Roland Orzabal: The Story Behind Tears for Fears, “Everybody Wants to Rule the World” & Finding His Way Back
Who’s talking
2 speakers1Transcript33 turns · 20 min
Welcome back to another Music Drives Us. It's the Elite Edition. I'm J-Bo. Today's guest needs no introduction, but with the 592 million views on YouTube, he deserves one. Please welcome Tia Shafir's Roland Orzabal. Welcome. Thank you. An honor to talk to you. We're going to talk about your great book, Welcome to Your Life, Love, Death, and Tears for Fears. It's hard to put down. I'm exploring with it. It shares your extraordinary career and the not so good times as well, which I think could end up as a healing tool for many of us. And I'm sure it's that way for you. So we'll talk about the book. But I got to talk about You have ruled the world, and you still are, where everybody wants to rule the world. That song probably will be played twice today on my station in Boston and Chicago. And it has one of the enduring shelf lives from the 80s and beyond. But it didn't start that way. That beautiful, hypnotic guitar, you were playing around with it, and it was a late addition to Songs in the Big Chair, right? Yeah.
Yeah, it was, um, it was unlike anything we'd done on the first album, the hurting. And, um, it was a different rhythm. We call it a shuffle, you know, that bouncy rhythm. And I. I thought the song was maybe a little bit more superficial than what we'd done in the past. But when I took it into the studio and played what I had to Chris Hughes, the producer, and Ian Stanley, the keyboard player, they immediately took to it. And so Chris insisted we play it every day to finish the song. And it came together really easily. You know, it's the
gift that keeps on giving. It does. I was going to say, I'm on two big stations every day in Boston and Chicago playing the classic hits of the 80s and 90s. And these big companies do research. You may know or not this. They put people online and they ask them to rate songs. Your song, Shout, and Everybody Wants to Rule the World comes back top 20 year after year after year. We're still playing it. After all these years, how can you explain that? Did you think when you created that little riff that people would be locking into it still?
No idea. You know, I mean, we were, you know, in our early twenties and we, we just, we didn't have, um, ambitions to be great rock stars or anything like that. We didn't, um, but I think sometimes. If you yourself are kind of hiding your ambition or you're washing it, I think it can appear outside of you. And it appeared outside of us with all the team around us that really forced us to introduce guitars, to make the noise bigger. And, you know, it was other people, not us, that wanted to break America. That was their ambition. Yeah. And it was successful.
And so were you. The song is beautiful. I know you started right around that electronic age when we got to know Duran Duran, but everybody wants to rule the world. If you heard the acoustic version on YouTube, that is gorgeous as well. It's a beautiful song and it fits Kurt's softness as well. There's a softness to it. That's just beautiful.
Yeah, it is certainly, yeah, it definitely suits Kurt's voice. I mean, I would say, I mean, I, I never ever thought about singing it. Never. You know, he was the first choice
2Episode notes
Roland Orzabal helped create some of the most enduring music of the 1980s—and decades later, Tears for Fears’ songs continue to find new audiences around the world.
On Music Drives Us: Jaybeau Jones sits down with Roland Orzabal, co-founder of Tears for Fears, for an honest and deeply personal conversation about the stories behind the music. Roland reveals how “Everybody Wants to Rule the World” came together, reflects on the lasting impact of “Shout,” and discusses how streaming has introduced Tears for Fears to generations of new listeners.
Roland also opens up about his memoir, Welcome to Your Life: Love, Death, and Tears for Fears, and the experiences that shaped both his life and his songwriting. He speaks candidly about grief, addiction, recovery, losing his first wife, finding love again, becoming a father again, and confronting a difficult chapter when fame, alcohol, sleeping pills, and the pressures of life on the road began to take their toll.
This conversation goes far beyond the hits. It’s a story about creativity, loss, recovery, family, resilience, and ultimately finding a way forward.
For fans of Tears for Fears, ’80s music, songwriting, and the stories behind legendary songs, this is a rare opportunity to hear Roland Orzabal reflect on the music, the memories, and the life behind the anthems.