The Police pt3
Yesterday’s listening was Zenyetta Mondatta… the last of the silly names albums. Thus begins the serious alienation and darkness, and when I start to like the “filler” over the singles. Opens up with Don’t Stand So Close to Me, which is a great song, and then just starts getting really depressing. In a good way. Driven to Tears, When The World is Running Down… even the more upbeat musically songs like Canary in a Coalmine have pretty dark lyrical content. Check out these lyrics:
The President looks in the mirror and speaks
His shirts are clean but his country reeks
Unpaid bills
In Afghanistan hills
Written in 2005? No, from “Bombs Away”, 1980. Some things never change.
Anyway… a few grips when listening straight through. De Do Do Do, De Da Da Da was a big hit, and it’s a fun song… but it sounds like it’s beamed in from another planet compared to the rest of the album, and it’s sequencing just throws off the whole vibe. Behind My Camel is a really crap instrumental and never should have seen the light of day - the only reason I can see for it being there is a transition from “De Do..” back into the general bleakness of the rest of the album, but that’s not quite what happens - we go into “Man in a Suitcase”, which is another throwaway song that probably shouldn’t have been in there. Finally, we get Shadows in the Rain, which is good but Sting did a much better version of solo a few years on… and the Other Way of Stopping, which is a pretty kick ass instrumental. I would have dropped that right after De Do and ended with Shadows, but that’s just me.