POLICE BLOTTERS

POLICE BLOTTERS

J. Kordosh

Do rock interviews ever turn deadly dull? On a red light with no hesitation, pal. Do musicians say things they might later regret? Sure, but only when they’ve gone broke. Do writers love to take quotes out of context and twist them to their own incurable purpose? Well, if you’re reading for your favorite charity, you’ve hit the bullseye!

Having talked with the Police at length— they were five, six feet from me—I “just happen to have” some out-takes that might prove more enlightening than an actual interview. Not to mention littleknown (hey, everything I write is littleknown) and biased observations. In other words, you’re one /udcy person! Or, maybe not!

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MY AIM CLEANS MY TEETH,

MY SMOKE IS TRUE

(This bit of mundane dialogue actually took place, proving that gabbing with a rock star is—like crossing the street—a potential death-trap!}

Me: Where were you from in America?

Stewart Copeland: Virginia, but I only lived there for about six months, [pull out a smoke.) Can I have one of those, please? Me. Sure.

Stewart Copeland: Are they menthol?

Me. Yeah.

Stewart Copeland: “Menthol True.” Weird.

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MY LIFE IN THE BUSH OF GHOSTS IN THE MACHINE METAL MUSIC?

(A self-explanatory soliloquy of consequence.)

Andy Summers.All of our (album) titles are there to confuse the issue, to point out the absurdity of titles. People can sort of write their own titles.

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FUTURE INTERVIEWS TO FEATURE FINISHED SENTENCES!

(My inherent jingoism coming to the fore, I managed to cleverly lure Copeland into the following America versus Britain "discussion. "Nothing is revealed.)

Me: I noticed that you were kind of down on America. A bit.

Stewart Copeland: I’m not down on America—

Me: Well, American music—

Stewart Copeland: American music—, yeah—

Me-. You said things have to go from American to England and back to America—

Stewart Copeland: That’s true—

Me.In order to be—

Stewart Copeland: That’s true; that’s true. Me: You think that’s true?

Stewart Copeland: Yeah. Right back to— Me: America has produced some fairly— say from Elvis to Bob Dylan—some fairly—

Stewart Copeland: That’s two. Considering the population of America compared to the population of England, you were saying Bob Dylan and...who was the other one?

Me.Little Richard.

Stewart Copeland: Elvis—

Me-. Fats Domino—

Stewart Copeland: OK, before Elvis it doesn’t count because it’s all American.

NO SWEAT, ANDY, I GET PAID TO REMEMBER

(Just to show that musicians stick to the point, here's what Andy eventually said to “I get the impression that you guys are pretty much down-to-earth. ”)

Andy Summers: ...It didn’t happen overnight, it took a few months before we started to get a glimmer of where we were gonna go with it. It really came out while we were in the studio...but what was the point now? What’s this about??

Me. We were talking about—

Andy Summers: Oh, yeah! Right Saying groups were more down-to-earth and that. ☆ ☆ ☆

HANDS ACROSS THE WATER

(The sum total of conversation between

"It's not like we're all clever business heads or anything... -Stewart Copeland"

Sting and the author.)

Me: Hello.

Sting: Hello.

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AND NOW A WORD FROM THE BAY CITY ROLLERS

(Back to jingoism, cats. And scoobie doobie do...)

Me: I mean America’s a crazy country. Stewart Copeland: Well, in England you would never in a million years hear an artist come on the radio and say: “Hi, this is Lenny Kaye of the Patti Smith Group. Whenever I’m in Boston I listen to WQXY.” I mean, that’s like a doctor advertising. You just wouldn’t hear that— it’s like an artist doesn’t do that sort of thing.

TV

BUT IF WE COULD ONLY ASK JOHN LENNON...

(A snip that practically begs a collective “HUH??”)

Me: Are you able to have privacy when you get back to England?

Andy Summers: Well, it’s very difficult, actually. I’m having to move and I had to change my phone number, and Sting’s had to move. They know where we live and they come around—I can’t leave my house anymore.

Me: Is it worth it?

Andy Summers.Oh, I think so. Yeah.

"fa 'ir

OK, BUT WILL YOU SUPPORT HER IN THE STYLE SHFS ACCUSTOMED TO?

(A true autograph to the author’s eightyear-old daughter, who is only beginning to distinguish “blonde adults. ”)

Hi Tracy. Will you marry me? (signed) Stewart C., the Police.

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PRE-SCHOOLERS TO REJECT NAPS IN FAVOR OF MANAGEMENT BUCKS!

(Here Stewart smooth-talks his band’s success, perhaps anticipating a logical CIA/International Hanky-Panky rationale. Methinks the drummer protests too much...)

Me: It appears that you had a pretty good idea—or plan—of how you were going to go about things, just by the nature of the way you do business.

Stewart Copeland: It’s not like we’re all clever business heads or anything like that. Me: You certainly look that way, in retrospect.

Stewart Copeland: It appears that way, but it really isn’t true. Basically, they’re principles a four-year-old could have worked out. It’s not like we’re real breadheads and worked out a way of, like, capturing the market and making millions out of it. We don’t spend all of our time work-

ing out business strategies. They re very i simple. In fact, once we got a manager to \ put them into operation, we didn’t really \ think about business all that much.

☆ ☆ ☆ : MORE PROOF THE WORLD IS INHERENTLY BAD!

(While the band tuned up, I talked with the buttons-and-tee-shirt peddler raking it in that particular night. As we gorged on backstage free food, he told me he used to be a promoter.)

Me: I wonder what they do with all this food.

Peddler: I did the Beatles when they played Kansas City. Do you know what they wanted backstage?

Me: No.

Peddler: Their contracts called for four Pepsi’s and a bag of chips. The Beatles.

Me: Wow.

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COULD YOU ELABORATE?

Me: Have you ever listened to Randy Newman?

Stewart Copeland: No.