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\n\tMany bands that rose to prominence in the \u201880s have turned into oldies bands, tied to a moment in history and profiting from fans\u2019 love for nostalgia. Roland Orzabal and Curt Smith of Tears for Fears<\/a> haven\u2019t fallen into the stagnant rut that has captured so many of their contemporaries. More than four decades after forming in Bath, England, in 1981, Tears for Fears is producing some of its best material.<\/p>\n \n\tOrzabal and Smith began their creative resurgence in 2022 with their first studio album in nearly 18 years, The Tipping Point<\/em>, which reached No. 1 on Billboard<\/em>\u2018s Top Album Sales and Top Alternative Albums charts. In October, the band continued its hot streak by releasing four new songs as part of a live album, Songs for a Nervous Planet<\/em>.<\/p>\n \n\t\u201cIt\u2019s because we care,\u201d Smith tells Billboard<\/em>\u2018s Behind the Setlist<\/em> podcast when explaining the caliber of the band\u2019s recent songwriting and recordings. \u201cWe don\u2019t want to do bad work. We still have a desire to get better. I don\u2019t think that\u2019s ever going to leave us. We look at other artists and still wish we were that good. That will never leave us, because we\u2019re never going to become that good, I don\u2019t think. There\u2019s always going to be someone that\u2019s better than us, without question. So when you still have that desire, you\u2019re going to continue to do good work because you are continuing to try and achieve something better than you\u2019ve done before. And that\u2019s what keeps us going.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tSongs for a Nervous Planet<\/em> is the audio complement to a live concert film, Tears for Fears Live (A Tipping Point Film)<\/em>, that was given a brief release in theaters in October before being made available online. Recorded at the FirstBank Amphitheater \u2014 a former quarry that provides a spectacular backdrop \u2014 in Franklin, Tenn., the film captures the band performing at the top of its game. \u201cEveryone that had come to see the show said it was amazing,\u201d says Smith. \u201cWe get a limited view of it because we\u2019re looking the other way. So we agreed to record it. And the reason being that we felt the band was the strongest they\u2019d ever been \u2014 or we had ever been, should I say. And we were playing great. We sounded great. We were singing better than we ever had, playing better than we ever had. So it seemed like a good time to do it.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tThe four new songs make Songs From a Nervous Planet<\/em>, as Smith puts it, more like an EP with 18 live bonus tracks rather than a live album with a few new songs. \u201cThe record company wanted us to do a couple new tracks,\u201d says Smith. \u201cWe felt that was kind of a way of saying, \u2018Add some throwaway tracks.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tInstead, they went into the studio and emerged with \u201cfour tracks that we felt really strongly about,\u201d says Smith. The Songs for a Nervous Planet<\/em> opener, \u201cSay Goodbye to Mum and Dad,\u201d perfectly captures the political and environmental tension of the day (\u201cIt\u2019s no life, this island of fear\/ When tomorrow comes, we\u2019ll brave the wild frontier\u201d). \u201cThe Girl That I Call Home\u201d is a love song for Orzabal\u2019s wife with a catchy melody (\u201cPrinces adore you\/ They cower before you\/ You\u2019re the girl that I call home\u201d). The stirring \u201cEmily Said\u201d is classic Tears for Fears: a complex song structure that doesn\u2019t distract or become superfluous.<\/p>\n \n\tTo Orzabal, the new songs \u201chold up brilliantly\u201d to the band\u2019s deep catalog of beloved songs that includes \u201cMad World\u201d from the 1983 debut The Hurting<\/em> and \u201cShout\u201d from the U.S. chart-topping 1985 album Songs From the Big Chair<\/em>. He\u2019s particularly proud of \u201cAstronaut,\u201d a song that mixes disillusionment with a space travel theme (\u201cI don\u2019t belong here\/ I got one eye on a different world\u201d), which didn\u2019t make the cut for The Tipping Point<\/em>. \u201cIt didn\u2019t quite fit, for whatever reason just didn\u2019t feel right,\u201d says Smith. \u201cA lot of these things are not easy to articulate, because it\u2019s just a feeling you have of what works, what doesn\u2019t work.\u201d <\/p>\n \n\tBut \u201cAstronaut\u201d was \u201cperfect\u201d for Songs for a Nervous Planet<\/em>, says Orzabal. \u201cThe whole imagery of the astronaut and the field of sunflowers [seen on the album cover], the continuity in the videos with the astronaut and his girlfriend, always featuring them, is superb.\u201d In a couple decades, he adds, \u201cAstronaut\u201d will be \u201ca huge hit for someone \u2014 not us, but for someone.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tListen to the interview with Roland Orzabal and Curt Smith in the embedded Spotify player below, or listen at Spotify<\/a>, Apple Podcasts<\/a>, Amazon Music<\/a>, iHeart<\/a>, PodBean<\/a> or Everand<\/a>.<\/p>\n