My music post for tonight is a two fer....two versions of the same song. In the early 80's I really loved the song Mad World by Tears For Fears. It is a haunting dream like version of the angst of our modern world and the emotional struggle to deal with it or surrender. The lyrics are great poetry. It was released in 1981.
I liked the Tears For fears version, but as with much of the music of the 80's there is too much of a fascination with the technology of synthesized sound, it was new and you could craft perfect shiny pop, but too often you were left with the feeling of an automatic system that ran on auto drive....Perhaps this was one of the elements that made Tears For Fears original so aptly haunting.
But the song was reinterpreted 20 years later and used in the movie Donnie Darko in 2001 by the artist Gary Jules as a simple piano piece, albeit augmented with a string section, but he is able to keep the same alienated dream like vision of modern emotional angst, but make it so much more human, intimate...I like both versions. Which is your favorite?
All around me are familiar faces
ReplyDeleteWorn out places, worn out faces
Bright and early for their daily races
Going nowhere, going nowhere
And their tears are filling 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 dying
Are the best I've ever had
I find it hard to tell you
'Cos I find it hard to take
When people run in circles
It's a very, very
Mad World
Children waiting for the day they feel good
Happy Birthday, Happy Birthday
Made to feel the way that every child should
Sit and listen, sit and listen
Went to school and I was very nervous
No one knew me, no one knew me
Hello teacher tell me what's my lesson
Look right through me, look right through me
I think I like the Gary Jules version better. It's pretty spooky, and actually I never knew it was a Tears for Fears remake until about a year ago. Either way, it's a great song. Thanks for posting it!
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