A later remix by noted British music producer Afterlife was featured on the 2005 reissue of the Tears for Fears greatest hits collection Tears Roll Down (Greatest Hits 82–92). This mix is very similar to the album version, with the most notable differences being the additional echo added to the intro and middle sections and the subtraction of a subtle keyboard part from the bridge. The song had only one remix on its initial release, the World Remix that was featured on a 7" double-single. The 7" version of "Mad World" is the same mix of the song found on The Hurting. It's looking out at a mad world from the eyes of a teenager. It throws together a lot of different images to paint a picture without saying anything specific about the world. The lyric "the dreams in which I'm dying are the best I've ever had" suggests that dreams of intense experiences such as death will be the best at releasing tension.
The song was influenced by the theories of Arthur Janov, author of The Primal Scream. I added it as a joke during the lead vocal session, and we kept it. The actual line is: "Halargian world." (Not "illogical world", "raunchy young world"(!), "enlarging your world", or a number of other interesting if not amusing guesses.) The real story: Halarge was an imaginary planet invented by either Chris Hughes or Ross Cullum during the recording of The Hurting. With Mad World's again-resurgent popularity, I'm getting asked more frequently about the last line on the album version from The Hurting, a line which I occasionally also sing in concert.
Smith clarified the actual lyric in 2010: Ĭurt Smith's ad lib in the song's final chorus resulted in a mondegreen. We had no idea that it would become a hit. The intention was to gain attention from it and we'd hopefully build up a little following. "Mad World" was the first single off the finished album. Not that Bath is very mad – I should have called it "Bourgeois World"! That came when I lived above a pizza restaurant in Bath and I could look out onto the centre of the city. The band instead decided it may be something people would like to hear on the radio and held back its release, waiting to issue the song as a single in its own right after re-recording it with Chris Hughes, a former drummer with Adam and the Ants. "Mad World" began life as the intended B-side for Tears for Fears' second single " Pale Shelter (You Don't Give Me Love)". 8.5 Chart positions for Adam Lambert's version.8 Michael Andrews and Gary Jules version.6.5 Chart positions for Adam Lambert's version.6 Michael Andrews and Gary Jules version.