New subject: Police guitarist: 'We're the same three (jerks) we always were'

6 Aug 2008

      From
http://www.cnn.com/2008/SHOWBIZ/Music/08/06/police.reunion.tour.ap/index.htm
l 

Police guitarist: 'We're the same three (jerks) we always were'

NEW YORK (AP) -- During a lengthy reunion tour that concludes Thursday, The
Police didn't necessarily resolve the conflicts that blew apart one of
rock's most successful groups nearly 25 years ago.

At least its members seem to understand them better.

"People don't really change," guitarist Andy Summers told The Associated
Press. "We're the same three (jerks) we always were. I'm actually quite
proud of the fact that it's gone on as long as it has."

The Police had initially planned to end their 30-year reunion tour a year
ago in Giants Stadium, bringing full circle to a career where the first U.S.
show was in New York's grungy CBGBs nightclub. 

Things were going so well, both personally and as a business, that they kept
adding legs; the reunion tour will end as one of the five biggest
money-making rock tours of all time.

The full circle idea stuck, however. The 96th and final show of the tour
will be in New York's Madison Square Garden
<http://topics.cnn.com/topics/Madison_Square_Garden> , a benefit for two
local public television stations.

At the simplest level, Summers said it has been immensely satisfying to see
the faces of fans who had grown up listening to songs like "Roxanne," "Don't
Stand So Close To Me" and "Every Breath You Take."

"I'm in front of the stage and you literally see people break out into sobs
or kiss each other and jump around expressing joy," he said. "It's been
quite emotional in many ways."

Some things never change: Summers was stuck in the middle between the "two
kids scrapping on either side," headstrong singer and composer Sting and
drummer Stewart Copeland, the volatile anchor of the band's meld of punk
rock, reggae and jazz.

Copeland is a visceral musician, one who sees music as a spontaneous
exercise of joy and who loves the creative process. Copeland views Sting as
a musical genius, but one sure of his ideas and not really interested in
collaboration. Now that Copeland has spent several years composing film
music <http://topics.cnn.com/topics/Music> , hiring musicians to play
exactly the notes he wrote, he can understand why he drives Sting nuts.

"When he exercises his right to have it the way he imagined it, it's a
problem for both him and me," he said. "I just can't do it. I can't remember
it. I have my own ideas. I'm incorrigible."

When he was 25 years old, he couldn't understand all this, said Copeland,
now 56.

Sting, Copeland and Summers would occasionally socialize after the band
broke up in 1984, "but not really to the extent where we were able to clear
up all of our misconceptions about each other," he said. "It was really good
for us to figure out what made the band work and what didn't work, so we
could appreciate each other unconfused by these other issues."

Working with Sting has been inspiring, he said, "but, man, I need to breathe
sometimes."

He doesn't want to overemphasize the conflicts, because Copeland said
they've really been having a good time on the road.

Copeland gave another hint to his personality when he trashed the band's
performance over the Internet after the first couple of gigs. "We are the
mighty Police and we are totally at sea," he wrote on his blog.

The last leg of the tour has contained the best shows, he said.

"As we're getting more into it and less uptight about living the legend, it
is actually becoming the stuff that got us here," he said.

So is this really the end?

"Yes," Copeland said. "It was the commitment in the beginning that made it
possible, that it was a finite commitment. That has actually made it a lot
of fun."

Same question to Summers. Is this really the end?

Yes, but ...

Maybe it's because he's seen the history of bands like the Eagles, who are
now a fully functioning recording and touring unit again after once saying
hell would freeze over before they would reunite.

"I'm fully prepared to say that was it, we're fine and we're done," Summers
said. "On the other hand, I'm fully prepared if someone comes back in a
couple of years and says we ought to give it a go. You have to consider it.

"A lot of bands, like the Eagles and probably numerous other ones, everyone
sort of matures and they realize that it's fantastic business and the
impetuosity that comes with being very young and walking away from something
that is really successful, you kind of get over that."

He said he doesn't expect it to happen, but "that's the model that's out
there for me."

Police guitarist: 'We're the same three (jerks) we always were'

Mitch Darby

David

captken3＠aol.com

tags

participants (3)