Tears for Fears
The Tipping Point

The Tears For Fears were a revelation on the road to Damascus during my adolescent listening habits, much like the Queen with their monumental Innuendo. It was the year 1992 when they released the underrated Laid So Low, essentially a solo piece by Roland Orzabal, leading their first compilation, a formidable sequence of 12 breathtaking tracks for someone like me who wasn't even aware of their existence.

Two good albums followed, still under the Tears For Fears name but essentially the work of Orzabal alone, and then years of silence. Curt Smith, the partner, reappeared in the early 2000s when they resumed the company's work to produce the weak Everybody Loves A Happy Ending. I’ve often wondered what went wrong... too immediate, too pop, too predictable, too Beatle-esque, too much of everything, yet with abundant ideas, inevitably wasted. And Curt Smith, with his sugary singing coating already over-produced compositions like powdered sugar.

I feared the damage again this time. Yet, I start by stating that it's the lesser partner who struck the decisive blow, bringing to this, let's make it clear right away, beautiful album, the first single in their history without the genius of Orzabal's intervention. Break The Man is definitely a successful single, worthy of their history, and serves one of their most incisive past themes. The gestation of the album wasn't easy, due to family dramas and inadequate management, but like many life events, when you rise from falls, you manage to give your best, or at least something extra, in this case, a mature work, magnificently played, and without clumsy imitations of the past.

There is also an emotional and purely nostalgic moment like the "almost suite" Rivers Of Mercy, where Tears For Fears remind us they are still capable of conceiving songs that transcend the pop form with a skillful use of influences from other musical genres. A piece cited by multiple reviewers as the best on the album and among the best in their discography, though it doesn't entirely convince an "Orzabalian" like myself. On the contrary, I consider Master Plan, the track, surprisingly the least listened to on Spotify, the pinnacle of the album, as a completed expression of the operation begun with Sowing The Seeds Of Love, positioning itself on the same complicated level as Lennon\McCartney. It's a pity for the subsequent End Of Night which ends up lost in Smith's usual choruses (okay, you've probably guessed I'm not rooting for him), preventing it from standing out among the best things out of Orzabal's pen.

On an instrumental level, the abandonment of the electric guitar in favor of acoustic and electronic sounds immediately stands out, unlike what happened in the '90s when some tracks bordered on hard rock. Emblematic cases are the first two singles released. No Small Thing is an isolated folk episode that evolves from a vocal on acoustic guitar à la Johnny Cash towards the usual melodic openings, of which our guys have never been stingy. The Tipping Point is played on an electronic base that seems intricately woven with lyrics that are the main key to reading the album. The point of no return, which forces us to choose other paths, is what enabled the two artists to break free and resume the work that made them famous worldwide.

If their songs are still the subject of cult and reinterpreted by various and unexpected music stars, it's because we are in the presence of true survivors of the great music of the '80s. Survivors, fortunately for us, in talent, which still seems intact and crystal clear.