Been listening to The Police a lot over the weekend…

Brio

…. They’re quite good aren’t they? :-)
I’ve not really played them much over the last few years but after watching the Beato trilogy of Police interviews I got drawn into a lot of listening.
Andy Summers may be one of my favourite guitarists now (until the next obsession on my part starts) and Stuart Copeland may be one of my favourite people, certainly a favourite interviewee.
One thing that struck me was that despite their ongoing acrimonious discussion over money and writing credits was that Summers and Copeland both had a lot of respect for Sting’s abilities as a musician and a songwriter.
Maybe not so much on Sting’s part…

mudslide73

I've been a fan of theirs since they were current. I spent a good six months in my late teens listening to no one else so feel like they're in my DNA. I think they're sometimes viewed as a bit highbrow by some and a bit pop by others - loved by musos while also being the sort of band your mate’s mom* had on cassette in the car. Obviously influential on bands like Rush (cleaner sounds and reggae bits).

I got gifted their first two albums on vinyl a few years back so I've completed the collection - every time I get something on Discogs I'll add a Police album to combine the postage

*West Mids spelling.

DefaultM

Last year I found out that Stewart Copeland did the soundtrack to the Spyro the Dragon video games. There's a video on YouTube.

axisus

The Police. There’s an interesting band. My first recollection of them was the good Can’t stand losing you single. They tagged onto that brilliant ‘New Wave’ movement, as many artists at the time tried to. After the initial flurry of interesting singles (CSLY, Roxanne, So Lonely) they settled into a format that I didn’t much like so I lost interest. I look back now though and think that they wrote a lot of fine singles/songs. What was interesting was that they were a LOT more talented musician-wise that pretty much all of the New Wave bands.

They were one of those bands that hit arena status, and I find that interesting for a 3 piece band, where just one guitar is filling in all the melodic content.

 As always, I find it a shame to hear that a band don’t get on and had difficult relationships with each other. In the youthful naivety of my teens I just assumed that members of any band loved being together and just had a blast all the time. I like to hear of truly harmonious bands, I’m sure there are not that many (Step forward Rush!).

So … in my later stage of life, I’m thinking that I may revisit the Police and investigate a bit more what all the fuss was about. Do they have a decent live record? I do like good live bands.

CaseOfAce

Sometimes you have to see these people in person to realise the dynamics that could have gone on behind the scenes.

Went and saw Stewart Copeland on his Have I Said Too Much tour last year. 
He walked out on stage- sprawled across the armchair and said...right's let's talk about me to the interviewer 

Over the next hour and a half he was amiable, charismatic and a great raconteur with a colossal ego- and I was exhausted just 5 minutes in - and this is in his mild mannered / mature 70s.
I can imagine in his younger years he must have been pretty full on to interact with.

His drumming is magnificent. It's also incredibly busy. On cuts like Walking On The Moon and Message In A Bottle they are intrinsic to the songs and unbelievable parts.
Now imagine Sting in '84 asking for a straight ahead 4/4 beat without the bells and whistles and Copeland's reaction after all that acclaim and focus on him in the earlier years.

Andy and Stewart also wanted their songs on the albums since they were seeing Sting buying his fifth Rolls Royce that week...etc. from the publishing royalties.

So I completely understand why the Police was never built to last. I also still think they're one the best British bands that have existed.

digitalkettle

mudslide73 said:

...Obviously influential on bands like Rush (cleaner sounds and reggae bits).
...

Rush were on their sixth album by 1978!

digitalkettle

axisus said:
...Do they have a decent live record? I do like good live bands.

You could try the album 'Live!'

However, I'd recommend all five studio albums in order

EricTheWeary

I got the cd box set of the studio albums a few years ago and went through everything a few times whilst on car journeys. I feel they had probably lost what was interesting about them by the end but for a few years they were a remarkable perfect storm. You can hear reggae, punk, jazz and other influences but probably at no point can you say that's a reggae song or that's a jazz song,etc. Copeland's use of the Space Echo was straight from dub reggae but you didn't hear it and go oh that's dub reggae, they just cherry picked and incorporated it into their own thing. 

guitars4you

A great band - So many superb tracks over 5 albums and a '5 year career' - I saw them live 3 times, once just as Roxanne had charted and they had little material to offer - Not played an album of theirs for a while, but should do so - But have many tracks on many play lists - Great band

Just a pity about the constant fall outs - I've actually not read any of the books about the Police and know I should - But think the power struggle always commenced between Sting, as the primary song writer and Copeland and his Brothers who funded, and promoted the first album and subsequent tours - Stewart formed the band but it appears it was never a 3 way split as such but his Brothers were certainly very influential at the start of it all 

Can't find it now, but on one of the 'come back tours' there is a great video of the band rehearsing - Sting and Stewart are having a heated discussion about how a rhythmic part of the song should go - Sting said it should be like this and Stewart said it has always been like this - Stewart responded with 'Am I getting this right, is the 'effing' bass player telling me how to play the drums 

UnclePsychosis

I think The Police are a band I respect more than I like, if that makes sense. 

Kittyfrisk

Tangentially, I heard Sting on R4 this morning, talking about his latest venture  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Last_Ship_(musical)
He has the worst Geordie accent when singing that I I have ever heard, apart from when southern comedians try. Cringeworthy.
The Police on their day were great 

Philly_Q

digitalkettle said:

mudslide73 said:

...Obviously influential on bands like Rush (cleaner sounds and reggae bits).
...

Rush were on their sixth album by 1978!

They were indeed, but I'm pretty sure the members of Rush have said that they were influenced by the Police (and other contemporary bands) when they started writing shorter, less proggy songs starting with the Permanent Waves album.

bloodandtears

Philly_Q said:

digitalkettle said:

mudslide73 said:

...Obviously influential on bands like Rush (cleaner sounds and reggae bits).
...

Rush were on their sixth album by 1978!

They were indeed, but I'm pretty sure the members of Rush have said that they were influenced by the Police (and other contemporary bands) when they started writing shorter, less proggy songs staring with the Permanent Waves album.

Lifeson definitely grabbed the Boss Chorus cos he'd heard Summers use...

victorludorum

Andy Summers's biography is a good one. I read it and didn't really connect with it, but I tried it again a couple of years later and was sold. Quite a bit of tension in that group and this comes across in their music I think. The live stuff from their last reunion was very 'energised' imo.

JonnyBgoode

Here's Rush doing a cover of a little known Police track. Ignore the vocals and sing 'EE-OH -OH' over the top for full effect:

Brio

Blimey!

Danny1969

I love the older Police stuff. It's a bit pitchy in places but has a kind of punk energy that the smoother stuff didn't. Copeland is like Bonzo, a drummer so good I find music in the drumming and fine myself listening to the drumming rather than the vocal sometimes.

I think Andy Summers got some of his style from Stings guitar parts. Those 5 and add 9 riffs like Message are Stings writing really. Sting is just one of those song writing muso machines like Paul McCartney who can just see the vision of the song and play the parts. The other two should get a taste of the publishing though as they added something to the sound that wouldn't be there otherwise. As for the tension in the band, that's a good thing for the music as it comes out in the music.

Philly_Q

I always thought it was fascinating that Summers is a decade older than Sting and Copeland - he's the same age as Paul McCartney - and he'd been playing professionally since the mid-'60s, working with a lot of pretty well-known artists.  I don't know whether he saw The Police as a long-term project, or just another paying gig that might be over in a year or two.

Musicwolf

Lerxst talks briefly about his influences, including Andy Summers, here

Kittyfrisk

Rift goes deep.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cn42lp1135vo

BillDL

I'm disappointed.  I read the thread title and thought maybe there was a drawn-out hostage situation in one of the neighbouring houses.

While I'm here though I would say that for me what @UnclePsychosis said earlier matches my feeling:

"I think The Police are a band I respect more than I like, if that makes sense".