by Greg Prato
JONATHAN ELIAS: They always used to laugh about telling me, "You're the only one that's on MTV as much as we are!"
JOE ELLIOTT: I loved 'em. I thought Duran Duran were great. You see, back in the '80s, people would throw things out like, "How do you get on with Iron Maiden? How do you get on with Twisted Sister...or Quiet Riot?" Because they were seen as "rivals." One of us had to be top of the pile. There was no rivalry between us and Duran Duran, because we were completely different musical types. So, consequently, when we were in Japan in '83, me and Phil went down there to do promo, and so did John Taylor and Roger Taylor. We were literally following each other all day through ten, twelve, fifteen TV channels, and we met up at Lexington Queen that night and got completely smashed! We would just talk about the bands that we loved when we grew up. Our careers were like a "Y." We were a stick for a while, and then we went left, and they went right. We all grew up listening to Roxy Music, Bowie, and bands like that. But Phil liked Slade and Sweet a bit more than Duran Duran would, and that's literally where the difference was. Our Bowie was Aladdin Sane, and their Bowie was Low and Lodger. They were just a bit more "keyboard," a bit more arty than we were. We were bricklayers in comparison to them. They were still a bunch of kids from Birmingham, their local accents not that different to Ozzy's. They always pretended they weren't, just like Roxy Music pretend they're not from Newcastle, or at least Bryan Ferry does. I loved Duran Duran. I thought things like "Rio" was a great song and brilliant video. We were jealous as hell of them. We didn't get to go to these exotic places with all these chicks and shoot videos on a yacht. We were up on gas towers in the middle of Dublin, freezing our bollocks off!
RIK EMMETT: In some ways — an obvious example would be Duran Duran — they're pretty boys, they have certain kinds of hairstyles, and they're doing wild, exotic things. So a certain segment of teenage girls, that like the music that's married to that kind of imagery, go, "Oh, this is great! I just can't get enough of this!" And the station realizes, "Wow, are our numbers ever getting great. And boy oh boy, can we ever sell lots of soda pop and pimple cream."
The Police
ALAN HUNTER: I think the Police brought a lot of class to the place. They seemed to be "the real thing." I loved their stripped-down, three-man sound, that stuff from Zenyatta Mondatta and somewhat Ghost in the Machine, although it started to become more produced at that point. It was kind of like Rush, three guys make a lot of noise. A good, full sound. I thought it was amazing how you only had three instruments playing and Sting's voice, in those early days. To me, the "Spirits in the Material World" video played at 2:00 in the morning really provided the kind of atmosphere that almost made MTV hallucinogenic in that first year. Coming in from a night on the town, to hear that song, and those chords in the beginning, kind of gave me chills. I still remember that video, along with things like "Once in a Lifetime," or even, for God's sakes, the cheesy "Abracadabra" from Steve Miller, or "Brass in Pocket" from the Pretenders. Lately, I've been hearing a lot more of those songs, and it gives me goosebumps.
CY CURNIN: My favorite videos were all the Police videos. They had a great sense of humor back then and did not make themselves out to be bad actors too often. They also had Godley and Creme behind-the-scenes as directors. That made a huge difference.
PHIL COLLEN: The Police are my favorite band. Loved what they were doing. You just wanted to see how they would play this stuff, the stuff that Stewart Copeland was playing on drums. It's your favorite band, and you could see where they go with it. "Every Breath" was great, the black and white and the upright bass. Just the imagery, perfect imagery. When you write a song, you're supposed to create an image as much as you can. Like a story or a book or a movie — like you're directing a movie. If you direct a video and it's along those lines, I certainly think with the Police videos, they were very cool. They weren't too far off from the mark of what the song was about. Obviously, Sting is a true artist, and he was pretty much aware of what was going on, and the band were. Like I said, we were a bit green, especially on the Pyromania thing. The Hysteria thing was different because we'd learned a lot by then. But we were just thrown into it. And I think you look at the Police stuff, and their approach is a bit more "grown up." They actually knew what they were doing.
DEREK POWER: I was a partner in the management firm, called Copeland Copeland Copeland and Power. I met Sting when I cast him in the movie Brimstone and Treacle, and as a consequence of that — and during a very long negotiation with Miles Copeland, Stewart's eldest brother — I ended up forming a very tight relationship with him, and he asked me if I would go into business with him. My job with the Police was, first of all, there was a big demand for concert films at the time. So I negotiated the deal we made with Showtime, to show the Synchronicity concert, to both produce and show the Synchronicity concert. But before that, I had introduced Godley and Creme to the band, and they had done a number of very successful Duran Duran videos. It seemed like they were a much slicker version of what the Police might be able to do. And, of course, they made the absolutely iconic videos that we remember so well, including "Every Breath You Take" and "Wrapped Around Your Finger."
STEWART COPELAND: We played the song live [the clip for "Roxanne"], and they cut the live performance to the track. Then there's "the red video," which I have seen the shots, and I think that was for the "Roxanne" shoot, but I have no recollection of the video shoot at all. All of our songs begin with the word "don't" or have the word "stand" in them — "Can't Stand Losing You," "Don't Stand So Close to Me." [For the "Don't Stand So Close to Me" video] Sting pulled his shirt off — unrehearsed. I'm sure he had it planned in his mind. But as I said, he would have been mortified to have discussed such a brazen tactic, and he would have pretended that it was spontaneous. Although he's very calculated about that sort of thing. I mean, to his credit, he's a professional. When we would tease him about this sort of thing, he would say, "Look guys, we're professionals. I'm doing my job...how about you guys start thinking about it, too?" We'd catch him teasing his hair or something like that. He was right. It was his job, and it was our job, too.
GEDDY LEE: They were always good-looking videos. Because their songs were always very high quality, they were always nice to look at.
STAN RIDGWAY: Fake reggae. I don't know them. I'm not really close to any of that. Stewart had seen Wall of Voodoo play in London, and his brother, Miles, was the head of our little record company then, IRS Records. When Stewart got called to do this Francis Ford Coppola film, Rumble Fish, he started to do the soundtrack, and I guess at some point, Coppola wanted a song, so Stewart thought of me and called me up. I appreciate that. Wrote the song ["Don't Box Me In"], went in there, performed it, put it down, [and] Stewart put a bridge to it, so we did write it together.
STEWART COPELAND: ["Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic"] we shot in Montserrat, and it's strange how that was regarded as "The Who destroying equipment of our time," because we were trashing that Trident desk. And that desk, by the way, ended up at Studio One in A&M, here in Los Angeles, and I've been to five or six different studios around the world that claim that the Neve sitting in their room is the one that we trashed. And I don't know which one is which. One Neve is the same as the other, if you ask me. And we weren't aware of trashing it at all. We were in the habit — because we were all very fit — of climbing over it, because it was very long. And if you were over there and you wanted to get over here to hit a fader or do something, we'd just climb over it. Certainly, we were not cognizant of any abuse of the console. But we were just dancing around. We hired a truck, to go and perform some of it — to mime some of it — with the natives of Montserrat, who were, I remember, really unimpressed. Absolutely unimpressed. And instead of us dancing around with the natives, and, "They're all dancing and laughing and singing!"...they were pissed off, because we didn't give them enough beer or something. They generally looked pretty grumpy, so there's probably not much of them in the shot.
COLIN HAY: I ca
n't really remember [the Police's] videos...there was one where they were kind of hitting each other in the control room of a studio. [Laughs] They were an awesome band. Everything about them was awesome, really. Amazing bass player, amazing drummer, amazing guitar player — they were almost like the perfect band. Because of its minimalism, too. Great power in three.
FRANK STALLONE: I thought "Every Breath You Take" was a great video. But some of their other ones aren't that great — "Message in a Bottle," "Don't Stand So Close to Me." They're just OK. They're generic.
JON ANDERSON: ["Every Breath You Take"] was brilliant, sort of like the Beatles' cover of the second album, very black and white and grainy.
STEWART COPELAND: ["Every Breath You Take"] was extremely high concept — Kevin and Lol again. It was based on another video that they had seen, and I think they've been public about that. They've credited that. Probably some French black-and-white director. It was very steady, very set up. Every frame of it was a concept, which they designed on paper. And we were very much "set dressing." Even Sting, although he was performing his song, the way they positioned the three of us and the way they shot it, each frame was like a work of art. Each frame was like a black-and-white photograph. ["Wrapped Around Your Finger"] was shot in A&M, on the soundstage they had there. They deny it, but I constantly hassle both Kevin and Lol about their stealing my idea that I actually did with Klark Kent — the other way around, where I had the music run slowly, so that I mimed in slow motion, and then when they synched it up to the music, I had this herky-jerky, kinda "fast-mo" movement, that was still in time with the music, only it was sort of jerky and strange body movements. Well, they did it the other way around, where they played the music fast, and we mimed to it fast, and then they slow it down, so we were all in synch with the music, but in slow-mo. And the set was very simple. It was just a row of candles. And then when we got everything, Sting got to have fun destroying the whole thing. ["Synchronicity II"] was a lot of fun. They filled up this soundstage with garbage, with big fans, so it would all be flying through the air. And the mountain of drums and the mountain of guitars. I'm not sure what Sting's mountain was made off...well, Sting. And they designed these cool outfits for us to wear, which Sting carried on and wore for the next three tours.
DEREK POWER: Clearly, MTV was probably the significant reason that Synchronicity became as huge as it did. Because when they presented the tour — "MTV Presents the Police," that's how it was — I'm not sure whether they ever had presented any other artists in the same way they presented the Police tour. It was such a beautiful integration of a video-friendly act, such as the Police, and the timing of the release of its most successful album. John Sykes and Bob Pittman could see the value. It was a perfect fusion of a moment, where they really wanted as much profile as they could get, and one of the ways they were able to do it was obviously by running the videos, which in turn were requested by the audience.
MIKE SCORE: Touring with the Police was the "heavenly spot." The Police were the biggest band in the world, and we were opening up for them. I think we ended up doing 30 or more shows with them. All huge shows, all brilliant. Watching Sting and the Police was like watching a master magician at work. Certain things that he did, which kept the crowd on edge and kept them wanting more. Just things he said and his delivery and their timing. It was like going to school every day. The thing is, with the Police, it took them quite a while to become as big as they did, so they obviously learned a lot on the way. And part of our problem was we weren't even going for a year when we were suddenly catapulted into stardom. We didn't really have time to learn. When you're suddenly out with someone like the Police, everything they do is from experience. When you start watching that, you start to realize why they're the biggest band in the world. And not just great songs, but the way they deliver them, the way they play, and the way they interact. And even though there was all that "stuff" between Sting and Stewart Copeland, that's the kind of tension that makes bands. It puts a certain thing in the air, and people want to see that. It's like going to a race, where you want to see the car crash, but you don't want to see anyone get hurt. That same kind of tension. To watch that and see the way the whole show was put together was a huge learning experience. Of course for us, you look back and you go, "Jesus, 15 months ago I was in Liverpool, and I was going to grotty clubs every night, just because we were bored. Now, we're standing on stage with the masters of the universe."
DAVE WAKELING: We did tour with the Police, for a long time. Stewart Copeland was the epitome of the "video generation," wasn't he? He used to run around with a camera in front of his face the whole time. His idea was just catching people in unguarded moments, which, of course, is exactly what you don't want. Otherwise, if you'd have known he was going to be pratting around with a camera, you would have perhaps been guarded. He would keep jumping in where he wasn't wanted with the camera. Eventually, I had to get rid of him. I said, "Y'know, you're pretending you're doing a documentary, but really, you're just hiding behind that camera, so you don't have to actually be involved in any of this, do you?" He was like the student with his arms folded in the corner of a party, thinking that he's observing everything, but in fact, the whole party is going, "Why is that prat standing in the corner with his arms folded?" [Laughs]
DEREK POWER: The Police were on top of the world [circa Synchronicity]. They were the biggest band in the world, and deservedly so. Creatively, I've always loved Michael Jackson for what he was, but he was a pop artist. I've always felt that the Police were something more. And I think you will find that there's a statistic that says that "Every Breath You Take" is the most played song of the 1980s. Michael Jackson sold more records, but I don't think he was creatively more interesting, neither lyrically and melodically. But he was Michael Jackson.
STEWART COPELAND: Really? [Stewart's reaction to being told that Synchronicity knocked Thriller out of the #1 spot on the Billboard charts] I wasn't aware that we even came close to that. Well OK...I'm honored, because Thriller was the big one. I guess "Every Breath You Take" was pretty big, too, but I never thought it was in competition with Thriller.
DEREK POWER: Here's the truth of it [about how the members of the Police got along]. There's a combination of realities here. There was a degree of competition, evidently, between Sting and Stewart. But there was also a lot of playful affection. I refer you to my film that I made with Stewart, Everyone Stares: The Police Inside Out. I think that answers that question largely. I won't say that there weren't moments where there were indeed real resentment and hostility, but it wasn't all that. My own experience was that there were moments where they weren't getting along, and there were moments where they were getting along fine and having a good time.
STEWART COPELAND: We were just screwing around [regarding an infamous clip where Stewart and Sting get confrontational during an MTV interview]. We had just played a show. I think it was in Toronto, one of those big "picnics" that they had up there. And it was our first show after recording an album, so we got the obligatory "Martha Quinn/Police interview." The conversation was stalling, so I forget who provoked who, but we had a nice bit of jolly jinx, with me chasing Sting off camera. I think somebody threw some water, somebody else threw a sandwich or something. I don't know. Anyhow, we went charging off, forgetting we were still plugged into our mics. We heard later, "The Police broke into a fist-fight and almost killed each other! Oh my God!" We were just screwing around. In fact, any time we were ever observed to be fighting, we were just screwing around. The time I broke Sting's rib, we were screwing around. We certainly did fight and have genuine disagreements and shouting matches, but those were never on camera and never involved anything physical.
MICHAEL SADLER: Fun and zany when it had to be, and cool when it had to be. Sting is one of the great artists of our time. Whether you like him or not, whether you like his pretension or not, he's an extremely gifted, creative man. And it's always been handled very professionally since day one. I know most o
f it was plotted out. You can just tell. Highly entertaining. Again, using the genre for what it was.
STEWART COPELAND: There was one [solo Sting video] that I thought was really cool — "She's Too Good for Me." I don't think it was one of his big hits, but it was a funny video, where he's all drunk and disorderly. I think he may have had Trudie — who I love — as the high-class woman in it. And he's just all fucked up, trashed, and getting thrown out of bars and stuff like that. I always enjoy Sting getting thrown out of a bar! [Sting's more popular '80s-era videos] is probably my "post-MTV days." I don't think I've probably ever saw them. I do remember that one, that I probably caught by accident, and thought that was a cool video. Because you know what? It accurately showed the Sting that I know, which is actually a very kind of loosey guy. He's always been very good at presenting an image of himself that is so not him. He is actually very humble, extremely casual, and not at all the figure that most people seem to think he is. I think that's why I enjoyed that video. That's more like the real Sting than the guy you see looking all serious, with his lute. He's really good at that lute, by the way.
