Mothers Talk

When you dive into Mothers Talk, you encounter a song that was a turning point for Tears for Fears. It was the first track that previewed their second album, Songs from the Big Chair, released in 1985. What's interesting is that this song was released six months earlier, aiming to forge a new creative path for the band. Although Roland Orzabal, one of the songwriters, acknowledged that the song pushed them in a different direction, he himself admitted not being a big fan of the track. However, producer Chris Hughes considers it fundamental to the group's development. The original recording, with producer Jeremy Green, did not fully convince the record label, so Hughes took the reins again for a new version that finally saw the light of day in August 1984.

This piece is an early example of the ingenious use of sampling in Tears for Fears' music. The string arrangements you hear at the beginning were taken from a recording by Barry Manilow. Furthermore, the rhythmic foundation of its B-side, Empire Building, was built from a sample of the song Today I Died Again by Simple Minds. The band experimented with release formats, offering multiple 12-inch versions with different remixes, and limited editions of the 7-inch single included a sticker of the group's new logo. The lyrics, on the other hand, are inspired by two ideas: on one hand, the warning mothers often give their children about making faces and how the wind might freeze them that way; and on the other, the theme of the anti-nuclear comic book When the Wind Blows by Raymond Briggs. In the United States, Mothers Talk arrived later, in April 1986, as the fourth and final single from the album, reaching number 27 on the Billboard Hot 100. This US version, labeled as a "remix," is actually a complete re-recording, mixed by Bob Clearmountain, who would later collaborate on the group's next album.