Police Reunion: 2007/08

The Police are taking advantage of the 21st century to settle old scores with their best past...

The English trio The Police demonstrated tonight in Valencia how one of the most profitable bands of the last 30 years has taken advantage of their brief return to bring their technical advances from the 21st century and settle old scores with their best past, the pop-rock that made them so popular in the 1980s.

Sting, Andy Summers, and Stewart Copeland spent a hundred minutes in front of approximately 15,000 people - out of an expected capacity of 28,000 at the Ciutat de València stadium - reviewing the essence of their legacy, the one they forged between 1977 and 1983 and which they have continued to live on ever since thanks to compilations and, over the past two years, a reunion that many had been asking for and even more had feared.

However, the reliability of their repertoire has made it clear that The Police, the group that best capitalized on the fusion of punk with jazz, reggae, and pop, has a loyal audience spread across the globe who have responded with admiration, respect, and gratitude.

Bass, guitar, and drums, wearing dark clothing and, in the case of the drummer, sporty - gloves, basketball shoes, and a headband - were enough to fill a stage with great music, where the high-definition of the three large screens and the spectacular 300,000-watt sound system have boosted them to a very high level of audiovisual power.

Ironically, the clarity of the screens made it possible to see even the smallest details of their faces, riddled with wrinkles and gray hair, and bodies that preferred to save energy from movement to fully rely on instrumental virtuosity.

For tonight's concert, organized by the Valencia Provincial Council and the first of their summer tour of Spain - which takes them to Bilbao tomorrow and Madrid on Saturday - The Police have brought out their best assets: Opening with "Message In A Bottle" and closing with "Every Breath You Take," they revived some of the songs that made them most popular for their fans.

Thus, "Walking On The Moon," "Voices Inside My Head," "Don't Stand So Close to Me," "Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic," and "Wrapped Around Your Finger" played perfectly alongside other massively chanted anthems, such as "Do Do Do, De Da Da Da," "Invisible Sun," and, in the final stretch, "Roxanne" (the stadium turned red), "King of Pain," and "So Lonely," with a spectacular finale by Summers.

"Every Breath You Take," the song they composed 25 years ago as a prelude to their split and thanks to which they have become globally immortal, nevertheless demonstrated the vocal limitations of Sting, whose age no longer prevents him from achieving virtuoso performances in an hour and a half concert.

It was a finale that once again reunited the entire audience with his band, who revived "Next To You" as an encore, where the screens showed black and white images of the trio taken between the late 1970s and early 1980s.

After this new concession to nostalgia, Sting, Copeland, and Summers left the stage separately, each at one end, symbolizing their dissolution a quarter of a century ago.

The Police, as a brand, will officially die on August 7th at Madison Square Garden in New York, the venue chosen to - according to its members - put an end to a career cut short too soon and intelligently revived in a century that has allowed them to respect the essence of their creativity and receive the well-deserved and global tribute to their musical legacy.

(c) Terra Actualidad