Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
The dreams in which I'm dying are the best I've ever had", 5 Oct 2008
Two discs and 35 tracks. Hey! I have always been a fan of these guys from the very first single, and this collection allows the listener to revisit their work from the start in 1982 to 1993.
I gave up listening to chart music around 1990, finally seeing it for what it is, merely a money-making exercise. But tears for Fears, Like Sting and a few others, are one of those musical gifts from the 1980s that continue to merit attention. Two of the major attractions of this group are the strength of the songwriting and the imaginative arrangements of the songs. Both are plainly in evidence here, for we have supremely well-crafted songs from the get-go. Many of them last more than six minutes (even some of the conventional rockers), thus giving plenty of scope for development and providing fresh nuances every time you hear them.
As well as thoughtful lyrics, there are strong production values too. And although much of the instrumentation is electronic imitation rather than the genuine article (but if the effect is the same, who cares), the choice of sound is both interesting and perfect. It seems they plainly worked hard and simply refused to be bland. In the short sleeve-note essay, Daryl Easlea quotes Orzabal as saying, "I believe to create you have to destroy. It's painful and difficult ..."
Orzabal has an incredible voice (check out the title track) and sings with amazing conviction. The lyrics are more than art-house whimsy: we have realism, "All the love in the world won't stop the rain from falling" (Break It Down Again); anger, "Kick out the style [council], bring back The Jam" (Sowing The Seeds Of Love); wit "My super-ego, where I go, he go/ego" (Lord of Karma); of parents, "They gave you life; you gave them hell" (Shout); of misogyny, "You better love loving and you better behave" (Woman In Chains); and angst, "The dreams in which I'm dying are the best I've ever had" (Mad World).
Of the 35 tracks, I think six merit three stars; twenty merit four; and a full nine are in the top league (that's rare for me). The nine are `Break It Down Again'; `Sowing The Seeds Of Love' (which feels it's over after three minutes, but no, thankfully there's another three more to go); `Cold'; `Famous Last Words' (criminally too short); `Shout'; `Head Over Heels' (do we hear the piano riff and lyrics in the earlier `We Are Broken'?); `Laid So Low'; `Everybody Wants To Rule The World'; and `Woman In Chains'. The earliest track on the CD set is the angst-driven Ultravox/New Romantic-sounding `Mad World' from 1982; the latest from the Orzabal-only `Elemental' album of 1993, prior to change of record company.
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Great Value, 5 Jan 2008
This is an amazing purchase for the price. All the essential (and not so) tracks are here, including the well known singles; Shout, Everybody Wants To Rule, etc and also lesser known classics such as Mother's Talk and The Hurting. Top stuff.
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4 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Not That good, 10 Mar 2008
I bought this album thinking it was a greatest hits, but now realise THE COLLECTION can mean anything, This double cd album was a big let down, there are so many album fillers, its hard to keep track which songs are great and which songs are experiments by the group, most of the songs are actual 90's a decade when nothing was being heard by the tears for fears this is why this album failed for me, the atrocities that are PHAROAHS, THE BIG CHAIR, DEJA VU, GHOST PAPA and many more are an attempt to make this into a double cd, seriously im doing this for all those people who loved there mid 80's tracks, go buy a greatest hits or something, this is a big big let down, and bands should be banned from conning the public this way, stay true to there fans, and sort it out---all you tears fears die hard fans will disagree, thats alright.
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