Zenyatta Mondatta: 1980/81

White reggae hits '80s with The Police...

It seems odd that reggae should have found a home away from home in Britain, where a continent and a culture separate reggae's roots from the overseas imitation. But reggae in Calgary?

To qualify that, The Police perform what's known as white reggae, hence the title of their second album, 'Regatta de Blanc'. But there's no getting around the fact that black reggae rhythms form the cornerstone of their music. What The Police have done is develop the rhythms, make reggae compatible with electric guitar and bass, and brought it into the '80s.

They opened with 'Don't Stand So Close To Me', setting the pace for a concert that, if for no other reason, stands out because it's so unusual for Calgary, hardly known as a town partial to musical innovation.

Naturally, the drummer is kept busy all evening, but since there are just three members in the band, all have to keep on their toes. While outwardly simple and spontaneous, reggae requires some degree of precision and often employs complicated rhythmic structures, of which The Police have taken full advantage.

Reggae lulls you into its rhythm while retaining the dynamic element found in the singing and in the lyrics.

Lead singer Gordon Mathew Sumner's vocals climb easily up and down the scale, and often consist of nothing more than a compelling, almost syllabic chant. Even when the music is more rock than reggae, Sumner's voice is distinct and the rhythm pervading, serving to guide rather than dominate the music.

Sumner's stand-up electric bass looks like a regular stand-up with the sides lopped off, but it adds texture to the sound because Sumner can manipulate it more, particularly in a song like 'Shadows in the Rain', where a bass note wavers and falls off as the rhythm flows regularly like waves across lyrics.

The band uses a number of simple electric effects, particularly echo, and the its distinction would be incomplete without electric guitar as an often-piercing counter- point.

But The Police are most easily identified by the easy structure they've retained throughout. By any standard the concert was a success, though in a promoter's eyes success would be measured in attendance - about 4,000 people. I was told.

There are so many good ideas floating around in XTC's music that it's hard to understand how it eventually comes across so negatively. XTC's style of pop is so disaffected it may even be unfair to use the word pop.

It's crisp and bouncy like pop, and the harmonies and basic structure are there, but the repetitious, robot-like tempo and overly efficient keyboards that characterize the music eventually serve to box it in and stifle the human element. XTC's members seem too intense and manipulative to be pop musicians. They've simply come up with a new dimension in superficiality, instead of overcoming it.

At times XTC demonstrated a cleverness that was none-the-less kept in the wings and rarely taken to the forefront. Intricate rhythms stood out, but only briefly. The pop format allows just three or four minutes to manipulate a few chords and words, and in this case it's a good thing. Even the band's best-known single, 'Making Plans For Nigel', seems to run off in three directions at once, falling apart from within.

XTC works one tempo to its demise, and often the singing is more like the stupid noises children make so they can hear themselves and attract attention by being annoying. The music is automatic and lacks spontaneity, at times even seeming hurried, perhaps in an effort to wrap it up before the three-minute limit is up. After three minutes, they might as well stop anyway.

(c) The Calgary Herald by Roman Cooney