Sting's Melbourne, Australia interview October 23, 1996

Radio 3MMM Melbourne

IAN RODGERSON: Hello all around Australia. I'm Ian Rodgerson. Let me fill you in on our special guest tonight. For more than two decades he has dominated the world charts. A man variously hailed as a genius, the lord of the manor, and the king of the rainforest. He is Sting and he joins us in the Rockstat studios tonight. Welcome, Sting.

STING: It's nice to be here.

IAN: And also welcome back to Australia. I should start by saying you are obviously out here for the Mercury Falling tour and also you have your sixth album, Mercury Falling. What's the state of Sting at the moment?

STING: The state of Sting? Hmm... well, I'm in Melbourne, I'm happy and I'm rich and healthy (laughing). What more can I say?

IAN: It's a funny thing, I mean if you are happy and you are obviously this rich, it must be one of those things where you think "why am I working?"

STING: I love to work, I mean I think work defines you, no matter what you're doing, work defines you! People need to work.

IAN: Yeah, I mean is it something you've actually tried to get away from at any time in your life?

STING: To work? No. I'm probably a workaholic. I love it! I mean I've got a job I would do for nothing to be honest with you, which I'm lucky about...

IAN: ...And a job you do very well. And you've got a great acoterie of musicians out here in Australia with you at the moment as well. I mean the difference between this Sting now and the Sting that used to be in The Police when you had a tight defined sort of band beforehand, and now you've got equally good musicians, probably more session orientated, jazz orientated. Um... is this an obvious change for you?

STING: I don't think there is that much difference. I think uh um Andy Summers ah I've forgotten their names!...Andy Summers and Stewart Copeland (laughing) were brilliant musicians and these guys, they don't define themselves as session musicians either. That's a kind of derogatory term.

IAN: Oh I'm sorry if I was being derogatory to them.

STING: But you know I've always been with musicians who are very open about the styles they play and how they play.

IAN: Well there are so many different styles you're playing at the moment too, I mean particularly evident on the album too. You seem to be going in a more soul orientated area?

STING: Well you know whenever I adopt another stye of music there's always a sort of irony in that you know.

IAN: How so?

STING: Well you know if I do a country song, its Sting doing a country song, I mean I'm from England.

IAN: Oh, right, I get ya!

STING: So it comes out as something else, which is funny (both laugh).

IAN: Well we will go in to a track right now and then we'll come back to take calls. This is If You Love Somebody Set Them Free. This was on The Dream of the Blue Turtles?

STING: That's right.

IAN: And that album was really a big step for you wasn't it?

STING: Well I'd just left The Police and apparently we'd been the biggest band in the world and everybody said "well you shouldn't do that because they're so successful." My instinct was saying "look you should try this" and 12 years later I think I'm justified in having done it!

(If You Love Somebody Set Them Free played)

IAN: Time to take a couple of calls. On the line we have Julieanne.

STING: Hi Julieanne.

JULIEANNE: Hi Sting, how you going? Can you tell me do you find working as a solo artist more satisfying and rewarding as opposed to working in a band situation?

STING: Well you know I'm in a band now? (snickering)

JULIEANNE: Are you?

STING: You know I have a band. I have five other musicians, in The Police I had two. There is no difference. It's the same thing. I don't argue as much 'cause I'm the boss. (laugh)

JULIEANNE: Yes you're the big boss aren't you?

STING: So what I say goes but umm apart from that its the same.

IAN: Are you a strict boss, Sting?

STING: Well...yes, I'm failry strict, but you know I dont stomp on peoples' creativity. You know if you have great musicians you have to use them, allow them to paint their own colors and be creative. So you know I'm just harnessing that. I'm also the father confessor to the five guys on the road and their problems.

IAN: well thanks Julie...now we have Bernard.

BERNARD: Hi Sting. The question I want to ask is: what style of music do you prefer playing most and why?

STING: What do I enjoy playing the most? Well I like all different styles of music. I look at music as being a very broad church, I'm not just interested in one kind like the blues or rock and roll or anything else. I like the whole thing. I even like classical music. I play a lot of classical music, badly, but I enjoy it, because you know for me thats my philosophy about music, it's one common language. (bass heard in background)

IAN: Is that you playing the guitar there?

STING: No. (laugh)

IAN: Well lets hear you playing accoustic ala MTV Unplugged. This is Message in a Bottle. Was the MTV Unplugged experience a good one?

STING: Ah, well it was so long ago...I think it was, I mean yes I'm sure it was!

(Message in a Bottle and Roxanne from Synch tour, Boston played)

IAN: Ah, that was The Police recorded live in Boston with Roxanne. Does that take you back Sting?

STING: Certainly does!

IAN: I mean the difference between those days and these days, is there a definate ah are you more assured?

STING: Well I think I'm better at my job, I hope I am. I think I am a better singer now, better bass player, better band leader, better person actually...yeah I'm sure its different.

IAN: Okay, well, a few more callers...we've got Daniel.

DANIEL: My question is: apart from guitar and bass, what other instruments do you play?

STING: Well like most songwriters I play all of my instruments very badly, but I can play just about anything, I can knock a tune out of anything. I think one of the reasons you become a songwriter in a band is because you can't play very well (laughs) and so you end up with a different skill, like if you're a guitar player you spend all your time practicing guitar licks, but I didn't... I thought I'd write songs. I play piano, tuba, I play anything!

IAN: Wow. Okay, right now we have Christine.

CHRISTINE: You started as a jazz player. Do you still play straight jazz anymore?

STING: Well I played in jazz groups, but I dont think I was ever classified as a jazz musician. I mean I learned how to play jazz. What I do now is I arrange music and jazz is essentially improvised, so its a totally different thing. It was a good education for me, but I play a little jazz with Kenny Kirkland, the keyboard player in the band, just for fun...but I wouldn't make any money out of it.

IAN: Sting, you have a Mexican bass here and everyone's trying to talk you into playing something on it. Do you feel the mood, do you want to play?

STING: No.

IAN: No? Nothing nothing at all?

STING: No, it's my day off today. (laughs) Can't be done!

IAN: Well, we'll take a call from Richard.

RICHARD: How are you?

STING: (laughing) I'm very good.

RICHARD: Hahaha, cool!

STING: (laughing)

RICHARD: I want to know what is your reason for writing Every Breath You Take? What was the background for that?

STING: Oh, I don't know. Do I have to have a reason for that? Well I suppose it's a pretty dark song. It was written in a pretty dark period in my life: my life seemed to be crumbling. The band I was in was breaking up, my first marriage was breaking up, I was breaking up, things were very bleak and I wrote this very obsessive, paranoid song called Every Breath You Take, which has a sort of seductive charm to it as well and I suppose umm thats why its been a successful song. I think because its so ambiguous; it's both dark and light.

IAN: Right now we are going to play Every Breath You Take from Sting, another unplugged recording. I also heard it was a song about stalking as well, or had been taken that way?

STING: Oh that's rubbish! (laughing)

IAN: Rubbish? Oh, okay, I'll write that down then: rubbish!

(Every Breath You Take and We'll be Together played)

IAN: Okay, that's Sting and we'll take a couple more calls. We have Sean.

SEAN: Hi Sting, my question is: in the past you've worked with classical projects, such as Stravinsky's A Soldier's Tale and more recently with Luciano Pavarotti. Can we expect to see more classical Sting in the future?

STING: I dont know, I mean I play classical music for my own amusement and I've been doing it for years, but uh I dont think its really worth giving it to the public. (laughs) It sounds like something I'm playing with my gloves on most of the time...I do it for fun!

IAN: Right now we have Danielle.

DANIELLE: Has your interest in the environment influenced your music in anyway?

STING: Umm...I don't think so. I tend to separate my advocacy of causes from my music. I would never write about the environment, its too complicated. I mean we all need an environment to live in, I'm glad we have air to breathe and water to drink, otherwise there wouldn't be music. But I don't think it's influenced my music.

IAN: Next we have Joshua.

JOSHUA: Is it true you have a nickname for your bass?

STING: (laughs) I have a nickname for everything. Brian is the nickname for my bass.

JOSHUA: Brian?? (amazed)

STING: When you're called Sting, everything has a funny nickname you know!

IAN: I can imagine! Right now we are going to hear the new single from Mercury Falling. You are going to perform finally for us acoustic in the studio I'm so Happy I Can't Stop Crying. The story behind this song, Sting?

STING: Oh well, it's a song about divorce um and because of that it cried out to be a country song, which is kind of ironic. But it's a song about divorce, but has a happy ending or at least a light at the end of the tunnel...it's not all misery so I think that justifies itself!

(plays acoustic version of I'm so Happy I Can't Stop Crying)

IAN: (clapping) Oh what a version!!! The single I'm so Happy I Can't Stop Crying live and exclusive to Rockstat!

STING: It was faultless, wasn't it?

IAN: Do you enjoy just playing music music wherever you may be, Sting?

STING: Well, you know I play music like I breath. I would busk on the street if I had to...in fact I have.

IAN: You'd just have a lot of hats to put out in front of you I guess.

STING: I've got one very large hat!

IAN: Okay, another caller: Jeff.

JEFF: Just wondering if any of your kids play instruments?

STING: Well you know I'm not very pushy, but they see me practising every day and so thats what they do, they think thats what normal people do all day: practice music. So they all play piano. But I'm not leaning on them to become great musicians or enter show business, I just think that playing an instrument is good for you as a kid.

IAN: Now we have Amber.

AMBER: Hello. Do you still see social causes as being important to you as a musician? If so, what causes are dear to your heart?

STING: I dont think social causes are important to me at all as a musician, but they are important to me as a person, as a citizen of the world. I could be musical without any of it. Music is a very abstract thing you know, I'm not really interested in.......(childs voice heard in background) Who's that in the background?

AMBER: Thats my son.

STING: Ah, sweet. (laughs)

IAN: And that bass you have in the studio isn't actually a Mexican bass, is it?

STING: No, its from Australia.

IAN: What brand is it?

STING: Hang on...its called a Maton.

IAN: Oh you don't want to play just a little taste....

STING: No! Its my day off I keep telling you.

IAN: Okay, I've been trying to get you to, but you keep telling me...

STING: Musicians union rules! (laughing)

IAN: I know it's bloody tough isn't it? (laughs) Actually we are going to hear another song off the album...a live version in the studio of You Still Touch Me.

STING: Alright, this is from the new album Mercury Falling. It's called You Still Touch Me and it goes like this...

(You Still Touch Me played)

IAN: Sting, it's been a real pleasure having you here this evening. You were mentioning before that you're going back to England after this. What's your next few moves?

STING: Then I go to Ireland. I'm playing in Dublin for a week and then Scotland and I wind up the tour about the beginning of March.

IAN: Then I guess you're taking a lot of time off and then maybe coming back with another album in about a year or so?

STING: I'm going to bed!!!

IAN: Thank you, Sting!

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