Is it an horrific dream?
Am I sinking fast? Could a person be so mean As to laugh and laugh? On my own Could you ease my load? Could you see my pain? Could you please explain the hurting? These are the first words of the first song on the album ‘The Hurting’ (from the song ‘The Hurting’). And I have been asking God why it is that these thoughts so resonated with me at the age of 20 and, even more puzzlingly, still resonate with me over thirty years later. I still ask God: ‘could you please explain the hurting?’ Similarly, the words of ‘Mad World’, the first big hit, in 1982, which drew me and many others to the band, which is the second song on the album, connect strongly with me now as they did then: All around me are familiar faces Worn out places, worn out faces Bright and early for their daily races Going nowhere, going nowhere Their tears are fillin' up their glasses No expression, no expression Hide my head I want to drown my sorrow No tomorrow, no tomorrow And I find it kind of funny I find it kind of sad The dreams in which I'm dyin' Are the best I've ever had I find it hard to tell you 'Cause I find it hard to take When people run in circles It's a very, very Mad world, mad world Mad world, mad world It is notable that Curt Smith in a 2013 interview with The Quietus[1] recognises that: ‘The subject matter [of ‘Mad World’] seemed to click with people. How simple it was, and how dark it was, seemed to connect. It says something about the English psyche, that’s for sure, as did the Gary Jules version being a number one hit at Christmas’, 21 years after the original, in 2013. ‘Maybe English people get depressed over Christmas…’ [1] In Their Own Words. This Is Going To Hurt: The Mad World Of Tears For Fears’ Debut LP Wyndham Wallace, September 20th, 2013 09:28, http://thequietus.com/articles/13379-tears-for-fears-the-hurting-interview, accessed 12 April 2016.
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