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Posted on Thu, Sep. 16, 2004
Together again
LIKE OLD FRIENDS, TEARS FOR FEARS REUNITES TO PLAY
By Brad Kava
Mercury News
At a private show in the Fairmont Hotel last Sunday for San Jose's KEZR-FM (106.5), the members of England's Tears for Fears, who hadn't played together in 13 years, were asked what they'd been listening to lately.
``He's listening to Simon and Garfunkel,'' said Roland Orzabal of his singing partner Curt Smith.
Ow!
With that little barb came a hint about the reasons for the breakup of friends, marriages and bands.
Smith and Orzabal were childhood friends in Bath, both from broken homes, who formed Tears for Fears in 1981 after playing in the ska band Graduate.
Their first album, 1983's ``The Hurting,'' was based on the writings of primal-scream therapist Arthur Janov, whose return-to-the-womb-and-scream therapy influenced John Lennon's first solo album.
Like Paul Simon, Orzabal wrote most of the songs and carried most of the weight in the duo, but Smith's high harmonies were integral to the formula. They had a three-disc string of hits that included the debut, 1985's ``Songs From the Big Chair,'' and 1989's ``Seeds of Love.'' Then they broke up after losing millions to corrupt manager.
A decade and a half later, Gary Jules' surprising cover of the track ``Mad World'' (which appeared on the soundtrack for the 2001 cult movie hit ``Donnie Darko'') from their first album has helped re-ignite interest in the synth-pop duo, which plays Golden Gate Park on Sunday, with Morrissey and others, as part of Alice radio's Now and Zen Festival.
After the breakup, Smith moved to Los Angeles, and Orzabal stayed in the United Kingdom and produced less-successful albums under the Tears for Fears name. The two didn't speak for almost a decade.
Smith played with the L.A. band Mayfield, an intriguing alternative-rock outfit that got some airplay on college stations.
``It was nine years of stony silence,'' Orzabal says in a telephone interview. ``But once we spoke, we realized we were not the teenagers that used to hang at Snowhill Flats and barf and drink together. We realized it would be nice to finish on a brighter note.''
Orzabal, who called Smith on a business matter, ended up moving to Los Angeles and collaborating on a new Tears for Fears album, ``Everybody Loves a Happy Ending,'' released last week.
It's a Beatle-esque disc whose title is both a serious look at their careers and a playful reference.
The duo (Orzabal has two sons and Smith two daughters) sounded great Sunday in a four-song set of new and old material, backed by additional guitar, piano and drums.
The challenge, Orzabal says, will be to integrate the new songs with the hits audiences crave.
``I hope we've challenged the belief that bands can't come back and make another great record,'' he says. ``We've gone back to our influences -- the Beatles, Pink Floyd, T Rex, a lot of glam rock, Led Zeppelin. You go through a period where it seems irrelevant, and then you rediscover it. You can't scrap some of the best music ever made, just because it comes from the 1960s or '70s.''
Tears for Fears
At the Now & Zen Festival with
Morrissey, Dashboard Confessional
and Howie Day
Where: Sharon Meadow, Golden Gate Park, San Francisco
When: Noon-5 p.m. Sunday
Tickets: $35 (plus service charge); free ages 5 and under
Call: (866) 468-3399 or check www.ticketweb.com