Songoftheday 3/4/14 - Welcome to your life there's no turning back, even while we sleep we will find you...

Tears For Fears - "Everybody Wants To Rule The World"
from the album Songs From The Big Chair (1985)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #1 (two weeks)
Weeks in the Top-40: 14

Today's Song of the Day is by the British new wave duo Tears For Fears, who came together in the southwest city of Bath in the beginning of the 80s. Roland Orzabal and Curt Smith were originally in an act called Graduate, before transforming to Tears For Fears, named for the psychological theory of screaming out emotion to release tension and mental anguish, otherwise known as "primal therapy".

The band's first big single, "Mad World", went to #3 on the British chart in 1982, before the release of their debut album The Hurting at the beginning of the following year. That set spun off four hit singles, three of them reaching the top-5 on the UK chart, and the second, "Change", becoming their first minor American hit at #73.

For their next album, Songs From The Big Chair (the name derived from the mutliple personality flick Sybil), the band released their third British single "Everybody Wants To Rule The World" as the first in the U.S. in 1985. Written by Smith and Orzabal with band keyboardist Ian Stanley, the song sounded much different from their previous work, though the emo-style lyrics about power and violence stayed intact..

"Everybody Wants To Rule The World" was their first big success in America, landing at #1 on the pop and dance charts in June of 1985, while reaching the runner-up spot on the Mainstream Rock and Adult Contemporary (or "easy-listening") radio charts in Billboard. Internationally, the single also topped the singles charts in Canada and New Zealand, while stopping at #2 in Australia, Ireland, The Netherlands, and their native England.

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Here's the band live in 1985...