At the Tears for Fears concert at the Chumash Casino on Thursday night, singer and songwriter Roland Orzabal reminded everyone that they had played nearby years before, joking, “Anyone here from Modesto?”
He was actually referring to their 1990 concert at the Santa Barbara Bowl, which was recorded and released as a concert video called “Going to California.” He even claimed that several of the audience members shown in the video were at the Chumash concert. Orzabal described the video’s title as somewhat prophetic, since the band’s singer/bassist, Curt Smith, who like Orzabal is from England, now lives in Los Angeles. Smith later joked, “Don’t hold that against me; it’s a work thing.”
The Chumash Casino concert was book-ended by the band’s smash hits from their stellar 1985 album Songs From the Big Chair, “Everybody Wants to Rule the World,” which gave a thrilling opening to the show, and “Shout,” which came as the encore. In between was a fascinating sampling of their songs both old and new.
This included several tracks from their acclaimed 1983 debut album, The Hurting, an album that somehow managed to turn emotional pain into catchy pop music. Consider some of the lyrics heard at the concert: “Memories fade but the scars still linger” from “Memories Fade”; “When you don’t give me love / You gave me pale shelter” from “Pale Shelter”; “You lost your honesty, I lost the life in you” from “Change”; and “Hide my head I want to drown my sorrow / No tomorrow, no tomorrow” from “Mad World.”
In Smith’s introduction to the latter, he pointed out that they were performing their version, not the slower revamped one by Michael Andrews and Gary Jules for the soundtrack to Donnie Darko, which reached No. 1 in 2003. Personally, I greatly preferred hearing the original, almost Depeche Mode-like arrangement.
They also played another cool hit from Songs From the Big Chair, “Head Over Heels,” which closed the main set. Sadly, that album’s electro-pop gem and minor hit “Mothers Talk” didn’t make the cut for this concert.
The band’s third album, The Seeds of Love, was represented by the epic “Sowing the Seeds of Love,” “Woman In Chains” in which the (male) background singer boldly sang Oleta Adams’ parts to big cheers from the crowd, and “Badman’s Song,” which Orzabal said was written after overhearing a party in adjacent hotel room where they were talking not-so-nicely about him.
Orzabal and Smith parted ways shortly after touring in support of The Seeds of Love, during which they shot the video “Going to California.” Orzabal then continued to record under the Tears for Fears name, but the band didn’t really regain its stride until Orzabal and Smith reunited for 2004’s aptly named Everybody Loves a Happy Ending. Songs played from this at the Chumash were the sunshine-y “Call Me Mellow,” the psychedelic title song, and “Secret World,” which included a snippet from Paul McCartney’s “Let ‘Em In.”
But the best was saved for last — the aforementioned “Shout,” which is based on Arthur Janov’s primal scream therapy for exorcising repressed pain, and simultaneously serves as a call for people to protest that which is wrong with the world. Or, it can just be appreciated as one of the catchiest songs from the 1980s, by one of the quintessential ‘80s bands.
Setlist
Everybody Wants to Rule the World
Secret World
Call Me Mellow
Sowing the Seeds of Love
Change
Falling Down
Everybody Loves a Happy Ending
Mad World
Memories Fade
Woman in Chains
Floating Down the River
Badman’s Song
Pale Shelter
Break It Down Again
Head Over Heels
Encore:
Shout
— Noozhawk contributing writer Jeff Moehlis is a professor of mechanical engineering at UCSB. Upcoming show recommendations, advice from musicians, interviews and more are available on his Web site, music-illuminati.com.
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