In September 2003, Tears for Fears reunited on stage in Las Vegas for the Grand Slam charity event. According to Curt Smith, the performance was the first time the duo had performed together since he had left in the early '90s. Smith, along with songwriting partner Roland Orzabal were responsible for trademark '80s singles like "Sowing the Seeds of Love," "Everybody Wants to Rule the World" and "Head Over Heels." For Smith, the Vegas concert also marked the first time his two children knew for sure that their dad had a job.
"My kids didn't know what I did for a living. They had never seen me play or sing before," Smith said. "It was a different experience bringing my children. My kids had the best time ever. Luckily, they are at the age where they think it's pretty cool. Roland's kids, being older, have more of that balance between it's sort of cool and it's sort of embarrassing."
The reunion of Smith and Orzabal came more than a decade after Smith had quit Tears For Fears—three years into recording a follow-up to Seeds of Love (1989)—in 1992, during the endless bickering in the studio with his partner. Smith then spent the remainder of the '90s making neglected solo discs while Orzabal soldiered on under the Tears for Fears moniker, releasing increasingly less successful discs.
It made sense, after getting together again onstage here, for the duo to attempt a new Tears For Fears disc again. After all, together Smith and Orzabal had made Tears for Fears among the most successful synth-pop bands of the '80s and apart, well .... Yet, that financial success meant the two still didn't need each other, so Smith wants fans to know this reunion is not simply an attempt to cash a check.
"We were blessed that we were successful when we were," he says. "That enabled us to live in a comfortable fashion. It's definitely a joy when you make a record to know you are doing it for the right reasons: You want to do it and that you think you have something valid to offer. I'm way past the need-to-do-it-for-the-money stage. That's definitely a good feeling."
Also, according to Smith, another reason a reunion disc was justified is that Tears for Fears, despite what some critics may say, was not just another MTV hair band, interchangeable with Heaven 17, Human League or A Flock of Seagulls. "We've never been a musically fashionable band. We've been successful, but I think that has something to do with us never following the trends," Smith explains.
So the duo sat down to begin writing the songs that would become the nontrend following (unless it is the eternal trend known as Beatlesesque) Everybody Loves a Happy Ending, the much belated follow-up to Seeds of Love.
"The first few days, we were circling each other a bit to see what had changed, if anything," Smith says. "But I think we are both considerably more relaxed than we used to be, and that became very apparent early on that we were quite open to each other's input. We appreciated each other's strengths and I think we didn't do that enough in our prior working relationship."
Perhaps it isn't surprising that the band's earlier studio collaborations were more traumatic. Long before Metallica, Tears for Fears was dedicated to dubious psychobabble as inspiration, becoming disciples of primal scream therapy that was the subject of the early hit, "Shout." Becoming a parent, though, has since made Smith more skeptical of primal therapy. "Primal theory is still a big part of my growing up, and I still agree with 60 to 70 percent of it," he says.
Among his bigger disappointments was meeting Arthur Janov, the therapy's creator. "I thought it was like meeting God, and he was more interested in us writing a musical about primal theory," Smith recounts. He says he now believes the medium is the message. "I think psychology still has a sway over everything we do, but music, in and of itself, is the therapy."
With Everybody Loves a Happy Ending, Smith claims to be psychologically and artistically satisfied, even if the results from the two of them working together as Tears for Fears remain a bit of a mystery to him.
"If I could only put my finger on the exact thing, then it would make my life a bit easier, but I can't," he says. "All I can say is that we wrote together and it sounds like Tears for Fears. Obviously, there is something that happens when we work together that has a certain sound."
For now, Smith and Orzabal are together again and Tears for Fears is happily codependent once more.