tearssongs

What to Listen For on Songs from the Big Chair

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Tears For Fears Available Now

UPDATE 2026

Below you will find an excerpt from the commentary we wrote for an early Shootout Winning pressing we played many years ago.

There is one quality that the best copies always have and that the worst copies always lack: Frequency Extension, especially on the top end.

When you get a copy like this one, with superb extension up top, the grit and edge on the highs almost disappears. You can test for that quality on side one very easily with the percussive opening to Shout.

If plenty of harmonics and air are present at the opening, you are very likely hearing a high quality copy.

Side one here has smooth, sweet, analog richness and spaciousness I didn’t think was possible for this recording. The bass is full and punchy. When it really starts cooking, like in the louder, more dynamic sections of Shout or Mothers Talk, it doesn’t get harsh and abrasive like practically every other copy I’ve heard.

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Tears For Fears – Songs From The Big Chair

More of the Music of Tears For Fears

  • An incredible vintage UK pressing with Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) sound on the first side and solid Double Plus (A++) sound on the second side
  • Rich, spacious and lively, with an open, extended top end – this is the sound you’ve been waiting for from Tears for Fears
  • More great songs than practically any other record made in the ’80s – “Shout,” “Everybody Wants To Rule The World” and “Head Over Heels” are just a few of the better known hits from this, their breakthrough third album
  • 4 1/2 stars: “It is not only a commercial triumph, it is an artistic tour de force. And in the loping, percolating “Everybody Wants to Rule the World,” Tears for Fears perfectly captured the zeitgeist of the mid-’80s while impossibly managing to also create a dreamy, timeless pop classic. Songs From the Big Chair is one of the finest statements of the decade.”

This is a classic in the Tears for Fears canon, probably the album most people regard as their best. I myself prefer Seeds of Love, which should take nothing away from Big Chair — both are exceptional productions from the ’80s no matter how you look at them.

SFTBC went to Number One on the charts for a reason. There’s really not a bad song on either side and mostly absolutely brilliant ones.

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Letter of the Week – “[My wife] jumped out of her seat on the couch after the percussive intro to Shout was over and the song launched.”

More of the Music of Tears For Fears

Hot Stamper Pressings of Help Available Now

One of our good customers had this to say about some Hot Stampers he purchased recently:

Hey Tom, 

I know you must have a TON of e-mail traffic to sort through but wanted to send accolades for the latest shipment of hot stampers from you! Simply incredible!

I don’t know how you managed to get the TFF Big Chair LP to play SO clean because it looks atrocious. If I would have seen that in a used record store I would have put it back but when the stylus touched down, dead silent surface and throughout the whole record. The sound is incredible as advertised. I played it for my wife who is enjoying these pressings with me and praises you after reading your descriptions. She jumped out of her seat on the couch after the percussive intro to Shout was over and the song launched.

The Beatles Help album was also incredible. Compared to the MoFi I have it now sounds overly bright and goosed. The UK 1970’s press sounds more cohesive and even across the spectrum. That title was missing from my others of that same pressing era.

All the jackets that have come with the LPs so far have been very nice. The TFF was crisp and new.

I am HOOKED on your hot stampers, Tom. My system is up to reproducing these as you hear them and with the play grades you rate them at.

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