Police Reunion: 2007/08

Worthy but prolonged journey...

"This is like 1983. Although most of you probably weren't even born then". Sting is probably flattering himself a bit too much when he welcomes the audience to The Police's reunion tour. Certainly because the 56-year-old Tin Tin-haired singer looks impressively well-preserved in his tight clothes and that he dances on the speakers as if it were still the 1980s. But it is hardly kids who in the Globen receive The Police's peroxide-bleached backbeat pop with open arms and a touching devotion.

It is just over twenty-five years since Sting, Andy Summers and Stewart Copeland were at the peak of their careers and at the same time took the opportunity to go their separate ways. After the breakup, Sting has said that a reunion of The Police would be proof that he has gone insane. Summers, in turn, has likened the group to an open wound. But just in time for the trio's thirtieth anniversary, the tide seems to have turned.

Perhaps it's the modest sum of one hundred million British pounds, for a ten-month world tour, that has acted as a band-aid on the band's wound. In interviews, at least, the members of The Police have frequently spoken of the need for healing.

Ahead of the reunion tour, the British-American trio recharged by practicing Pilates and Ashtanga yoga together at Sting's villa in Tuscany. In a newspaper interview, Copeland revealed that, in an attempt to make The Police in 2007 a more functional version of their former selves, there were also a lot of group hugs. And with that background, it is not entirely unlikely to suspect that the group has taken the help of a feng shui expert to determine the set design and the members' position in relation to each other.

The interaction and energy balance between the three works without any problems and they actually look quite harmonious together. Sting is in a bush mood and sneaks up on Andy Summers while he plays his guitar solo in So lonely. At the drums, Stewart Copeland sits with a white headband and cuts down drumsticks on a continuous line.

The latest thing the group has released in terms of music is a double compilation album and The Police on a reunion tour is, in other words, a band on a greatest hits journey. No new songs need to be included, and if only Sting had agreed to his police colleagues' wishes to keep the songs in their original form.

The singing bassist instead insisted that the old earrings would get updated interpretations. Unfortunately, that concept included him - with his eyes closed - turning Roxanne into a tough shaman rock. A particularly ungrateful treatment of the single that helped launch the band's career.

Fortunately, the reggae-tinged 'Walking On The Moon' is allowed to be just as it is and in 'Wrapped Around Your Finger' a whole percussion buffet is pushed up to Copeland. When Sting takes out a pan flute in 'Walking In Your Footsteps' and does the apé, a few jumping dolphins are the only thing missing for a complete new age rock experience.

It's a worthy reunion. albeit a far too stretched one, of The Police taking place. Enough because there's twenty-five years of absence to be made up for, but are all these tedious passages and solo stretches really necessary?

When the trio finally joins hands and bows, the members radiate something that could be a taste of more. Although Sting, in 'Can't Stand Losing You', emphasizes the lyric "I guess this is our last goodbye", don't be surprised if this isn't a closing at all but instead the beginning of a new chapter.

(c) Svenska Dagbladet by Kristen Lundell

Magnificent reunion...

"The Police Reunion Tour" is great. Just before Stewart Copeland, drums and percussion, Andy Summers, guitar and Gordon Sumner, alias Sting, bass and vocals, take the stage in front of a packed Globe, we hear Bob Marley in 'Stand Up For Your Rights' through the speakers.

When it's 8:47 p.m., the three who formed The Police 30 years ago are on stage and they start with 'Message In A Bottle' and 'Synchronicity II' and it sounds better than ever.

Sting's voice is fuller, Summers' guitar playing masterful and just right enough for Copeland's magnificent drumming to grow. It's a magnificent concert we're getting through. None of it is nostalgia. Here are new scars from skilled musicians and a song catalog that could have lasted twice as long as the barely two hours we get to enjoy.

"The Police Reunion Tour" has its European premiere tonight and we get to hear more than 20 of their songs from the late 1970s and early 80s.

We get to experience a fully-fledged ensemble performance. Solo space is given as if we were at a jazz club. Sing-along and many standing clapping and cheering. On stage, a joy of playing that ends in a touching thank you when the three hold each other's hands and thank each other.

The tour started in North America this spring and after a summer break there will be about twenty-five concerts in Europe and the whole thing ends in Australia in early February after another tour of North America, Mexico and South America. We can only hope that one result of the tour will be a bunch of new songs. We can hardly imagine that the three will not take advantage of the opportunity to compose new material between the gigs.

If I remember correctly, the track list looked like this and the last five were encores. When it was at its best in the second half of the concert, I didn't really have time to write down: Message In A Bottle / Synchronicity II / Don't Stand So Close To Me / Voices Inside My Head / When the World Is Running Down / Spirits In The Material World / Driven To Tears / Walking On The Moon / Truth Hits Everybody / Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic/Wrapped Around Your Finger / The Bed's Too Big Without You / Murder By Numbers / De Do Do Do, De Da Da Da / Invisible Sun / Walking In Your Footsteps / Can't Stand Losing You / Roxanne / King Of Pain / So Lonely / Every Breath You Take / Next To You.

(c) Gefle Dagblad by Bengt Söderhäll