Police contending for the top of pop...
At the UCD Coffeehouse Monday night, the Police stalked on stage and made it clear that they are in contention for the title of Power Pop Kings, elbowing up against recent rockets like the Cars and the Fabulous Poodle: for the crown.
Although the band, like the aforementioned others, falls below the artistic excellence of musically similar bands like Elvis Costello and the Talking Heads, they have an invigorating sound and healthy songwriting prowess that aspires to be great rock and roll.
The big tunes of the night, of course, was 'Roxanne', which has been rotating at every station in Northern California for weeks. But along with this fine number were absolute songwriting gems like 'Hole In My Life' 'Losin' You' and 'Lonely'. Their repertoire is small at this point, witnessed by the fact that they had to repeat their opening number as an encore, but if the quality stays up, they could be packing concert halls and record stores for many years to come.
It s really no surprise that the band is so adept. Guitarist Andy Summers has played with British stalwarts Kevin Coyne and Kevin Ayers, Drummer Stewart Copeland with Curved Air (an old band of UK violinist/keyboardist Eddie Jobson), and bassist/vocalist Sting has sung in the Sex Pistol's film (he rapes Paul Cook) and appeared as Ace, the Mod dude in the Who's "Quadrophenia."
The audience responded to nearly every song with great enthusiasm, alleviating any doubts that 'Roxanne' is a one-shot commercial success. In fact, any one of the previously mentioned songs could be a hit single The rhythms, especially, are very catchy and punch, with a large amount of the credit for the bands power sound going to drummer Copeland.
Opening for the band was the San Francisco-based group the Readymades, who scored big points with the audience on all counts: A sizzling, energetic style, a sincere, effective stage presence, and at least five songs that could crack the airwaves.
Their melodies were not particularly different from the brand new generation of punkists, but the lyricism showed an apt and precise intuition for the plight o the middle-and upper-class white. There were great riffs in tunes like 'After the Earthquake', 'Pretty Wendy', 'Could There Be Anything Like Your Love', and 'Electric Toys', but the greatest of all was '415', with lyrics like "415-Music Three Chord-Music/GarageMusic White-Boys/Making-White Noise."
The band is rumoured near a contract and have the ubiquitous Sandy Pearlman of Blue Oyster Cult producing a demo tape. With a little class production to trim their edges, they should go all the way.
(c) The Sacramento Union by Mike Farrance
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