The fanfare was pretty elaborate; not only was Sting putting out his first solo album, but it was a whole two years since the last Police album (and we didn’t know then that it would be The Last Police Album). On top of that, he was working with contemporary jazz musicians—and he was playing guitar, not bass! The fabric of the universe felt a tug.
After all that, The Dream Of The Blue Turtles turned out to be pretty likable. He did the smart thing and starts side one with the hit single, the grammatically challenging “If You Love Somebody Set Them Free”. “Love Is The Seventh Wave” isn’t too far removed from the white reggae his previous band used to shill, and the fadeout even features a gentle tweak of “Every Breath You Take”. “Russians” takes a fairly elementary stance on world policy, lashed to a lugubrious arrangement. “Children’s Crusade” is a haunting study of abuse through the centuries, though the final verse’s depiction of heroin addicts comes off as forced after the extended instrumental middle. The side ends with a strikingly different arrangement of “Shadows In The Rain”. While the original Police track was a plodding offbeat dub exercise, this new version ups the urgency about 300%. (Also, the track begins with Branford Marsalis asking about the key, but the drums start their gallop despite his protests and they take off without him. Hysterical.)
Side two is slightly less energetic. “We Work The Black Seam” wanders around a verse that’s not as hypnotic as it intends, breaking through the gloom only just before each chorus. “Consider Me Gone” sounds like a kiss-off left over from the divorce proceedings on side two of Synchronicity, and the mood is broken by the short free jazz instrumental title track that somehow got nominated for a jazz Grammy. “Moon Over Bourbon Street” brings Anne Rice to the mainstream in a piece that wouldn’t have been out of place on Police albums either. And it all comes home with the thundercrack that opens “Fortress Around Your Heart”, which could well be his best song.
For all its potential for pretension (it was around this time some of us started referring to him not as Sting but Smug) The Dream Of The Blue Turtles is an enjoyable album that shouldn’t have pissed off too many Police fans, while exposing them to some of the better players on the jazz scene. This is, after all, where most people first heard of Wynton’s brother Branford, and Darryl Jones went from being The Guy Playing Bass Who’s Not Sting to Bill Wyman’s replacement in the Rolling Stones within ten years’ time.
Sting The Dream Of The Blue Turtles (1985)—3½
you stated that it was amazing that pete townsend could sit up in a room and create something so universal. sting does the exact opposite. he's so inward looking, so pretentious, and in the end, so uninteresting.
ReplyDeleterichard
I like this review, it captured a time. At the time, I liked it a lot. In retrospect you can see Stings arc of pretentiousness. I agree with you on Fortress, a fine fine song and one of my favourites by him. Didn't know that about Daryl Jones, moving onto the Stones. Thanks wardo!
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