Album Review: The Tipping Point by Tears for Fears

When a band from a bygone era makes a comeback almost 40 years after the release of their debut album, the expectation is that the effort in question will be somewhat artificial, noisily glossy, and scrupulously overproduced. It's happened with loads of artists; a hyped up return to form falls flat in its perpetually tired and self-important mediocrity. In Tears for Fears' case though, their first record since 2004, The Tipping Point, is clean, respectfully confident, and actually has a purpose that justifies its subtle grandiosity.

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Four decades on from the Bath band’s formation, Roland Orzabal and Curt Smith’s latest connects generations It's hard to believe for those that have been followers from the very start, that Tears For Fears' quite excellent synth-pop debut The Hurting is almost 40 years old. Everyone probably knows the journey since then, you would hope, but here's a quick recap of what followed their golden years that also produced Songs From The Big Chair (1985) and The Seeds Of Love (1989): Curt Smith and Roland Orzabal had a bust-up, fuelled by many ingredients like creative differences, more personal stuff, fame pressures and expectation. Smith debunked to the USA and the pair didn't speak for almost a decade.

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They say what doesn't kill you makes you stronger and that timeworn adage certainly seems to hold true for Tears For Fears' Roland Orzabal, whose life has been put through the proverbial ringer in the last few years. Back in 2017, his world crumbled when he watched Caroline, his wife of 25 years, die from alcohol-related dementia; a deeply traumatic period he recently described to The Guardian as "five years of hell. " In the aftermath of that tragedy, Orzabal - whose bereavement understandably left him psychologically fragile - saw his own mental health decline for a time but in an epiphany-like moment of clarity, realised that the best therapy he could get was to renew his musical marriage to Curt Smith.

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It's been almost 20 years since Tears For Fears last graced the release schedule, with fans growing to view 2004's 'Everybody Loves A Happy Ending' as something of an unexpected coda. Yet the band themselves seemingly never viewed it this way - sessions for 'The Tipping Point' have been under way for years, sometimes secretly, with work continuing at a glacial pace. But, it was ever thus.

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