides of the Atlantic, Orzabal and Smith made their major international breakthrough with Songs From the Big Chair in 1985, which included their most commercially popular material to date (scoring two Billboard Hot 100 #1s and a UK #2).
They released three albums - the synthesizer-based The Hurting (1983), Songs from the Big Chair (1985) (which broke free from the new-wave mold) and the jazz/blues/
Beatles influenced The Seeds of Love (1989) - before Orzabal and Smith had an extremely acrimonious falling out.
The split of the duo was ultimately blamed on Orzabal's intricate but frustrating approach to production and Smith's distaste for the pop music world. The two spent the 1990s working separately.
Orzabal kept the band name alive by releasing the single
Laid So Low (Tears Roll Down), which also appeared on Tears Roll Down (Greatest Hits 82-92). Then in 1993, Roland released the full-length album Elemental, also under the Tears for Fears name, even though, like with the single, he was solo. Later Orzabal released Raoul and the Kings of Spain under the band´s moniker and Tomcats Screaming Outside (2001) as a solo artist. Smith also released a solo album in the beginning of the nineties and released a CD as a band, called
Mayfield.
In 2001, routine paperwork obligations led to Orzabal and Curt Smith's first conversation in over a decade. The two patched up their differences and fourteen songs were written and recorded in less than six months. The ensuing album, Everybody Loves a Happy Ending, was released in September, 2004.
Classic tracks such as
Mad World later appeared on the cult-classic film Donnie Darko, providing the band with some rejuvenation for newer generations.
The duo's next move is currently unknown, though Orzabal is keeping busy with writing his first novel. Given the nature of their surprise comeback in 2004, the success of a live CD/DVD in 2006 and a handful of recent European concerts, it's unlikely that we've heard the last from Tears For Fears.
