TEARS FOR FEARS - SONGS FROM THE BIG CHAIR (1985) POLL

See, I knew the photo I tried to post would fuck up. I knew it.

http://i307.photobucket.com/albums/nn306/Floridian_20/TearsForFears-SongsFromTheBigChair.jpg

http://www.onlyolivia.com/music/albums/data/dontstop.jpg

Hahahahhahahhahah you know me too well Mr. Yuro!

Ok I'm gonna have to revisit this one. I think I was pretty overwhelmed by it in my naive youth. Perhaps I had a relatively sheltered musical upbringing but I seem to recall thinking it was the one of most bombastic and detailed things I had ever heard. Now I can't even remember half of the tracks.

I only bought this a couple of years, although, of course, I grew up with the the four singles. Some of the album tracks are surprising: the Bo Diddley-beat interlude in "The Working Hour," fer instance. Still voted for "Head Over Heels" over "Everybody Wants to Rule The World." That chorus! The opening keyboards!

Alfred posted. OMG, I'm saved. If I could just find that libcrypt, though.

Alfred, I still remember Twist of Fate, though, I do still have that. Also I'm very close downloading this Daryl Hall album...whatever that is they mentioned on the Eno thread. I've almost got all of that, now.

I just relistened to it, after 20-odd years, and I'm afraid I was unimpressed. Another childhood illusion shattered. Shout and Everybody and Head over Heels are still great 80s pop songs - still get a shiver from the intro of the latter - but the rest is distinctly self-indulgent. Mothers Talk is just a bit of a mess, Broken really does sound like the work of someone with an over-inflated ego (and why the live reprise at the end of Head over Heels?), and Listen was just embarrassing.

Took me years to realize 'The Hurting' is a better record. I'll vote 'Head over Heels' here, if not for the cheesy library video alone.

"The Hurting" is way better IMO. My pick here is "Head Over Heels", just ahead of the two more famous hits.

I have no idea If I'm picking Head Over Heels or Shout here. I love both songs so much for very different reasons.

"Head Over Heels" and "Everybody Wants to Rule the World" are so great.

Head Over Heels

EWTRTW over HOH

EWTRTW slightly over Shout. Both great pop songs. Head Over Heels is good, too (not as good as the Go-Go's song of the same name, but good). The rest, meh.

obviously yes the hurting is the better album (it's the only great album they ever made actually) but this is pretty classic in another way altogether, in the sense that 'so' was classic and lots of other 80's albums were; they were kind of challenging and HUGELY popular. anyway "head over heels" gets my vote since I was in a lip synch competition at school in sixth grade (maybe seventh?) and we did this.

SHOUT = so very clearly an influence on ...MASSES era depeche it hurts. especially NEVER LET ME DOWN AGAIN.

Everybody Wants To Rule The World never loses its magic. Ever. I don't know why.

Listen

No way is this album any worse than The Hurting. They never made one remotely perfect album, and, anyway, they were made for arena synth-pop, not the miserabilist kind.

Yeah fucking Hurting. I should bloody well listen to that one again. I've got it right here on my iPod.

Also fucking Curtis is right. I still don't have the Chameleons Tony Fletcher CD ripped, but never mind.

The Working Hour has always been a personal favorite. What a great record.

This thread seem to die a little early (and I admit I got pretty off topic, but damn that Timi Yuro didn't help matters :)) so I'm gonna give it a bump to help it out a little.

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Still voted for "Head Over Heels" over "Everybody Wants to Rule The World." That chorus! The opening keyboards!

Alfred remains my proxy in all things.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

Woohooahh! Head Over Heels nearly in a landslide! I didn't see that one coming at all! Twice as much as Everybody...wow. ILMers have spoken. I love it.

Surprising but nice.

Now I hope "The Hurting" is next up?

SHOUT = so very clearly an influence on ...MASSES era depeche it hurts. especially NEVER LET ME DOWN AGAIN.

yah both are produced by david bascombe. dm used him for "masses" because they loved his worok on "big chair" (i think they said as much in reissue notes)

Which was quite pointless, as Depeche Mode had always been much better than Tears For Fears. Even when Tears For Fears were at their very best, as on "The Hurting" (which is a much better album than "Songs From The Big Chair"). Frankly, Depeche Mode might have benefited musically from continuing to have Daniel Miller as their producer on every album. They have been great afterwards too (partly except for "Songs Of Faith And Devotion" and "Music From The Masses" - their two least synthpop'y albums), but not as great as they were in the Daniel Miller era during the 80s.

http://softporal.ucoz.ru/Music/DepecheMode-Wrong.jpg

in fact 5:07 into 'mother's talk' sounds *just like* the intro to 'never let me down again'. i'm starting to realise how our man Bascombe was much more massively key to the succes of DM The American Arena Years. the drum machines on Big Chair are basically *the same ones* as on Music For The Masses.

How do I know I didn't vote in this poll?
6. Broken – 0

Between the searching and the need to work it out
I stopped believing everything will be alright

I love the crazy fucking siren guitar, too! The whole song sounds like a really polite & clean mental breakdown.

And in that way I see the song as an extension of their stuff on "The Hurting" moreso than any other song on this album though.

This album is fucking great BTW! I love both of them all the way through.

Save The Robot once wrote that Donnie Darko makes Head Over Heels seem like the greatest song of the 80s.

I remember being taunted by a guy on my Little League team when I told him my sister had bought this record for me for my birthday. Can't remember what he said exactly but it was something along the lines of "faggot shit." Mind you, we were twelve...

If I'd voted in this poll when it happened, I more than likely would have voted 'The Working Hour'. Listening to it right this very moment, however, 'I Believe' is really really doing it for me.

"The Working Hour" is a really odd track for a big-selling album, don't you think?

It's always been a huge favourite of mine... the way it introduces itself with the saxophone and keyboards, then the programmed rhythm arrives and that big, powerful sounding piano.

You're kinda right in a way, for a big selling album this really only has three obvious singles on it: 'Shout', 'Everybody Wants To Rule The World' and 'Head Over Heels', although I think 'Head Over Heels' loses something when taken in isolation, and it's best heard as part of the 'Broken'/'Head Over Heels'/'Broken (Live)' suite on the album.

'Mothers Talk' and 'I Believe' were both released as singles, and even though I like 'Mothers Talk' (that BIG drum sound) and I *LOVE* 'I Believe', I wouldn't have had either down as contenders to be released as singles. 'Broken' and 'Listen' could never have been singles in a million years.

The best parts of 'The Working Hour' for me are the build in the intro and the sheer power of the "find out... find out..." outro, rather than the actual SONG itself. I feel that editing it down would have proved to be a bit of a headache, and it would have been necessary to do so if they were going to put it out as a single. I definitely think it would lose something if those parts were fucked with in any way!!

In fact, I think I remember a review of a reissue of Songs From The Big Chair which described 'The Working Hour' as "over-inflated rot"... christ, no! Every single part of that song has a purpose!

Agreed. Even better, I had the UK cassette which had a bunch of bonus tracks including this version: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L4G6XYm8hoc

Thanks for that, I hadn't heard that version before! :D

The part of "The Working Hour" where the band does the Bo Diddley riff/rhythm = wow.

"Working Hour" might seem an outlier, but it underscores the innate proggy-ness of a lot of this stuff. If anything, it's a much better job of prog as pop than anything Genesis did in the '80s, save perhaps bits of "Invisible Touch." ("Broken" is a total "Invisible Touch" song.) I remember reading an interview with the drummer on this, Manny Elias, and he readily admitted copping all sorts of Collins stuff.

Everybody Wants To Rule The World is one of the greatest singles of all time

based on the audience at the end of the live track I'd assumed they were pretty big by the time this album came out, though who knows maybe that applause is from somewhere else?

It's wild to think about how unknown these guys were at the time.

Unknown where? They were scoring hit singles in Europe from 1982 onwards.

I've always loved that two guys born in the same hospital as me recorded a world-conquering album in a village a few miles outside my town

y'all, The Hurting was #1 in England and scored a couple top five hits -- unknown they weren'et.

*weren't

When I finally heard The Hurting, I realized I already knew all the singles but didn’t know them as Tears of Fears songs

growing up I knew Shout, Everybody Wants to Rule the World, and Head over Heels but didn't know they were all by the same band, thought it was 3 separate one hit wonders actually

The interim single between the first two records 'The Way You Are' is seen as a bit of a misstep by the band, but I've always been quite fond of it, I enjoy the bits where they strive to sound a little like Japan.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lY3CBCyK49s

It appeared on several '80s comps 30 years ago. I loke it too.

growing up I knew Shout, Everybody Wants to Rule the World, and Head over Heels but didn't know they were all by the same band, thought it was 3 separate one hit wonders actually

One of my favorite things when I first started buying CDs as a kid was stumbling across stuff like this, “ohhhhh they did this song too!!”

They were absolutely unknown outside of college radio and late night radio shows in Boston in 1984. We all know that many bands who conquered the UK couldn't get arrested in America.

I forget how good a guitarist Orzabal is whenever I see live clips of him playing the first solo in "Everybody Rules the World" and all over the place on other tracks.

I brought that song to my guitar teacher once, and he could totally tell the second solo was the one played by a pro, lol. Still good, though!

pretty sure the first time i remember hearing Shout it was a cover version by Weird Al as part of the Polka Party medley and to this day sometimes in my mind at some point in the song i'm ready to start singing Papa Don't Preach.

When I finally heard The Hurting, I realized I already knew all the singles but didn’t know them as Tears of Fears songs

I had that experience with "Mad World," which I knew from college radio. When Songs From the Big Chair hit it took me a while to clock that they were the guys who did the "I find it kind of funny, I find it kind of sad" song.

Three songs on KROQ's 1983 year-end tally. "Mad World" in the top five:

https://rocklists.com/kroq-1983.html

The second solo in "Everybody Wants to Rule the World" is showier but Orzabal's solo is the one that transports me. He's a great guitarist

The three big singles are supreme. My favorite atm being Head over Heels, but Everybody Wants to Rule the World is so quintessential to the decade in my mind. I have gotten bored/annoyed by many big hits in my life but this one still works for me 4 decades later. I can’t think of many mainstream hits that have this sort of infinite shelf life for me.

The rest of the album is really good too. I think the only track I don’t care about is “Listen” but it’s not terrible.

I love "Listen" not least as a kind of chaser/statement/palate cleanser, especially after the "Broken" encore. But you're right about the singles, they really transcend the trappings of the times.

lol
listening to the “Urban Mix” of EWTRTW wondering what is so different and then at about 2:36 someone starts going crazy on the drum presets

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AfIZivD4n_w

An awful example of mid-00s remixes. At least it had a name other than "12 inch mix".

But you're right about the singles, they really transcend the trappings of the times.

― Josh in Chicago, Wednesday, February 25, 2026 9:18 AM (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink

they transcend the trappings of the times but are also the ur-example of what the best of what the trends of that time could produce, if you know what i mean

that's exactly right

An awful example of mid-00s remixes. At least it had a name other than "12 inch mix".

it’s from 1985!

I find it kind of sad.

anyways the B sides from big chair are great. some of them sound like they inspired Disco Inferno (the band)

Apologies, I mistyped.

I know the basic 7 track album is just about perfect as is but I had the extended cassette with this tracklisting on side 2:

B1 The Big Chair
B2 Empire Building
B3 The Marauders
B4 Broken Revisited
B5 The Conflict
B6 The Working Hour (Piano Version)

It's almost like an experimental ambient alternate reality TFF.

No doubt discussed (linked?) above, but the Classic Albums/making-of doc was revelatory. Might have been on BBC?

A friend of mine was talking about EWTRTW recently and said that he realised, after decades, that near the end when RO sings 'say that you never never never never need it' that he's mimicking the opening riff, which is pretty cool, intentional or otherwise.

holy shit, yes!

although it's Smith who sings most of the song, right? I know he and Orzabal double it up for the chorus and middle eight.

I never noticed that Curt only gets one co-writing credit on the album, but he is no Andrew Ridgeley. FWIW he only gets one on "Seeds of Love," too, but it's the title track. And he gets solo writing credit on several on the first album, including "Mad World," "Pale Shelter" and "Change," the ones I hear the most.

i think they double-up that part too

xp

Orzabal wrote the entirety of The Hurting solo, Josh. You're looking at vocal credits.

Whoops! So that means lyrics, then.

No, just who sung them. RO was sole writer.

Ah, I see now. The Wikipedia credit chart is labeled differently for that album.

https://reverbmachine.com/blog/tears-for-fears-everybody-wants-to-rule-the-world-synths/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fJti5XA0MGg

Read a cool story about how RO's original lyrics for "EWTRTW" were more obviously about nuclear war (a major cultural fixation in the mid-80s) but the band didn't like them for some reason and we went in a more ambiguous and fecund direction. That was a close call for music history!

brb, gonna work on a mashup with “Ronnie, Talk To Russia” by Prince

"Roland, Talk to Russia"

Echoes of "Under Pressure," which iirc was originally titled "People on the Streets" before Bowie took over and focused what they had.

once you start getting into 80s music its really striking how many of the lyrics were about nuclear war, most of them were a bit more subtle than Sting was however

Read a cool story about how RO's original lyrics for "EWTRTW" were more obviously about nuclear war (a major cultural fixation in the mid-80s) but the band didn't like them for some reason and we went in a more ambiguous and fecund direction.

Huh, I always figured it was about that anyway. "Say that you'll never never never need it," etc., to me at the time I seemed clear enough.

IT seemed clear enough. I was as clear as mud as any other 14 year old.

most of them were a bit more subtle than Sting was however

"Love Is The Seventh (Shock) Wave (Ripping The Meat From Our Bones)"

I dunno, speaking for myself I need a nuclear war

That's because you're about as easy as one!

I don't subscribe to your point of view