After leaving Tears for Fears in 1990, Curt Smith moved to New York, He acclimated to his new life there by hosting an MTV show, as well as a new music radio show that was syndicated to over 300 U.S. colleges, and by teaching a music industry course at New York University. Then, in 1995 a mutual friend introduced him to songwriter-guitarist Charlton Pettus. “I liked him, even though he used the word ‘meritocracy’ in the first sentence he spoke to me,” Smith jokes. “I liked his passion. I’d spent so much time around people in the industry whose prime concern was business and income, that talking to someone whose love of music was so obvious made me realize why I’d become a musician in the first place.”

Smith and Pettus began writing together and formed a band called Mayfield. “It was first and foremost a live band,” Smith explains. “I wanted to play gigs in small clubs, and record without the use of too much technology.” Mayfield released a self-titled album in 1997. “I loved it,” Smith says. “Technically it could have undoubtedly been better, but that would have been missing the point.”