My tears and fears over losing my wife
only habit I got into was good wine, which I loved from a very early age. “That was great. But the problem is if you start drinking it every day. That’s when you get into trouble.” Roland developed a drink problem and later endured his own hard times with drugs, admitting: “I experienced the excesses later in my life. Being clean was and is better.”
Roland’s devotion to his wife and his ability to stay grounded were shaped by his poverty-stricken upbringing.
Like bandmate Curt, Roland grew up on a council estate in Bath. His French father and English mother ran an entertainment firm, but dad George was often bedridden during Roland’s childhood.
“I was acutely aware, even when I was five, that we had no car and we never went on holiday,” the star recalls. “Curt and I were both council house kids with intellectual leanings.We both had poverty and we both wanted to get out of it.We were very aware of how poor we were.”
Tears For Fears formed when, aged 16, Roland invited Curt to join his school band, Graduate.
The pair hit it off and soon realised they were better off on their own, with Curt’s falsetto voice a contrast to Roland’s deep tones.
Although Roland was the songwriter, he explains: “It wouldn’t have worked without Curt.
“I tried singing the demos of Mad World and Pale Shelter and they were terrible.
“Curt brought them to life, though there were some songs like Shout I was better suited to.
“It’s funny, because in the UK I think Curt is regarded as the lead singer, whereas in America the fans think I have that role.” Asked about his sometimes high-brow lyrics, Roland laughs: “I was a swot at school. I’d got into reading heavy books about existential philosophy at a very early age.
“I was a young man looking for an answer. I was highly impressionable and very sensitive.”
Roland had begun to suffer from depression in his late teens and his dark thoughts inspired early hits such as Mad World and Pale Shelter on successful debut album The Hurting.
“We were called ‘The thinking girl’sWham!’,” he says today.
“We were singing these dark songs about heavy subjects, yet there we were on Top Of The Pops, miming away. Our success caused a little bit of unease and a slight embarrassment.”
Attitudes to mental health have changed greatly since then, but Roland warns: “Until you go through extreme depression and anxiety, it’s going to be a mystery.
“I’m pleased attitudes have changed, that we can talk about it and have adverts on TV.
“But it’s something you can only truly know if you’ve experienced it.
“I was guilty of poo-pooing other people’s depression then, when I went through it, I was suddenly, ‘Oh, OK. I get it now’.”
AFTER the mega-success of Songs From The Big Chair, released in February 1985, Curt and Roland’s relationship began to suffer.
They struggled for four years to finish their third album The Seeds Of Love. It reached No 1, but was their final album together until they reformed for 2005’s Everybody Loves A Happy Ending.
Curt now lives in LA with wife Frances. They have two daughters,
Diva and Wilder. Roland mainly lives in England, though he too has a house in LA to make it easier to record with Curt.
He stays fit by playing tennis three times a week, while Curt is a keen runner. Joking about his fellow celebrity tennis enthusiasts, Roland claims: “I think I could take Cliff Richard and I could definitely take Bill Gates.”
He sometimes bumps into Curt on the way to tennis, which is when he realises how far the pair have come from their struggling childhoods.
“We pass each other in the hills in LA, me with a tennis racquet and Curt out jogging,” Roland summarises. “We’ll look at each other and ask, ‘Whatever happened to those council house kids?’”
The 35th anniversary deluxe 4CD/2DVD boxset of Songs From The Big Chair is released on March 13 on UMC/Virgin, also available on picture disc vinyl