Police - Synchronicity POLL

Mother is a delight. I played that damn song so many times in 2001. Real Mother kick.

It reminds me off a sillier/creepier (longer) '5% for Nothing.'

I really, really hate "Mother". I'm all about crazy songs where someone just screams, but really.

It is pretty out of place, I will admit.

It was "Mother" that prepared me for the likes of Captain Beefheart and Wild Man Fischer

"Synchronicity II" is awesome and really not overplayed for me - not sure what it was like at the time but it's now the Police single you never here. Sting may lay it on thick in places ("another suburban family morning" etc) but there's some really great moments of stridency and man, yeah, Summers is kicking ass on this one. Love the "BA DA DA DANG DANG BRANG A DANG A DANG DANG" after the part about how the guy's eyeballs ache. And the spooky evil rising from the dark Scottish lake works for me - the two parallel plots make a nice pair of really detailed daily breakdown versus really vague/menacing.

It's probably supposed to be some psychoanalytic BS where the dark Scottish lake is the guy's subconscious but I like it better as just this totally separate thing happening, "Meanwhile, far away, unbeknownst to our hero..."

That said, this is the one Police album I haven't yet been able to make myself spring for a dollar copy of and so I'm not voting.

There's two versions of the cover art on the original LP. One has a bare breast. One does not.

Also, a lot of copies are not actually black, but semi transparent purple. Hold yours up to the light and check.

They play 'Synchronicity II' as bumper music on Coast to Coast AM episodes about synchronicity.

DO YOU SEE

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

After this poll started I listened to this album about 400 times. Soooooo goooooooooood.

I love how he says 'HUMILIATING kick in the CROTCH."

I think Mother is great! It's so fucked up. I'm tempted to vote for it. Or Sync I. Can't decide.

I thought ILM hated this album. Pleasant surprise that I was wrong. Best thing Sting was ever involved in of course.

Yes because ILM is all one brain.

"Best thing Sting was ever involved in of course"

Yes, except for DUNE.

the one that goes "I WILL LISTEN HARD TO YOUR TUITION"

I stop caring about the Police after their third album. And by this one, I basically can't stand them. My wife, on the other hand, is a huge fan -- first concert she ever saw, etc. When I asked her what her favorite track was, she said she didn't have one because it's meant to be listened to as an entire album. But when pressed, she named "Synchronicity I," for being the "most rock." So I'll vote for that.

Also, we just checked her copy, and the vinyl is in fact translucent purple -- looks pretty cool! We can't find any bare breasts, however (except for those belonging to actual Police members.)

Holy shit! Mine is purple too! Wow, you would never see that unless you held it up to the light. I had to go get another record by someone else and hold it up to the light just to prove my sanity. I wonder why they didn't make it more obvious, because it's really beautiful. I don't see any bare (female) breasts on mine, either, though. The Asian lady standing near Summers is the only female I see on this.

Also subtly translucent: Neil Young's Tonight's The Night

Yeah I heard about the purple thing a long time ago. Pretty subtle and unexpected for the era and label. The bare breast one isn't terribly rare (I don't think), just obviously wasn't as widely distributed.

I bought this album at 12:01am on the day of release. "Every Breath You Take" was (and still is I believe) a terrific single and big-upped everywhere on MTV and KROQ so the anticipation for the whole album was tremendous. But when I opened the shrink wrap and gave it a listen I was vaguely pleased and vaguely underwhelmed. OK sure... I put Ghosts In The Machine back on and waited for tickets to go on sale for the tour. The following year I'd have the same reaction to The Unforgettable Fire

The eventual show at Hollywood Park was nuts. 75,000 in a venue that had no business hosting a rock concert of that size and smack in the middle of a summer heat wave. This was one of the few times where I've felt unsafe at a show... people were passing out from the heat, kids were getting crushed near the stage, and after the ninth or tenth kid being carried out over the security fence with a bloody face or body part I headed for the exit. Meanwhile, Sting was singing "So Lonely." Never really cared about The Police after than and since then I listen to the Summers/Fripp albums a lot more.

Anyway, the opening song on that night was "Voices In My Head" - weird moody choice, but right after that was "Synchronicity I" and WAY more fired up than what was recorded. In fact the live versions of everything on the album were significantly better live. "Synchronicity II" was next and just as powerful, but I hadn't ever seen tens of thousands of people go from meh to YEAH instantly so "Synchronicity I" gets my vote.

FWIW, The Fixx and Berlin were the openers and FAR better than The Police (the Thompson Twins opened too, but live they were irrelevant). Hell, Berlin was one of the better bands I'd seen anywhere.

That's the song wherein The Police say fuck it and imitate Rush.

I like that later Rush decided to say fuck it and imitate The Police (to greater effect too)

Rush > Police

Anyone who thinks otherwise is crazy.

And by crazy I mean is probably a woman.

Thank you Bob Dylan.

I am a crazy woman.

My wife, who is a woman and not crazy and also a really big Rush fan, says the bands are not comparable. (She did agree, though, that "Synchronicity" sounds like the Police trying to be Rush.)

"Synchronicity I" barely over "King of Pain".

God, I'd love to hear Rush do a cover of Synchronicity.

If bimble pulled this out on vinyl to start the poll as stated above - I don't believe it would have had 'tea in the sahara,' right? I remember being fairly peeved at 13 and finding my buddy's cassette had a song my vinyl copy didn't have ... that said - I vote 'Synchronicity I' ...

PS - Excellent call on the wish for Rush to cover Synchronicity - (heck either one!)

"Murder By Numbers" was the extra song not on the original vinyl release, "Tea in the Sahara" was on both.

What he said.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

Votes are pretty right on except for Mother scoring so low. Pretend it's Scratch Acid and re-listen!

I voted for "O My God" by accident and now I'm totally happy that I did because I would have cried if it was beat by "Mother."

Was searching for an image of the bare breast cover art and found this info on Wikipedia:

The album's original cover artwork was available in 36 variations, with different arrangements of the colour stripes and showing different photographs of the band members, which they took themselves. In one version Sting is reading a copy of Jung's Synchronicity on the front cover along with a negative/superimposed image of the actual text of the synchronicity hypothesis. A photo on the back cover also shows a close-up, but mirrored and upside-down, image of the Jung's book.

Yeah, that's actually the one I've got, with all the pics of Jung's Synchronicity.

I have to constantly sing along with one part, "packed-like-lemmings into shiny metal boxes"

Anyone heard the B-Side "I Burn For You"?? Such a great tune, surprised it didn't make it on here

"Synchronicity 1". Song doesn't get nearly enough love.

― Alex in NYC, Monday, April 6, 2009 7:56 AM (2 years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

alex so OTM (as usual)

I love the vocal harmonies in 'Synchronicity I'. I would have voted for 'Synchronicity II' in this, though.

Hey, mighty brontosaurus,
Don't you have a lesson for us

I feel disappointed to learn the lyrics are not "Are you SICK, Miss Gradenko?"

Miss Gradenko are you SICK

TPL does the album; not quite as good as I remember it being - http://nobilliards.blogspot.co.uk/2014/01/the-police-synchronicity.html

I definitely agree that Ghost is a better record. In fact, I feel like that and Reggatta are the great records that you claim the Police never made. Synchronicity is definitely not it, though that Side 2 continues to be astounding, even "Tea in the Sahara" which I loathed for so many years. Just incredible that the band who recorded "Next to You" only six years prior would wind up doing such tightly knit sophistipop songs like this.

Have you heard the B-side "I Burn For You"? I believe it wound up on a soundtrack somewhere, which is unfortunate - it's one of Sting's best songs, and had they slotted it in the middle of Side 2, kicked out "O My God", and made "Synchronicity II" close the first side, the album could be a masterpiece. Alas...

I agree - I think "I Burn For You" was the best thing they ever did, and it got thrown away on the Brimstone And Treacle soundtrack (the cassette of which I've kept pretty much for that track only).

I Burn for You is indeed awesome. It would have fit well on Zenyatta or maybe even Synchronicity. I would have closed side one pretty well. Even more than a lot of later Police stuff, there's barely anything for Andy to do on the track, though.

Though Sting (and certainly Omar Hakim) makes a pretty good case for it c. "Blue Turtles."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kgxy9lMbqJc