Police - Every Breath You Take: The Classics

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Free Music Notes for Every Breath You Take: The Classics

Free Music Review: Every breath you take, I'll be watching you
Hit: 5 Stars

"Roxanne, you don't have to put on the red light/those days are over/you don't have to sell your body to the night" goes a verse in the first song, which is clear what the song is about. Its B-side, the reggae-influenced "Can't Stand Losing You", is a tragic song about a man on the outs with his girl with angsty lyrics as "I see you sent my letters back/and my LP records and they're all scratched." There's also a sense of goofy desperation in the last verse: "I guess this is our last goodbye/and you don't care so I won't cry/and you'll be sorry when I'm dead/and all this guilt will be on your head."

The post-punk "Message In A Bottle" is my second favourite Police song because of its universal message of alienation. In this wide world, we're all one of those "hundred billion castaways looking for a home." However, I'm darned if I can tell the difference between this and the New Classic Rock Mix at the end of the CD.

I'm not sure what to make of the playful reggae bounce of "Walking On The Moon". "Don't Stand So Close To Me" has shades of Lolita, of a schoolteacher with a pupil who has an unhealthy obsession towards him. The original has a more upbeat reggae-ish beat compared to the sombre elegiac 86 remix, As it turned out, I first heard the 86 version, THEN the original, so I prefer the remix. "De Do Do Do, De Da Da Da" ties in the lack of the apt phrase with the opiate of control spewed out by politicans and the clergy.

"Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic" is a catchy tune about that painful shyness a man feels towards a woman he admires, the shyness that evokes the loneliness in "Message." "But my silent fears have gripped me/long before I reach the phone/long before my tongue has trippedMust I always be alone?"

I've gained a better appreciation for "Invisible Sun" and "Spirits In The Material World" recently. The hopelessness of government and society and the former is underscored by "And they're only gonna change this place/by killing everybody in the human race/And they would kill me for a cigarette/but I'm don't even wanna die just yet." As for the latter, The line of government leaders subjugating the meek and equating it with the rhetoric of failure seems timely. What's more timeless is the answer to it all being something we can't buy.

The timelessness of "Every Breath You Take" and that opening bass line, those relaxing and uplifting keyboards in the midsection makes this one of my favourite songs of all time. It got the Grammy for Record of the Year in 1983, and it spent 8 weeks at Billboard's top spot. Its reputation has been unfortunately tarnished with Puff Daddy's plagiarism of it in 1997.

"King Of Pain" demonstrates the interconnectedness of politico-social consciousness. Be it the "skeleton choking on a crust of bread", "a blue whale beached on a springtide's ebb," that's his soul up there.

"Wrapped Around Your Finger" demonstrates the classic reversal between master and servant. Sting's classics knowledge is apparent, referring to Scylla and Charybdis from the Odyssey.

What I liked about the Police was the songs of reflective inner solitude and social consciousness. Their induction into the Hall of Fame and the reissues of this compilation is perfect timing. And that's all I have to say to you. De Do Do Do....

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