Say something interesting about sting/police

Oh, wait, that's not interesting.

Also: at the reunion gig they did at the Amnesty International concert in '89 or so, Stewart had a really great haircut.

Best line from Police Behind the Music: Stewart saying "In my mind, the Police will always be my band. And Sting? He's my singer. No, actually- -he's my BASS PLAYER."

The pic of Stewart in Curved Air (in the Uncut article) is quite charming. He looks so mischevious. (And, woo, look at 'em go out on a limb and slap _Synchronicity_ with a 2.5 star rating. Whoa doctor!)

Also, Popshots is OTM about that LLV song.

I seem to recall more than one ILMer has defended "Dream Of The Blue Turtles" before in these parts. Care to elaborate, whoever it was?

i wd rather die that be caught owning one of their "albums", of course – indeed i'm not sure what FORMAT i'd find acceptable, 7"s possibly

He invited me ro a party one night. I wasn't going to go, but people were stomping and yelling "OH YEAH!" and "ALRIGHT!" and sounding like they were having the time of their lives. So I went upstairs expecting some out-of-control celebration and there was no-one there but the band, and they were all gathered around the TV watching a video of a Sting concert, screaming in ecstasy at Sting's every movement. It was creepier than a GG Allin concert.

He'd photoshopped his own face over his father's face in a wedding picture of his parents...

I have nothing else to say. I don't know if I'll even be able to speak for the rest of the day.

The second was discovering that the opening chords to "Message In A Bottle" was actually Boston's "Peace Of Mind" slowed down.

*scratches head, checks AMG*

Anyone who plays on an Asia reunion record from 2001 is immediately suspect.

Please post comments on my girlfriends blog:
http://www.publictelevisionrocks.org/share-your-stories/stories
I think this could be important.

fun fact: the police are hugely popular and widely respected in brazil. probably, i think, because they were quite complex rhythmically, and brazil is all about complex rhythms*. and as brazil makes great music (yes, the entire country! really!) ergo, if everyone there thinks the police are great, there must be something to it. obviously.

*and also, sting doesn't make a lot of personal visits there

An uncle of mine who passed away about five years ago was absolutely convinced that the Police were French, which prompted many a vein-popping argument `round the Thanksgiving table. He would not be convinced otherwise. It was maddening. No, I didn't kill him.

^^^ any particular reason why he thought that? It seems weird, like thinking the Stones are from Louisiana. Actually come to think of it, the Police are a bit French looking. Maybe it's the haircuts. Or Summers ' insistence on wearing jackets with the sleeves rolled up which gives off a certain mid-80's Lyon chic thing. Copeland in particular seems to have a permanent Gallic shrug on. And maybe Sting's pretentiousness is more acceptable if he's thought of as a sort of French art student.

The vague patois Sting affects in "Message In Bottle" sounds a bit like a French person speaking English, if I dwell on it.

It was primarily due to Sting's afore-mentioned bullshit accent, and the titles of their first two albums.

And they did sing that song in French on Ghost in the Machine.

That doesn't make them French, though.

they're the kind of band who would be considered cool in france in the late 70s and 80s.*

*ie when france was at a low ebb, music hotness-wise

Stewart Copeland's hi-hat on 'Walking on the Moon' is obviously, if unusually, multitracked. He would occasionally amuse himself by seeking out pub bands playing Police covers, and watching the drummers tie themselves in knots trying to recreate parts that only octopuses could play.

Also, The Police's 'world tours' actually did venture beyond western Europe and the US. At the height of their fame they played gigs in places like India, Thailand and Egypt.

French students pissing around...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ltUiKvNsgJ0

Who is the little one, a pet perhaps? Will she deserve my special attentions??

He would occasionally amuse himself by seeking out pub bands playing Police covers, and watching the drummers tie themselves in knots trying to recreate parts that only octopuses could play.

smug

Then Play Long takes an alphabetical look at Sting's ...Nothing Like The Sun: http://nobilliards.blogspot.co.uk/2014/11/sting-nothing-like-sun.html

one wonders whether Sting is looking at the lonely dancing ladies of Chile or the world destroying itself and resisting the temptation to add the line “That’s my soul up there."

I think right now a lot of people are just saying "Fuck the police".

I once lived downstairs from this ponytailed wannabe graphic designer guy. He was a real mama's boy - we was in his late twenties and his mom was always coming to pick up his laundry and shit. He had this framed picture up that he made a big deal of showing everyone who came to his house. He'd photoshopped his own face over his father's face in a wedding picture of his parents and clearly had no clue that this was a Freudian nightmare scenario. He sang for a band that looked as if it had been assembled by the Canadian government for an anti-smoking ad campaign. Clean cut kids from diverse backgrounds playing modestly funky Hootie-pop wearing cargo pants and Risky Business Ray-Bans.
He invited me ro a party one night. I wasn't going to go, but people were stomping and yelling "OH YEAH!" and "ALRIGHT!" and sounding like they were having the time of their lives. So I went upstairs expecting some out-of-control celebration and there was no-one there but the band, and they were all gathered around the TV watching a video of a Sting concert, screaming in ecstasy at Sting's every movement. It was creepier than a GG Allin concert.

― fritz, Monday, 18 March 2002 01:00 (12 years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

This is the single most disturbing thing i've ever read

It should be made into a short film.

I’ll be honest with you I usually don’t check what thread I’m posting in

there is only one thread, i'm on the same page. literally

When I was a kid, I had Sting’s autograph — my mom saw him at a restaurant or hotel, and asked him to sign a slip of paper. He wrote: “To [my name], Sting.” I had it a little frame on my bulletin board, next to a few other autographs that my mom got me on business trips.

My high school must have been super "cool" (or cynical) because everyone hated The Police. Then I got to college and a super hip college radio DJ said, "no one would dare criticize The Police!" I was like, "oh really?" I guess it depends on geography.

But I did have a good friend in h.s. who was madly in love with Sting and had pictures of him all over her wall. I could NOT see the appeal.

Then, a few months ago, I watched a video of a recent Sting interview and found myself thinking, "yeah, I'd hit it." And was horrified with myself, but to be honest, he has aged remarkably well (must be all that yoga).

Would have been cooler if they used more ragtime in their sound.

they were my favorite band as a kid. even though they broke up the year I was born. I found an Outlandos d'Amour mirror in a thrift shop once and it was my most prized possession. I've still never seen another one. it's probably worth 3 bucks.

I saw them in 2007 in Milwaukee with Elvis Costello opening. good show actually but Sting ruined it by saying something like "I was a school teacher man...what the fuck happened to me?" as though he didn't make millions of dollars selling AOR shite

the more Stewart Copeland stuff I listen to the more I realize that he brought a lot of the elements that drew me to the band in the first place. I think him & Andy did a lot to streamline the band's sound. obviously it doesn't work if Sting wasn't crankin' out the hits but there are certain Copeland discs that sound way more like The Police than anything Sting did

Defund the Police imo

copeland composed the soundtracks to the spyro the dragon games, which a friend insists is some of the greatest music ever. i usually agree with his taste to some extent but to me it's some of the most strangely tuneless music i've ever heard

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cwqxLW9138g

Copeland may be the best thing about the Police, but the first time I ever saw him on TV was backing THE DOORS on late night television. An unbelievably fake reunion of an often shitty band, Ian Astbury replaced Jim Morrison. I heard John Densmore objected and refused to participate, choosing instead to sue them (and eventually winning), but I was shocked that Copeland of all people agreed to fill in. He's a far, FAR better drummer than Densmore, but it was absolutely ridiculous to hear his drumming slotted into "Light My Fire" - he still sounded like the drummer for the Police, incongruously thrown into a very different band.

Not counting TV appearances, he only did about four shows with them, and supposedly he pulled out due to an injury. I wish I could say it was an excuse to quit after coming to his senses, but he actually intended to go back, and when he was told he would be replaced, he sued them for breaching their oral contract.

The whole debacle climaxed with Densmore's lawsuit. As it was later reported, "in a shocking turn of events, Police drummer Stewart Copeland...took the stand to speak out against the misuse of the name...[according to Densmore,] 'Copeland challenged [Ray Manzarek and Robby Krieger's] use of the Doors name. He said that it wouldn’t be appropriate to call themselves the Doors. But if they didn’t, the limos and big arenas might disappear.'"

A few years later, the Police reunion happened, which seemed like a blatant but far more palatable cash-in, selling out stadiums playing the same exact setlist of hits with the most bare-bones stage possible. I don't think it would've been worth the average ticket price of $135 (adjusted for inflation), but at least they sounded okay.

why is he a far better drummer than Densmore?

I used to love them as a kid. They were my first concert ( Shea Stadium, NYC with REM and Joan Jett ). Hated the concert.

I was going to post something a couple of weeks back about the golden age of the splash cymbal in the '80s, lead by Copeland but continuing with Manu Katche, Mark Brzezicki, Neil Peart. The run might have ended with David Lovering, who uses the splash a lot in the Pixies, but now you mostly just hear it as accents in metal and prog.

I'm still bitter they didn't record an album in 2007, it would probably have sucked but I wanted to hear them try. every other New Wave group did it

Watched and enjoyed the Andy Summers focused documentary "Cant Stand Losing You: Surviving the Police" last night off the Amazon.

Got to say how it was put together does show why they came apart even from the reunion angle and some of Summers photographs were really pretty amazing.

Loved the reunion clip of him in Japan and happening on the Karaoke bar with the customers singing "Every Breath You Take". I sure hope it was not staged, did not look like it was.

Couple good lines and pictures about his early bands and Eric Burdon too. Worth checking out if a fan of the group.

I met a guy a few years back in western Mass. who is a close friend of Sting's, and the young daughter who was with him kept referring to Uncle Sting which I thought was very cute.

the post by fritz upthread is amazing.

stings cousin bernard can not sing!

the post by fritz upthread is amazing.

^ yes!

i had no idea until yesterday that andy summers won a grammy for 'behind my camel' - best rock instrumental performance in 1980

their only Grammy!

not quite - the police also won it in 1979 for regatta de blanc (the track not the album). the 'behind my camel' award is funny though as it's such a weird tune. apparently sting refused to play on it because he hated it so much?

it beat YYZ! fucking insane

btw I found the Klark Kent 10" at a shop the other day, just browsing some unorganized stack. thought it may have been fairly rare but apparently it's not (I paid a fiver). its an amusing record to me b/c once you listen to it you can tell that even though Sting was writing most of the songs the actual Police "sound" was very much Copeland's (at least on the first 3 albums). fwiw most of the best Klark Kent stuff isn't on it - the best 45 minutes of "Kollected Works" would be about as good as any Police LP really

when I was a kid I thought sting sung the way he does because he was French

apologies for the violent tense shifting there

their only Grammy!

Wait, the Police won 5 Grammys and, additionally, Sting, as songwriter, also won Song of the Year for "Every Breath You Take". (That song alone won two Grammys.)

https://www.grammy.com/grammys/artists/police/8039
https://www.grammy.com/grammys/artists/sting/10244

Haha:

xzanfar wrote this on thread Say something interesting about sting/police on board I Love Music on 2021-10-18

stings cousin bernard can not sing!

xzanfar wrote this on thread Vocalists whose voices are your own personal nails on chalkboard. on board I Love Music on 2021-05-21

stings cousin bernard sumner who can not sing and ruined songs by 808 state and chemical brothers too!

xzanfar wrote this on thread Getting Away With It: The ELECTRONIC Poll on board I Love Music on 2021-05-27

stings cousin can not sing so i like the songs he does not sing on or is not alone on!

xzanfar wrote this on thread songs that sound like other songs on board I Love Music on 2021-01-08

even the same marimba sound is used and stings cousin bernard can not sing either as he also butchered the songs he did for 808 state and the chemical brothers too so he needs to stick to his twanger from joy division days!

xzanfar wrote this on thread musicians material you do not like after their band broke up! on board I Love Music on 2020-11-16

sting lost me after 10 sumners tales but his cousin bernard like i said before sucks as he can not sing!

TS: Electronic with Sting vs The Police with Marr

That doc was OK, thanks for recommending. I read his book and probably thought the film was ultimately more revealing, at least as far as the Police experience goes. You really get the sense that, a la Fleetwood Mac, they just don't like each other that much. There's not enough room for all the egos involved. And yet, those three egos came up with some cool stuff as a unit. Reminds me a bit of Pete Townshend's quote about how strange it is to be thrown together with these random guys at the right time at a young age, and have that group of random guys becomes linked to you for the rest of your life, no matter what happens next.

And yeah, Andy is a good photographer.

Stewart Copeland's new band "Gizmodrome" apparently has a live album coming out pretty soon? cool tracklist...

LP1
Amaka Pipa
Zombies In The Mall
Stay Ready
Miss Gradenko
Summer's Coming
Sweet Angels
Elephant Talk
Does Everyone Stare
Man On The Mountain
Excesses

LP2
Ride Your Life
I Know Too Much
Darkness
Zubatta Cheve
Young Lions
Strange Things Happen
Don't Box Me In
Spin This
Thela Hun Ginjeet
Bombs Away
Don't Box Me In feat. Manuel Agnelli (Bonus Track)

band line-up is pretty nuts:

https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0056/8043/1219/products/51uzPxu6WBL_480x480.jpg

(first guy is a jazz fusion keyboard dude who started off in the italo prog band PFM)

I actually like the album fine, if you dig Copeland's stuff as Klark Kent you'd probably enjoy it (in fact I believe both Stay Ready and Strange Things were unreleased KK tunes). I do think the lineup suggests something a bit more proggy and technical though. also the fact that Copeland does most of the vocals when Belew is right there is kinda strange

do they do any level 42 tunes?

doesn't look like it, most of the material is from the studio album

Yeah, I've seen some live clips, and it's ... fine. More or less what you expect, but you do get some deep cuts. Any band with Copeland and Belew is, imo, just a little too perpetually "on."

Interesting Sting thought: pretty good bassist, oft overshadowed by luminous cohort.

Another thought: "All This Time" is a lovely song.

And speaking of which, a very rare video of Sting playing that song with Mark Brzezicki (Big Country) on drums, during the brief window before Vinnie Colaiuta was brought on as his full time drummer.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fFSTIu2O0LE

I've just been made away of the "I'm So Happy That I Can't Stop Crying" video and uh, what the fuck

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LI8khooPyJk

oh wow that brings me back. Forgot all about it.

The new Sting album is good. I like it more than his last one...less focus on "rocking" (never what Sting was best at IMO) and closer to his early 90's/Ten Summoner's Tales style which is what I want from him anyway lol

Ooh that sounds great I didn’t know there was one out

nothing like the sun, dream of the blue turtles, summoners tales and soul cages were heavy listening in high school/college; wonder if they hold up.

mercury falling/brand new day era put me off him until now i guess

Beato's been doing more interviews, it seems. And this is a good one with Sting:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=efRQh2vspVc

Oh, and xpost, I think "Nothing like the Sun" is an impeccable and diverse adult contemporary album, some of it beautiful, some of it silly.

As ever.

I've heard parts of his new album. the main impression I get is that his voice sounds remarkably good for his age. he's one of the few megastar singers who actually figured out how to adapt to his new voice

This new one is quite lovely, in the mold of Fragile and Shape of My Heart:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lx5moNrPKpk

It won't convince anyone who thinks he's a bore, but it has the Sting hallmarks (tricky chords, evocative melody) and the singing and lyrics sound almost like Leonard Cohen.

Roxanne takes you down
To her place near the river

Did I saw Andy Summers memoir One Train Later was really interesting. Had me wanting to hear the early days of teh police when he was still playing guitar washes and things.
Definitley would love to hear him with the Soft machine where he was supposed to be playing raga guitar but not sure anything ever got recorded. certainly never heard any.

He's in some ways still underrated, because it's kind of hard to convey all the cool things he does. Like, the Edge, it's pretty easy to distill what he does because he's so simple, but even in the early days of the Police Summers was doing some pretty sophisticated things.

Re-recommending that Sting interview, it's really perceptive.

does he have unnaturally big hands or something? I've heard those looping guitar riffs on songs like "Bring on the Night", "Message in a Bottle", and "Every Breath You Take" are really hard to play

I don't know if his hands are big but he does stretch them waaaaaay wide, and if you have smaller hands (like me) it takes a lot of pain and suffering to get there. You need to do that on at least the latter two songs. "Bring on the Night," that's some dexterous fingerpicking.

An observation my guitar teacher has made is that he really figured out just the right chords to use with a flanger/delay, creating pretty cool overtones and the like that fill up space in interesting ways.

okay what the fuck does that "deadly now for 12,000 years/is Carbon-14" line in We Work the Black Seam mean? does Sting just not understand some scientific thing?

yeah i think so

carbon-14 is a radioactive form of carbon that has a half-life of ~5700 years, but it occurs naturally in very low amounts that isn't harmful to humans, and half-life doesn't mean 'it lasts the length of two half-lives'. nuclear weapons testing in the 50s increased the levels of it in the atmosphere but still not to anything resembling dangerous levels, and is produced by nuclear power plants too. think it's just a not very good attempt to link nuclear power with the coal miners' strike?

if "Lazarus Heart" was an 80s Peter Gabriel song people would've gone gaga for it. that little jazz break is pretty dumb though and obviously something Peter Gabriel would not have done

Every day another miracle!

On the evidence of a photo I saw in the Telegraph, Sting isn’t actually very good at all at yoga - despite all those private lessons.

I suspect it’s a bit like Elvis’s karate skills.

think I've watched this 20 times straight

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tGi7bwu8SHM

yep, that's a classic!

This reminds me: you know how music documentaries typically leave you feeling either better about the artist, neutral / the same about the artist, or worse about the artist? I always liked The Police, but man, the documentary really bummed me out. All three of them, for various reasons, seem like people you really wouldn't want to know.

Remember this exchange from that interview with Revolver?

Copeland: Andy, since we're here, I'm going to back you up on this. You should stand up right now and say, 'I Andy want all the Puff Daddy money. Because that's not Sting's song he's using, that's my guitar riff.' Okay over to you Andy, Go for it...

Summers: (meekly) Ok, I want all of the Puff Daddy Money.

Copeland: There you go, you feel better now don't you?

Sting: Okay Andy here's all the money. [pours some change on the table] Unfortunately, I've spent the rest of it.

Summers: I'll tell you what, Stewart, I'll take your share, I know Stings' not going to let me have his.

Copeland: So Sting's making out like a bankrobber here, while Andy and I have gone unrewarded and unloved for our efforts and contributions.

Sting: Life... is... f***ing... tough. Here I am in Tuscany.

Copeland: And don't we know it! You're in Tuscany in your palace with wine being poured down your throat and grapes being peeled for you. Sting can you buy me a castle in Italy too? With the proceeds from the longest running hit single in the history of radio? Just a little chateau somewhere?

Sting: We don't have f***ing chateaus in Italy, They're called palazzos. I'll lend you a room. (laughs)

I guess Andy really did carry a grudge over that.

Andy is 80. Probably a bit late to start hinting.

The Shend finds him a great imaginary foil. Continual point of humour on his FB feed.

He appears to be a lousy dancer if Quadrophenia is anything to go by. For a bassist does he have a sense of rhythm?

John Constantine came out of wanting to depict someone that looked like him in a couple of panels.

Sting: Life... is... f***ing... tough. Here I am in Tuscany.

looooool

I’d be interested to know how Summers could possibly have a claim after all this time has passed.

He should talk to Matthew Fisher of Procol Harum:

In 2006, the High Court found Fisher to be joint-author and co-owner of Procol Harum's song "A Whiter Shade of Pale" by virtue of his contribution to the song in the form of his organ solo, despite waiting nearly 40 years since its release to make a claim. Fisher won the case on 20 December 2006 but was awarded 40% of the composers' share of the music copyright, rather than the 50% he was seeking and was not granted royalties prior to 2005.

Huh, wild… well there you go. Maybe he can get a piece of those sweet ongoing royalties.

Does anyone find it wild that the Police are all in their 70s or 80s? Boo hiss time

Well, they did do a song called "Born in the 50's," so they have been preparing you for this realization.

I'm in tears at that video

think I've watched this 20 times straight

Well, they did do a song called "Born in the 50's," so they have been preparing you for this realization.

Except Andy Summers was born in the (early) 40s!

Stink must have known he would be filmed during the performance. I guess the stink was too strong to deny

dunno if I want to admit this but "They Dance Alone" is really pretty and nearly brings me to tears in light of current world events. I guess it's easy to mock him for this stuff but sometimes he does hit it out of the park

"Fragile" on that album works too.

love “be still my beating heart”

still love 'lazarus heart' which sounds like a cross between wayne shorter and paul simon

yeah I posted about it upthread, its probably my favorite Sting deep cut. pretty crazy lyrics too.

I'd always considered Blue Turtles the only worthwhile Sting solo album but I'm rethinking that now. the second half is pretty rough though. I give "We'll Be Together" a pass knowing that Sting didn't want to write it but "Rock Steady" is one of the worst songs I've ever heard in my life. and the last 3 songs are all really dull. manages to wring all the life out of "Little Wing" somehow. I guess "Straight To My Heart" is pretty fun?

"They Dance Alone" made me cry alone in the car recently!!!!

"Rock Steady" is one of the worst songs I've ever heard in my life too!!!

what was the last great song that sting wrote?

Why Should I Cry for You

I guess it's easy to mock him for this stuff but sometimes he does hit it out of the park

otm

If I Ever Lose My Faith in You is a pretty undeniable pop song I think. but yeah idk if he's ever hit the emotional depth of Why Should I Cry For You since

The Soul Cages has several bangers. I'm impressed he got a single as resigned as "All This Time" into the top five.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LI8khooPyJk

undeniable

where he mastered those Simon-influenced talk-singing cadences.

Xpost

I think both Nothing like the Sun and Soul Cages were both inspired by the death of his parents, the Soul Cages especially. that line on "All This Time" which goes "if I had my way/I'd take a boat to the river/and I'd bury the old man/I'd bury him at sea" always gets me.

NB: "Fragile" is one of Neil Tennant's favorite songs.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LI8khooPyJk

undeniable

― kurt schwitterz, Wednesday, February 7, 2024 5:11 PM (two minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

genuinely one of the most insane music videos ever made, even today it still feels like an SNL sketch

the song itself may be good, I've heard a few people say it's a really great divorce song

One of my friends brought Dream of the Blue Turtles to spin one night a couple of years ago. Another of my friends said, "You broke up the Police for this? Fuck you" LOL

My intro to Toby Keith! He covered it (with Sting).

Blue Turtles is good but the live album was really something. believe it or not it was my first exposure to hip-hop.

I managed to see that tour when it came to Red Rocks, it was really good, but still.

Rock Steady" is one of the worst songs I've ever heard in my life too!!!

that was written under duress though. also "Rock Steady" attempts to be a cute Bible song and those are just never ever good

what was the last great song that sting wrote?

― blazin' squab (NickB), Wednesday, February 7, 2024 6:02 PM

Why Should I Cry for You

― Virginia Wolfman (Ye Mad Puffin), Wednesday, February 7, 2024 6:05 PM

Why should I cry for you?
Why would you want me to?
What would it mean to say,
I loved you in my fashion?

^^ he sings it quite well too

What's wrong with "We'll Be Together"? I liked it at the time, and heard it in Barnes & Noble this past weekend and still liked it.

"We'll Be Together" sounds cheap: one of the more crasser let-me-assemble-a-hit things. He didn't have a clue how to arrange the backup singers or how to use the Casio organ preset.

"Hauling on frozen ropes"

That's the line that gets me. The metaphor has to be that you wish to do something that is possible, but difficult.

A much more nuanced metaphor than trying to do something impossible, or trying to do something that us easy.

Why should I try?

The card metaphor is overdone, but I've always liked "Shape of My Heart."

i thought i liked that one too, but i just went back to it - and though it's still got a certain prettiness to it, it also embodies the dreariness of tone and tempo that made his albums such a bore

Hip-hop artists looooooved that track

Very late to the topic but imo the last great sting song was “a thousand years”