Written by Roland Orzabal and sung by bassist Curt Smith for the album The Hurting, the new wave classic featured peppy synthesizers and a pulsing drum machine paired with surprisingly melancholy lyrics. “Mad World” became a major hit in the UK—Tears for Fears’ first— but the song failed to chart on the US Billboard Hot 100.
Recorded by pianist Michael Andrews and singer Gary Jules, the “Mad World” cover was slower and starker. But it hit in the US. The 2003 single soared to No. 1 on the US Billboard Adult Alternative Airplay chart in April 2004 and made another comeback in December 2008, at No. 16 on the Digital Song Sales chart.
“I think it’s a really beautiful example of a person struggling with the fact that life is mad,” he told the BBC of the song. “Especially when stripped down to just voice, piano, and cello, I honestly think it’s one of the most beautiful songs I have ever heard, and the way it’s stripped down now just pins people.”
Not only did the first two versions of the song get renewed attention, but Lambert’s studio version of the song peaked at No. 19 on the Billboard Hot 100 in June 2009.
“I picked ‘Mad World’ because it spoke to me and it was a song about being an outsider and how emotional that can make you feel,” he shared. “It reminded me of how I felt in middle school. … I basically just lifted the version from Donnie Darko,” he added.
“When I wrote ‘Mad World,’ it sounded pretty bad, to be honest with you,” he once admitted to Songwriting magazine. “I couldn’t sing it very well, because my voice is designed for acrobatics and drama, enunciation and doing crazy things, and shooting up into falsetto. So I wasn’t sure about the song at all.”
“I feel a deep responsibility to perform it (and experience it) live, in front of real people, with all of the peril and imperfection front and center,” he told NME in 2023. “The song gives people permission to reflect, to sit in chaos, loss, change, and (hopefully) find beauty and community in the midst of isolation. I feel it too, every single time I sing it, even 20 years later.”
Related: 1981 Classic, Ranked Among ‘Greatest Rock Duets of All Time,’ Became the Biggest Hit Ever for Both Artists
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