Songoftheday 1/11/19 - So those are my dreams and these are my eyes, stand tall like a man headstrong like a horse...
from the album Elemental (1993)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #25 (one week)
Weeks in the Top-40: 9
Today's song of the day comes from the alternative rock act Tears For Fears, who we last saw ushering out the 1980s with their ambitious Seed Of Love album, which sent "Sowing The Seeds Of Love" into the American pop top ten and the Oleta Adams-adorned "Woman In Chains" in the top-40 as a follow-up. However, things were not so "squeaky clean" between primary members Curt Smith and Roland Orzabal, who had fallen out over the stress of overwork and their manager who was eventually nailed for fraud. Smith split, leaving Orzabal alone in charge of the Tears For Fears name. In 1992 as part of a hits collection he released a reworked Seed Of Love-era instrumental, "Tears Roll Down", as a proper vocal cut in "Laid So Low (Tears Roll Down)", which went to #17 on the British singles chart and climbed to #10 on the American Modern Rock radio chart in Billboard magazine.
While Curt released a solo record that bombed so badly it never even made a Stateside release, Orzabal's Tears For Fears released Elemental in 1993, with help from producer and writing partner Alan Griffiths along with studio musicians. The pair would write almost all the album together, including the lead single "Break It Down Again". It would become the act's last pop mainstream success in the U.S. for a long time..
"Break It Down Again" became Tears For Fears' seventh and so far final top-40 pop hit in September of 1993. The track was a huge hit on rock radio here, spending three weeks at #1 on Billboard's Modern Rock format chart, as well as getting to #25 on their Adult Contemporary (or "easy listening") radio list. Internationally, the single went all the way to #4 in Canada and #7 in Italy, and reached the top-40 in France (#19), their native UK (#20), and the Netherlands (#27). While in the UK, second single "Cold" became a minor hit at #72, in the States and Canada, we were treated to "Goodnight Song", which almost made the top-40 in Canada at #44 and "bubbled under" the American Hot 100 at #125.
In 1995, Orzabal and Griffiths returned with another Tears For Fears album, the Latin-tinged Raoul and the Kings Of Spain. The title track brought them back to the top-40 in England, while single "God's Mistake" again "bubbled under" the pop Hot 100 in America at #102. Let go by new label Sony, Roland put the Tears for Fears name to rest for a bit, releasing a solo album Tomcats Screaming Outside (albeit still with Griffiths) in 2001 that went unnoticed.
At the beginning of the new millenium, Smith and Orzabal mended fences and reunited as Tears For Fears, which they've been at since. In 2004 the pair released a new album, Everybody Loves A Happy Ending, and from it single "Call Me Mellow" went to #28 on Billboard's Adult Top-40 radio chart in America, while in Britain "Closest Thing To Heaven" returned them to the pop top-40 at #40. They continue to tour, and in 2017 a successful hits set reached the top-20 on the British albums chart.
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Here's Tears For Fears appearing on Arsenio Hall live in 1993...
And finally a reunited band in 2017 live for the BBC...
Up tomorrow: Philly-gone-Beverly Hills rapper causes some disruption?
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