For the first time in 17 years, Tears For Fears have a brand new album to share with the world. It was a long time coming in many ways, but was well worth the wait.
LISTEN NOW: Tears For Fears talks with Audacy's Taryn Daly
Roland Orzabal and Curt Smith of Tears For Fears joined Audacy’s Taryn Daly for an Audacy Check In as they took us inside their new album The Tipping Point.
While the album marks their first since 2004, the two have been hard at work on the record for quite some time. “We started making this album about seven years ago,” Orzabal said. “Before that and following the release of Everybody Loves A Happy Ending, we did a lot of touring. So we’ve been working together for many, many, many years.”
“This album was a strange one,” Orzabal added. “We started off trying to work with modern songwriters trying to get this hit single, but it was only in the beginning of 2020 when we sat down and looked at what we have and got together and decided we were going to go in a completely different direction. That we weren’t going to worry about singles, that we were just going to worry about making a great album.”
Listen to music from Tears For Fears and more on Audacy’s New Wave Mix Tape
That decision came at a rather peculiar time as Orzabal said it was a month before lockdown from COVID-19 when this all took place. “Strangely enough,” he says “[as] horrible as it was, it kind of made it easier for us to make the album.”
“The hard part was getting together at that point,” Smith added. The two had five songs that they decided to keep from their older sessions that had to be updated for the new album. During lockdown, they exchanged ideas over email until they could get together in person again. “The actual process,” Smith says, “once we found out what it was that we wanted to achieve, was relatively quick.”
Tears For Fears is gearing up for a lengthy tour in support of The Tipping Point (check out tour dates and grab tickets here) as they’ll be bringing Garbage along for the ride. The decision to have Garbage provide support was an easy one to make. “What happens with touring,” Smith says, “you get suggestions thrown at you of people to tour with you and Garbage seemed a good fit.”
Smith went on to say that they ruled out bringing bands along that got their start when Tears For Fears did. “You get tied and labeled to a decade unfortunately,” he said.
“We were trying to find someone that was certainly younger than us and Garbage seemed a good fit. I’ve met Shirley [Manson] and I’ve met Butch [Vig] before, they’re nice people so I think it’ll be an easy one for us to do.”
Tears For Fears have seen many of their songs covered over the years or used as samples. Artists like Kanye West, Drake, The Weeknd, and other contemporary musicians have utilized their work in their music.
Smith not only appreciates the music these artists create from Tears For Fears songs, but their willingness to dig deep into the band’s catalog. “What was interesting with those versions were these modern day artists taking the songs, all the things they took were from The Hurting, which actually wasn’t very big in America,” he said. “They really mined the history of Tears For Fears and went back to our very first album and took samples from there.”
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