A favourite album of mine in 1984 (age 20) was ‘The Hurting’ by Tears for Fears. The album cover is very moving, and features a little boy, against a white background, curled up, with his head in his hands.
I owned the album in the old tape cassette format, and a particular memory is of driving from Redhill in Surrey down to college in Plymouth, as fast as was possible in a light blue Austin Metro, down the A303, with The Hurting blasting out through the open windows. This was made all the more challenging by the fact my highly advanced audio arrangements consisted of an ultra modern six-buttoned tape recorder player, perched precariously on the passenger seat of the car along with other bits of student debris. The requirement to turn the tape over every 20 minutes presented a considerable challenge in such circumstances, and the anxiety this induced was heightened beyond measure by the fact that the machine itself was prone to severe battery failure without a moment’s notice. Quite apart from the immediate loss of music on such occasions, this also signalled a far more catastrophic consequence in the form of the dreaded chewed up tape scenario. One’s entire musical life support system was in danger of coming to a sorry and desperate end at the hands of a mangled mass of failed technology. All judgment gone, the need of coming to the immediate aid of the tape on such occasions far surpassed the threat to life from swerving all over the A303. And the angst induced by such an experience only served to increase the poignancy of the profound lyrics of The Hurting.
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December 2020
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