Ghost In The Machine: 1981/82

Bare essentials rock is what the Police play...

Last night in the Tucson Community Center Arena, the Police proved they could move a capacity audience of 9,500 as easily as they did the University of Arizona's Main Auditorium crowd of 2,600 two years ago.

This British trio has animal magnetism to burn. And it did, for a 90 minute show of bare essentials rock'n'roll that kept fans standing on their chairs and cheering the entire time.

The group's blond bass player, Sting, has become the centre of this adulation. Singing most of the songs, doing all the talking and providing the main point of reference with his strutting about, Sting's personality at times eclipsed that of the others.

For last night's concert he wore a bright yellow foul weather sailing jacket, T-shirt with thin blue and white horizontal stripes and baggy white pants. With his punk haircut and a large circle earring dangling from his right earlobe, he looked perfect for the role of a contemporary pirate.

But musically, the Police are a totally integrated unit. They consistently make the emotional moment greater than its contributing elements.

Drummer Stewart Copeland is credited with originating the winning concept for this trio. He and Sting met by chance in the north of England, played together with another guitarist, and worked briefly as a quartet when guitarist Andy Summers was invited to join. The Police made their formal debut with the present line-up of Sting, Copeland and Summers in August 1977, in Birmingham, England.

They make minimalist music to be sure. Or, stated in automotive terms, the Police are a high performance compact car that gets good mileage. Perfect for the 1980s. Last night we got to sample the deluxe model, which included a three-piece horn section, fog machines and trigger-quick lighting effects, all of which made the songs work even better.

The set opened with 'Message In A Bottle'. Then the horn section were introduced to punch up 'Every Little Things She Does Is Fine'. Then banks of fog came billowing out behind the band and the horn section for 'Walking On The Moon'. By the time these guys got to their fourth song, 'Spirits In The Material World' the crowd knew it was going to get it's money's worth.

The momentum continued building straight through the power punk, punk pop, reggae rock and several flavours of blues the group did as it brought out songs from its current album and a few older tunes, such as 'De Do Do Do, De Da Da Da'.

The set culminated with 'Invisible Sun' - which had Sting tripling on keyboards, bass and vocals - followed by a very strong reggae attack on 'Roxanne'. Next up, as an encore was 'Don't Stand So Close To Me.'

(c) The Tucson Citizen by Chuck Graham

New Wave is getting older, but The Police ride the crest...

It's really funny, after almost two years away from the music scene, to see how institutionalized New Wave has become. It was showing signs of it then, but it's gotten ridiculous - no wonder the hard-core turn their noses up at the term.

Sunday night's Police concert at the Tucson Community Center Arena seemed more like the preliminary rounds of a Go-Go's look-alike contest, with all the pre-teeny-boppers in cutesy miniskirts and black eye- liner and bizarre nail polish.

It's appropriate, because The Police were among the most commercial of the New Wave groups to burst upon the scene in the late '70s. They seemed as well-groomed and non-threatening as the Beatles were, once our parents had seen the Rolling Stones.

Now The Police have reached the status of conquering heroes, which was how they were greeted by the near-capacity crowd of more than 9,000 Sunday, two days after their performance at the mammoth US Festival in San Bernardino, Calif.

Their smoothed-down, sleeked-up reggae-jazz-pop-rock sound hasn't changed much. This Anglo-American band has just grown more assured, more solid over the years. They are very, very good at what they do to say they're the best would be empty praise, because there doesn't seem to be anyone else doing quite the same thing.

They've stood the conventional power trio on its head, putting the emphasis on rhythm rather than guitar thrashings. Andy Summers' guitar, Sting's bass and Stewart Copeland's drums all work together forcefully, with Sting's plaintive vocals weaving in and out, sometimes flowing along, sometimes angling against the grain.

They are indeed a band - a strong, cohesive unit even though they've come up with their very own star in Sting. He still holds the stage as if he'd spent every minute of his life there, always in motion, and always projecting the sort of self-assured charisma that has led moviemakers to borrow his talents. (Remember the icy leader of the Mods in 'Quadrophenia'?)

Their concert Sunday was an almost unbroken string of hits and near-hits, from the earliest ('Roxanne') to the most recent ones from 'Ghost in the Machine', including 'Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic' and 'One World (Not Three)', a bit of social commentary for which they may be uniquely qualified after their Asian tour a couple years ago. In a live performance, the songs have an intensity that isn't immediately apparent on record, where they sometimes sound lightweight and too poppish.

Opening act Dave Edmunds, a veteran British guitarist-singer most recently with Rockpile, comes from the other end of the musical spectrum, specializing in the sort of sizzling rock'n'roll that Chuck Berry and the Sun Records stable exploded upon the world in the late '50s.

With only 40 minutes for his performance, though, Edmunds didn't have a chance to show the depth of his talent - he can turn a nice ballad, too.

In his fast-paced set, he did get to perform a batch of nifty songs-like 'Crawling from the Wreckage', 'From Small Things (Big Things One Day Come)', 'Girls Talk' and 'I Hear You Knocking', his early '70s hit. And by the time it ended, even the Go-Go's clones were bouncing in their seats. The real rock'n'rollers were standing and screaming their approval.

(c) Arizona Daily Star by Pam Parrish