— Roland Orzbal
They're back! Yes, the fair gentlemen Roland Orzbal and Curt Smith have emerged from their lair on the outskirts of Bath to bestow upon us a brand new single — and all we had to do was wait a "paltry" four years. In that space of time, Mrs Thatcher won yet another election, English football sides got themselves banned from Europe and Australian telly stopped being rubbish — and you very well may have forgotten all about Tears for Fears. Here's to them being a chart "fixture" for the foreseeable future without any further down time!
Do you recall their earlier work, being that it's been such a long time, oh viewers? No? Well, they had a record called "Everybody Wants to Rule the World" which might as well have been called "Everybody Wants to Buy This Flippin' Great Single" because that's what everyone did — and who could blame them? It was joyous, instantly singalongable and felt important. Their next big hit was called "Shout" which was a little closer to the duff side as Roland and Curt never got round to telling us what they could do without and just ended up repeating the same chorus fourteen thousand times and even it managed to sell by the camperized van-load. The accompanying album Songs from the Big Chair, too, was bought by everyone on Earth and ver Fears were on top of the world. Then they figured it would be the perfect time to disappear.
But now they're back and their latest single, "Sowing the Seeds of Love", is sure to delight all that hear it and send them swiftly back up to the top of the charts. It harks back to the sixties (ie a time when people bought lots of flowery shirts, grew their hair and sat in fields listening to hoary old men playing sitars) but its, er, seeds go back to a job that the singer briefly had with this very same top pop mag. "The second summer of love?" Roland Orzbal asks Paul Margach. "I wasn't aware that the first one ever ended."
Back in the early part of 1985, the Hits was going through a bit of an overhaul. Neil Tennant was off to form a band of some sort (any idea how that worked out?) while other members of the staff were moving on to other pop mags or even getting out of the country. We were short staffed and, to make up for it, we asked a lot of famous people to come in to review the singles and some even said yes. The lead singer of Tears for Fears was one such kind pop star who agreed.
"I basically did it for a laugh," admits Roland Orzbal. "Curt couldn't be bothered so I was all alone." He wasn't terribly impressed by much of what he heard. "They kept teasing me with the promise of a Beatles record for me to review but they kept putting on lousy pop records. I began to suspect that they were just trying to keep me happy but, sure enough, "Ticket to Ride" was there in the pile".
A longtime fan of the Fab Four, Roland was keen to hear the ancient single - "if only to get the taste of the rest of this rubbish out of my mouth" — but he was unexpectedly more taken by another record. Lacking a proper sleeve, it looked as old as anything The Beatles ever did — and sounded like it too.
That release was called "The Mole from the Ministry" by a bunch of old codgers calling themselves The Dukes of Stratosphear which the singer might have confused for something done over twenty years earlier. But Roland knows his sixties pop and had never heard of them so he figured they were a new act. What he didn't realise was that they were an old bunch pretending to be a new group who, er, came from long ago. Or something.
XTC were by then a trio of hoary old blokes from Swindon who had had some chart hits in the early eighties but who had subsequently stopped touring and soon slid down the dumper. They initially denied being The Dukes of Stratosphear and adopted the aliases Sir John Johns (hmmm, an odd name), The Red Curtain (doesn't sound made up to us!), Lord Cornelius Plum (again, somewhat curious) and E.I.E.I. Owen (oh stop it!) but it was one of pop's most poorly kept secrets — even if few at the time cared one way or another. One who did seem to give a toss was Roland ("I couldn't believe it was XTC").
Roland had always admired XTC but he was especially impressed with this new direction. "They were channelling the Beatles so well and it was funny," he remembers. "It's about a mole that is messing with people's lives but they figure it must be their own madness causing it. This mole sounds evil and scheming but I sort of wonder if he's just pretending to be manipulative just to further mess with people. He could be an incompetent bugger but people think he's pulling the strings."
The music also made the singer sit up and take notice. "It sounded just like "I Am the Walrus", it was brilliant," he enthuses. "The Beatles hadn't mattered to people in such a long time that you sometimes felt embarrassed talking them up but that seems to be changing now. Admitting that you were into the Beatles five or ten years ago was tantamount to throwing up your arms and telling the world that you thought all modern pop was crap."
He was so impressed that he began to think about doing his own homage to sixties acid rock and, during ver Fears' lengthy layover, that's exactly what he did and the result is their super new single "Sowing the Seeds of Love". But aren't the words a little too straightforward compared to the Dukes?
"Well, maybe but I tried to nestle current concerns into an old psychedelic piece. A lot of it is about Margaret Thatcher and what she's doing to Britain. But I like to think that there's some of the same paranoia in "The Mole from the Ministry" with some added hope for a more loving universe".
Roland is thankful to the Hits for introducing him to The Dukes of Stratosphear and for a inspiring his latest single. So would he care to review the singles again for the sake of his own creativity? "No, I think once was enough. Get someone like Dr. Robert from the Blow Monkeys. God knows he could do with some inspiration."
~~~~~
Also Reviewed This Fortnight
The Style Council: "Walls Come Tumbling Down"
The Style Council's latest single is, as usual, chart bound but there is some confusion as to one of the song's lyrics. "What's he going on about?" queried our tea boy. "Why's he singin' about enjoying a Cherry Coke as the walls come tumblin' down?" Hits staff were similarly puzzled so we reached out to Paul Weller for clarification. But we couldn't get hold of him. We also tried keyboardist "Merton" Mick Talbot and "backing" singer D.C. Lee but neither of them got back to us. Then, we contacted drummer Steve White who seemed dead chuffed to get be getting a call. "Oh that," he chuckled. "Paul and Mick are very health conscious and I try to be too but my one vice is I drink quite a bit of Cherry Coke. Paul put that in as a joke but he's since said that it's a commentary on how when the revolution comes there will be some who will be standing there on the sidelines, sipping Cherry Coke and watching it all happen". Does that include yourself? "It might do but they shouldn't forget that I'm the strongest member of the group. I'd be a lot more effective at pushing down some walls than Paul!" Well, that clears that up then.
They're back! Yes, the fair gentlemen Roland Orzbal and Curt Smith have emerged from their lair on the outskirts of Bath to bestow upon us a brand new single — and all we had to do was wait a "paltry" four years. In that space of time, Mrs Thatcher won yet another election, English football sides got themselves banned from Europe and Australian telly stopped being rubbish — and you very well may have forgotten all about Tears for Fears. Here's to them being a chart "fixture" for the foreseeable future without any further down time!
Do you recall their earlier work, being that it's been such a long time, oh viewers? No? Well, they had a record called "Everybody Wants to Rule the World" which might as well have been called "Everybody Wants to Buy This Flippin' Great Single" because that's what everyone did — and who could blame them? It was joyous, instantly singalongable and felt important. Their next big hit was called "Shout" which was a little closer to the duff side as Roland and Curt never got round to telling us what they could do without and just ended up repeating the same chorus fourteen thousand times and even it managed to sell by the camperized van-load. The accompanying album Songs from the Big Chair, too, was bought by everyone on Earth and ver Fears were on top of the world. Then they figured it would be the perfect time to disappear.
But now they're back and their latest single, "Sowing the Seeds of Love", is sure to delight all that hear it and send them swiftly back up to the top of the charts. It harks back to the sixties (ie a time when people bought lots of flowery shirts, grew their hair and sat in fields listening to hoary old men playing sitars) but its, er, seeds go back to a job that the singer briefly had with this very same top pop mag. "The second summer of love?" Roland Orzbal asks Paul Margach. "I wasn't aware that the first one ever ended."
Back in the early part of 1985, the Hits was going through a bit of an overhaul. Neil Tennant was off to form a band of some sort (any idea how that worked out?) while other members of the staff were moving on to other pop mags or even getting out of the country. We were short staffed and, to make up for it, we asked a lot of famous people to come in to review the singles and some even said yes. The lead singer of Tears for Fears was one such kind pop star who agreed.
"I basically did it for a laugh," admits Roland Orzbal. "Curt couldn't be bothered so I was all alone." He wasn't terribly impressed by much of what he heard. "They kept teasing me with the promise of a Beatles record for me to review but they kept putting on lousy pop records. I began to suspect that they were just trying to keep me happy but, sure enough, "Ticket to Ride" was there in the pile".
A longtime fan of the Fab Four, Roland was keen to hear the ancient single - "if only to get the taste of the rest of this rubbish out of my mouth" — but he was unexpectedly more taken by another record. Lacking a proper sleeve, it looked as old as anything The Beatles ever did — and sounded like it too.
That release was called "The Mole from the Ministry" by a bunch of old codgers calling themselves The Dukes of Stratosphear which the singer might have confused for something done over twenty years earlier. But Roland knows his sixties pop and had never heard of them so he figured they were a new act. What he didn't realise was that they were an old bunch pretending to be a new group who, er, came from long ago. Or something.
XTC were by then a trio of hoary old blokes from Swindon who had had some chart hits in the early eighties but who had subsequently stopped touring and soon slid down the dumper. They initially denied being The Dukes of Stratosphear and adopted the aliases Sir John Johns (hmmm, an odd name), The Red Curtain (doesn't sound made up to us!), Lord Cornelius Plum (again, somewhat curious) and E.I.E.I. Owen (oh stop it!) but it was one of pop's most poorly kept secrets — even if few at the time cared one way or another. One who did seem to give a toss was Roland ("I couldn't believe it was XTC").
Roland had always admired XTC but he was especially impressed with this new direction. "They were channelling the Beatles so well and it was funny," he remembers. "It's about a mole that is messing with people's lives but they figure it must be their own madness causing it. This mole sounds evil and scheming but I sort of wonder if he's just pretending to be manipulative just to further mess with people. He could be an incompetent bugger but people think he's pulling the strings."
The music also made the singer sit up and take notice. "It sounded just like "I Am the Walrus", it was brilliant," he enthuses. "The Beatles hadn't mattered to people in such a long time that you sometimes felt embarrassed talking them up but that seems to be changing now. Admitting that you were into the Beatles five or ten years ago was tantamount to throwing up your arms and telling the world that you thought all modern pop was crap."
He was so impressed that he began to think about doing his own homage to sixties acid rock and, during ver Fears' lengthy layover, that's exactly what he did and the result is their super new single "Sowing the Seeds of Love". But aren't the words a little too straightforward compared to the Dukes?
"Well, maybe but I tried to nestle current concerns into an old psychedelic piece. A lot of it is about Margaret Thatcher and what she's doing to Britain. But I like to think that there's some of the same paranoia in "The Mole from the Ministry" with some added hope for a more loving universe".
Roland is thankful to the Hits for introducing him to The Dukes of Stratosphear and for a inspiring his latest single. So would he care to review the singles again for the sake of his own creativity? "No, I think once was enough. Get someone like Dr. Robert from the Blow Monkeys. God knows he could do with some inspiration."
~~~~~
Also Reviewed This Fortnight
The Style Council: "Walls Come Tumbling Down"
The Style Council's latest single is, as usual, chart bound but there is some confusion as to one of the song's lyrics. "What's he going on about?" queried our tea boy. "Why's he singin' about enjoying a Cherry Coke as the walls come tumblin' down?" Hits staff were similarly puzzled so we reached out to Paul Weller for clarification. But we couldn't get hold of him. We also tried keyboardist "Merton" Mick Talbot and "backing" singer D.C. Lee but neither of them got back to us. Then, we contacted drummer Steve White who seemed dead chuffed to get be getting a call. "Oh that," he chuckled. "Paul and Mick are very health conscious and I try to be too but my one vice is I drink quite a bit of Cherry Coke. Paul put that in as a joke but he's since said that it's a commentary on how when the revolution comes there will be some who will be standing there on the sidelines, sipping Cherry Coke and watching it all happen". Does that include yourself? "It might do but they shouldn't forget that I'm the strongest member of the group. I'd be a lot more effective at pushing down some walls than Paul!" Well, that clears that up then.
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