WEST HOLLYWOOD, California – When he was once asked, “Can you ever conceive of a circumstance in which the Police would do a reunion tour?,” Sting replied, “I think that’d be a good cause to have me certified insane.”
So …
“Yes, I am certifiably insane,” Sting joked Monday (February 12) at the Whiskey a Go Go after the above sound bite was played to begin a packed press conference announcing a Police reunion tour. “If anyone comes at me with white coats, just let them through.”
More than 20 years after the Police last toured – behind 1983’s massively successful Synchronicity – the rock trio are hitting the road once again, on a world tour that will launch in May and run at least through the rest of 2007.
And judging by Monday’s event, which featured the band performing four pitch-perfect favorites and chatting loosely and often hilariously (after the first song, Sting said, “I’d like to introduce the band: Andy [Summers], this is Stewart [Copeland]”), fans are in for something special.
“If you asked me the day before I made this decision, I would have said, ‘You’re out of your mind, my head is somewhere else,’ ” Sting said of how the reunion came about. “I woke up one morning about three months ago, and this light bulb went off in my head. I went, ‘I’m gonna call Andy and Stewart and say, “We should do a tour.” ‘ I thought, ‘Well, it’ll surprise them, it’ll surprise the world and it’s surprising me too.’ ”
Sting said the Police are a part of his life that he ran from 25 years ago, but now he’s wiser and enjoying developing those relationships again.
“The nature of the arguments were all about the music,” he said. “And also hairstyles,” he added, laughing.
“We never hated each other,” drummer Copeland emphasized. “We always liked each other.”
On the tour, the Police will strictly be playing songs from their five studio albums (no Sting solo material), with just the trio onstage. “There’s no reason why we shouldn’t be 25 years better than we were then, and we were good then,” Sting said. “There are subtleties in the music that we’re more willing to address now.”
The Police dubbed Monday’s performance a rehearsal, and Sting made no secrets about reading the “Can’t Stand Losing You” lyrics from a prompter and telling the audience of music-industry insiders, “I have no idea how it ends or what happens in the middle.”
The set also featured “Message in a Bottle,” “Voices Inside My Head” and “Roxanne,” which the band performed at Sunday’s Grammys .
“When we were young, we had to conquer the world,” said Copeland, whose wide smile never left his face. “We were three extremely ambitious young men. Now we’re three happy fathers of many. And I’m just really enjoying playing my drums. … We don’t have an agenda.”
The Police reunion is obviously big news to fans, including some famous faces who came Monday for the press conference.
“I’ve been waiting for this moment all my life, I wouldn’t miss this for nothing,” ?uestlove of the Roots told MTV News. “They are, to me, one of the greatest bands ever. They went out on top, and that’s a very brilliant thing.”
“It’s one of those things that you definitely set the alarm for,” added Fall Out Boy singer Patrick Stump. “They were a group of essentially jazz musicians who weren’t snooty about pop music and I think that brought something amazing to pop music. Sort of like how Bad Brains invented hardcore on accident because they were too good.”
DJ AM was also spotted in the crowd, singing along to every word, as was Foo Fighters drummer Taylor Hawkins, who posed as a reporter from the fictitious Topanga Canyon Tribune in order to ask a question during the press conference.
“So you got three months before the tour starts,” Hawkins began. “Do you think there’s time for the mullets to return?”
“Finally a serious question,” guitarist Summers replied.
Preliminary Police reunion tour dates, according to the tour’s Web site:
- 5/28 – Vancouver, BC @ GM Place
- 6/6 – Seattle, WA @ Key Arena
- 6/9 – Denver, CO @ Pepsi Center
- 6/15 – Las Vegas, NV @ MGM Grand Garden
- 6/16 – Manchester, TN @ Bonnaroo Music & Arts Festival
- 6/18 – Phoenix, AZ @ U.S. Airways Center
- 6/26 – Dallas, TX @ American Airlines Center
- 6/30 – New Orleans, LA @ New Orleans Arena
- 7/2 – St. Louis, MO @ Scottrade Center
- 7/22 – Toronto, ON @ Air Canada Centre
- 7/25 – Montreal, QC @ Bell Centre
- 7/28 – Boston, MA @ Fenway Park
- 8/1 – New York, NY @ Madison Square Garden
- 8/3 – New York, NY @ Madison Square Garden
