Outlandos D'Amour - Police (The) > Reviews > I've got a Police Record and I'm proud of it.

Author's product rating:   

Originality	Definitely a cut above the rest
Lyrics	Thought-provoking
Quality and consistency of tracks	Mixed
How does it compare to the artist's other releases	Good
Value for Money

Advantages:	Hear them before they were polished, professional smoothies .
Disadvantages:	Hear them before they were polished, professional smoothies .

Recommend to potential buyers:

yes

Full review

It's 1979, my clothes aren't lairy but it's a close run thing. I'm rushing to the record shop before it closes to buy the debut album of a new group called Police. The lead singer's a bit of alright, especially with his short blonde hair and army keks, and I think I'm falling in love again.

I buy the record. It's fate. There's a track called "Be My Girl Sally". This is too much.

I run all the way home and slap the LP on the turntable, drop the arm on MY track and settle back to wallow in self-indulgent delciousness.

It kicks off with a good beat. "Will ya be my girl, will ya be my girl, will ya be my, be my, be my girl.." repeats twice, starts to fade out. Hmmm, I sniff, not quite what I had in mind. A broad northern accent is now emerging from the speakers, reciting a sort of poem (somewhat reminiscent of Five Penny Piece, a northern folk group much beloved of my father)..."I was blue an' lonely, I couldn't sleep a wink, an' I could only get unconcious, if I 'ad too much to drink..."

Right eyebrow extends and a "Whaaat?" look creeps over my face. He's part way through his monologue.."...in a glossy magazine, something quite unusual, the like I've never seen.." Now I'm starting to panic a bit. There's nothing remotely sexy about this, there's not even any music. ".... and when I'm feeling naughty, I blow her up with air".

Dear God. It's about a rubber doll. Sting, how could you??

The rest of the album got played as soon as I could snatch the arm off the record.

"Next to you" and "So lonely" are pretty much in the same vein. The strange sort of jarring punk with a reggae beat. Sting's voice sounds fragile, but he still screams his way through most of the latter track. And very effective it is to. Pogoing territory.

"Hole in my life" is slowed down a bit and they've made more of an attempt to put an actual melody together for this. Slightly less punk and more in favour of their distinctive reggae sound.

"Roxanne" The definitive Police track. The opening elongated syllable is guaranteed to get people old enough to start scrabbling around for the Karaoke mike. Famously about a prostitute and her john who wishes for her to give up her life on the street. Builds up to a rocking crescendo that seems to be the signature of this particular album.

"Peanuts" Load of nuts, more like. This bugged the hell out of me and still can do. More of a manic-cum-poppy punk than anything else, and sadly this isn't their forte.

"Can't stand losing you". Great track that was showing the way that their second album would begin to follow. Good lyrics, good melody but it doesn't lose a jot of it's raw edge into the bargain. Loved the line "I see you sent my letters back, and my LP records and they're all scratched". Jeez. How many times did that happen to me. These guys were singing my life...

"Truth hits everybody". More poppy punk. I was beginning to understand by this track that so long as it had the reggae sound to it, it would be alright. This one doesn't.

"Born in the 50s". Hate this. Hate this with a passion. For some reason best known to them, they slid in this inconsequential track, which even though it has strong lyrics, really ticks me off in the tune department. The chorus in particular. Really boring and naff, and sticks out from the rest of the tracks even more so because of it. Nudge that needle onwards.

"Be my girl Sally". Been there, done it, still gutted.

"Masoko Tango" A nice little instrumental piece to wrap off this rather odd sounding conglomeration.

As a start into the music world, this album did just enough to lift Police from out of the dregs of pop pap, and put them in a niche all by themselves.

Very naive, raw and could really do with being overhauled nowadays to be appreciated fully. But then if you do that, you lose that edgy, flying by the seat of it's pants feel that this has. And that's kind of charming in a way.

The second album knocks spots of their debut, but this is still an interesting dip into the 'before they were famous' world they were living in. I'm quite proud to have this in my collection as it showed that I had a good ear for a band. They went on to be rather famous< y'know.

Roxanne stands head and shoulders above the rest of the tracks on here for commercial value, but there are some other curiously good pieces that deserve a listen to. Even if it's just the once.

"...Will ya be my girl, will ya be my girl, will ya be my, be my, be my girl..."

Oh go on then. Where's that air pump...