When the World is Running Down, You Make the POLL of What's Still Around – ILM Artist Poll #116 – THE POLICE - (Voting extended to Friday, Dec 2, 2022)

the truth is it would've been huge even if

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=837k74c4rHQ

Have seen an interview with Andy where he talks about his guitar playing on 'Bring On the Night' and how he based those lovely arpeggios that you can hear during the verses on stuff that he learned from studying the guitar compositions of Villa-Lobos at California State University, and that atmosphere he creates really makes the song for me. Take one guess who gets the sole writing credit for it?

imo there is no way the Police ever got reMOTEly as big without the things Summers and Copeland do, on every single one of their hits. they're always kicking the energy up more and more, turning pretty good songs into incredible earworms and electrifying toe-tappers, or sketching out all this atmosphere and space and emotional depth. i'm sure when i was a teen i thought of them as Sting and two faceless other guys who got super lucky, but once i really started paying attention to their music it was obvious they were anything but that.

which has probably earned the band some 50 million dollars on its own? Or more?

apparently it earns sting $2000 a day.

Infamously, the Miles Davis recording of "My Favorite Things" is credited solely to Rodgers and Hammerstein even though each individual soloist improvised their part completely from scratch. ILX came down firmly on the side of the performance being the composition, and the Tin Pan Alley definition of songwriting / copyright is utterly out of date. I do not disagree with that assessment.

This problem would be solved if performers/recording artists received royalties in all the same situations as songwriters and publishers, but don't say composing/songwriting doesn't exist when 95% of professionally released music depends on some form of the craft.

split songwriting credit equally...probably goes a long way toward promoting longevity if you're not always fighting about money.

Unless one guy (let's call him Sting) is actually writing (or originating) the hit songs and resents splitting with the others. Anyone feeling aggrieved for Summers and Copeland should remember that they would have shared in album sales (when those meant something) and concert grosses over and above songwriting royalties; and, even their one song apiece on Synchronicity probably made them each six figures with roughly zero airplay.

Also, "official" songwriting credits are sometimes not the entire story. In Jethro Tull, for instance, Ian Anderson would take almost total credit but earnings for certain songs with contributions from other members would be paid "informally" via the Tull management.

Just to be clear (I probably wasn't) I agree 200% with Doctor Casino. The music is the performance done by the people, and that is what lasts.

However- I am kind of also interested in the germ of a particular idea, and that is also salient. No, a Stingian idea is not (on its own) a song by the Police.

But one can also ask - how many songs by the Police would exist without Stingian ideas? Not as many, probably. He is an insufferable asshole and I am sure I would want to punch him in the face more or less constantly if I were in a band with him. But he was a creative catalyst, and that needs to be factored into our assessment of the band.

Upthread we mused about the Police with a different drummer, and how boring it would be.

But to continue the thought experiment: imagine a band consisting of excellent guitarist Andy Summers, exciting drummer Stewart Copeland, and a good bass player like... I dunno, Tony Butler or Kim Deal or John Taylor or Benjamin Orr.

How well would that band do, chartwise? Where would its songs come from? What would be its overall creative direction?

I totally get the impulse to say that Sting would have sucked without the other Policemen. But it's equally true that without him, the other two would have lacked a space in which to work their specific magic.

I say split it all equally. Why not? The resentment isn't worth it, for anybody involved. If you're raking in millions and millions of dollars for your rock band that might just as easily have run out of steam after six weeks, you should be delighted that your bandmates are also now millionaires, and not waste a moment going down the path of wondering if you deserve more credit than they do...

well, one of them does live in a castle

time traveling Kim Deal plus Summers and Copeland sounds incredible, imo!

btw "how far would they make it" is kind of an unfair question given what we know about Miles Copeland and his aggressive marketing techniques. like how far would they make it if they weren't all blonde and didn't have a singer who looked like a movie star

Just to be clear (I probably wasn't) I agree 200% with Doctor Casino. The music is the performance done by the people, and that is what lasts.

So songwriters shouldn't receive any royalties at all?

to be clear summers and copeland do receive royalties for their performances on all the recordings, they just don’t get publishing on sting’s “solo” compositions

so they didn’t benefit from the puff daddy windfall, and they don’t get paid when “every breath” is played on the radio (more than any song in fm history)

Generally I love the model of splitting money and credit equally - I am on record as loving how REM and U2 both did precisely this.

But I believe we can walk and chew gum at the same time.

1. Yes absolutely we can and should praise and reward instrumentalists (who, almost always, write their own parts).

2. But also yes, there actually IS something notable going on when someone initiates the process of original songwriting in the form of lyrics, melody.

I think we can honor both #1 and #2 without risk of hypocrisy. We don't need to overcompensate to redress a historical imbalance.

right, which is why performing artists in bands or on session sheets earn royalties when a recording is purchased or streamed

there actually IS something notable going on when someone initiates the process of original songwriting

And songwriting is work that takes time and effort.

Xxxxxxxpost to self

I was obv way off re Roxy

Because music publishing operates according to an antiquated, pre-rock conception of composition that rewards those who write the top-line melody and lyrics, most Roxy tunes are credited solely to Ferry. "It goes back to Tin Pan Alley and the 1930s," says Manzanera. "Eno's synth part on Ladytron, Andy's oboe parts – that came from them. Each member was contributing to the music and to all the arrangements. I like to think that we produced the musical context for Bryan to put his vision into. But that's not reflected in the publishing."

It's all the more unfair because, according to Manzanera, from about halfway through For Your Pleasure and onwards, the band would write "the music first – all the music, including the solos. Then Bryan would listen to it and try to write a top-line tune and words.

From here

On the Roxy forum where I found this being discussed, someone mentioned that Blur split was 10% drummer, 20% bassist, 30% bassist and 40% singer - my anarchist ideals feel an even split is better, but that’s a non-terrible setup imo

Sorry those two big pars are quotes

Blur split was 10% drummer, 20% bassist, 30% bassist and 40% singer

Oof, poor old Graham.

Wow, did not know that re. Roxy. Some songs that makes sense—Ferry singing “You got me girl on the run round …” over the oboe melody and drone—others it seems harder to imagine. In the case of The Police, I find it hard to believe that if, say, Summers had written the riff to Message in a Bottle (not just the harmonies as the YouTuber describes upthread, as good as they are) he wouldn’t have gotten some songwriting credit. But very little ever surprises me about the music industry screwing over artists, so ...

One thing BTW that I think gets overlooked with Summers is his sound. Back when I was a teenager we used to kind of slag Summers as a player because he was almost anti-flash. But listening back, it’s clear that a huge part of what makes Police records tick is that incredibly warm chorus-y distortion he gets on his guitar. Yes he did some clever overdubbing of his parts and on later records added the Roland GR-300 guitar synth to the mix (ie, the synth wash intro to Secret Journey). But, the sound of his guitar is one of the band’s chief aural attractions and through-lines from Outlandos to Synchronicity.

Oh, absolutely. His use of the Echoplex and, later, the Memory Man was historic, but might not have been so had he not understood what kinds of chords really lent themselves well to delay. Especially since, like I mentioned, all the overdubs and whatnot in "Message..." were I think an anomaly, that's more intricate a studio production than he usually does, especially on that album. "Ghost in the Machine" is the sound of a bored Sting trying to grab full control of the band, which is why a song like "Every Little Thing" barely features any guitar at all, and you get Sting playing rudimentary horns and bringing in outside musicians and aside from the opening salvos, songs that barely count as jams and sketches.

anyone into the band's early period may wanna check this out:

https://www.discogs.com/master/243998-Strontium-90-Police-Academy

the liner notes kind of imply this was the band that led to the formation of The Police, though I think they were actually already around by then, but with Henry Padovani instead of Summers. it's a project headed up by Mike Howlett of Gong, which wound explain how he got a guy like Andy Summers. originally they wanted Chris Cutler to drum but wound up with Copeland instead. if nothing else this is what must've convinced them to go with Summers instead so I guess it's pretty important. anyway the CD is just a loose collection of demos, and a lot of it is written by Howlett, but there are some gems for the Police fan. "Visions of the Night" was re-recorded as a B-Side. the riff on "3 O'Clock Shot" was later used on "Be My Girl - Sally" and the lyrics would later show up on "O My God". there is a 4-track demo of "Every Little Thing She Does As Magic" which I think is relevant to this discussion. I think this is all Sting. the bones of the song are all there, but obviously it sounds nothing like the record.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FfolkO4Ninc

Heretical, I know, but I enjoy the '86 rerecording of "Don't Stand So Close to Me..."

Me too! The original is fun and spiky, but the lusher version works too. I remember it seeming like a bold move. A self-cover.

Kinda wish more bands did stuff like that. There is never just one way to interpret a song. But you have to be choosy about it.

"Ghost in the Machine" is the sound of a bored Sting trying to grab full control of the band, which is why a song like "Every Little Thing" barely features any guitar at all, and you get Sting playing rudimentary horns and bringing in outside musicians and aside from the opening salvos, songs that barely count as jams and sketches.

Yes and no. Ghost has a lot of synth and keyboard experimentation that Sting and Hugh Padgham were clearly leading, but Summers is also, as I noted, pretty present and I suspect a lot of those synthesizer riffs on the album were actually composed on the guitar by Andy. And the thing is, it works -- I mean, yes, Every Little Thing is sort of dominated by the piano -- but it is pretty simpatico with Summers’ guitar arpeggio in the verse – Summers' part almost sounds like a high speed warmup for the Every Breath riff 2 years later.

So I don’t think it was exactly just Andy sitting on the sideline and taking a dip in the pool while Sting pushed him out of the way. And, as I mentioned, Summers got in on the synthesizer act himself. Ghost is the rare record where I think “bringing in the synths“ actually works.

Yes. "Darkness"!

the Gizmodrome version of Darkness is great, I think Mark King sings it better than Sting does

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UcNWlA11Llk

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ypBOn6jsoQk

^ live version of 'Secret Journey' off GITM is pretty cool with more synth than on the album. As per the comments, Andy is on synth guitar, and Sting is apparently playing one of this things with his feet while he plays the bass:

https://dt7v1i9vyp3mf.cloudfront.net/styles/news_large/s3/imagelibrary/M/MoogTaurus3_01-MsS22TpcNKTmi41G0fvKMXixwq8heEz_.jpg

whoa that actually sounds a lot like Fortress Around Your Heart. like I almost expected that chorus to come in after the mid section

Indeed!

I dunno, aside from "Demolition Man" I can't think of much Andy at all on the jammy stuff. "Hungry for You," "Too Much Information," ""One World (Not Three)"... those are the ones that are barely songs, and I can't recall off the top of my head what Andy is doing there. And as for "Demolition Man," that guitar stuff is pretty run of the mill, especially for Andy. Even the guitar synth stuff on that album is pretty simple, at least the stuff more recognizable as guitar synth. It's Andy finding something to do on tracks that don't necessarily lend themselves to what it is he does. I mean, Mike Rutherford was using guitar synths to at least trigger synth pads in a lot of Genesis, but I don't think what he was up to was particularly interesting, either. Just a way to thicken the sound a little and/or find something to do with himself.

But for sure I agree those last three songs on the album are great, because they're distinctive and weird. And I love Stew's playing on the record.

Too Much Information is so good! That afrobeat riffing in the right channel and the wah pedal on the left, bassline nicked from 'A Love Supreme'

I'm not saying they're bad or no fun, they're just not really songs, imo. Just kind of repetitive jams.

xp No wait, Hungry For You has the Love Supreme bassline, always getting those muddled in my head, pretty similar iirc

I'm not saying they're bad or no fun, they're just not really songs, imo. Just kind of repetitive jams.

Well they'd obviously been listening to Fela and a lot of jazz, so no they're not typical western rock songs but that is sort of the point

on the "covering your own song" topic: i agree! i think it's something a lot of bands work out in a live setting, which would probably be really fun and stimulating especially if you've been playing the same song another way for a long time. and maybe if you're enjoying it in that way, it doesn't seem necessary to record it... see also, bands with songs where some later, different live arrangement becomes THE definitive version, in the eyes of the fans. (is that a thread btw?)

(also: putting it on record risks giving the impression that you're desperate, out of ideas, trying to boost your new album with a whiff of past glories, etc. you have to be in a mood where you're not afraid of all that stuff.)

tbh I love the "not really a song" stuff on Zenyatta & Ghost...I guess Reggatta had some of this as well ("Deathwish"??). in retrospect this band was touring constantly and doing a bazillion interviews so it's not surprising they didn't have much time to develop actual material....so it's a testament to how great the band was that this stuff actually sounds pretty great

This re-recording of "Truth Hits Everybody" from 1983 is apparently based on the live arrangement they had been doing:

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

There's some suspicion that it's actually a demo with Sting playing guitar as well as bass and programmed drums.

I'm into that, it sounds like an early Husker Du song like Amusement or something

It’s all in the Wikipedia article so hardly deep lore, but I was surprised to hear the 86 version of DSSCTM sounded so synthetic because Copeland broke his collarbone and sequenced the drum parts. No wonder it sounds leaden.
The unforgivable thing about Ghost for me is how shrill and ugly it sounds. Sting sounds like he’s being pushed against the bars of an iron fence most of the time, and when you add deliberate discord on some tracks it’s just unlistenable. Hard to believe they signed off on the mix.

"Shrill and ugly" is what I love about "Demolition Man"!

Sure, but not an entire album of it.

I used to listen to the cassette of Ghost while working my morning paper route. My brother listened to it every night at bedtime. It was a perfect album for both contexts.

I always thought the production on Ghost matched the album cover - a sea of blackness with these bright slanted shapes in the center. feels like it was recorded in a space with unknown but generally large dimensions. kind of a Robocop vibe to it.

I think I owned the record for 3 years before I understood the cover, I’d thought it was just a graphic showing malfunction and chaos.

It's kind of chilling when you figure it out.

...I always thought it was a representation of the three band members?

think I had it for 20 years before I finally figured that out! thought it was some sort of code, or an ancient script rendered in lcd, which fitted in with my understanding of Secret Journey, a song about ancient knowledge played on synths

I always thought it had a dual symbology in that it spells out "666."

Well, it seemed cool in high school.