The Dream of the Blue Turtles (A&M) - Sting (CD 1990)

Not too often that you see a wildly successful band lose their lead singer, only for the lead singer to go solo... and become even bigger. That's just what Sting did with his departure from the Police -- in 1985, he released his first solo effort, The Dream of the Blue Turtles.

No doubt, Sting had to be nervous about it. He even has a look of apprehension right there on the cover. However, when the opening single "If You Love Somebody, Set Them Free" started pummeling its way through the charts, Sting's career was already well cemented.

The opening of the song is a bit outlandish, with two levels of falsetto harmonizing -- Free, free, set them free... The band breaks in and you already sense that some of the Police's rock overtone has been shed. Guitars, while not completely eliminated, have been largely replaced by synthesizers, piano and even horns.

The trend continues into the second track, a more average tune by comparison. "Love is the Seventh Wave" is the famous Sting video with all the pastel drawings and the kindergarteners. Similarly, the song is a "xylophoney" nursery rhyme of sorts.

At the still point of destruction
At the centre of the fury
All the angels all the devils
All around us can't you see
There is a deeper wave than this
Rising in the land
There is a deeper wave than this
Nothing will withstand

Probably not the best song on the album, but not as laughable as it would be coming from anyone else. His homage to the previous Police hit "Every Breath You Take" is both cute and funny -- Every breath you take, every move you make, every cake you bake.

Sting pulls a Phil Collins and uses his solo status to start making a political statement in "Russians" which made it to #3 on the charts. Funny I don't recall hearing the song when I was younger. It's a dark, richly orchestrated ballad that now becomes an appropriate statement with the war and all. I think this song is more convincing than "Fragile"...

How can I save my little boy from Oppenheimer's deadly toy
There is no monopoly of common sense
On either side of the political fence
We share the same biology
Regardless of ideology
Believe me when I say to you
I hope the Russians love their children too.

"Children's Crusade" continues on the same path lyrically as "Russians" did. It is here, however, that Sting's developing "world music" style really starts to show. Chances are the music here is something you have never heard before, the melody so completely labyrinthian that it could never be replicated by anyone else. The whole sound can't be replicated; it's truly something.

Young men, soldiers, nineteen fourteen
Marching through countries they'd never seen
Virgins with rifles, a game of charades
All for a children's crusade

Pawns in the game are not victims of chance
Strewn on the fields of Belgium and France
Poppies for young men, death's bitter trade
All of these young lives betrayed.

Deep in the silence, you hear one of the band members saying "Hey, wait, wait!" only to be drowned out by insane drumming. Over the drums he manages to shout, "What key is it in?" and then you hear him give this "Uhhh" like he's just going to have to go with it. It's a pretty funny moment. Without any instruments so far, Sting starts singing, Woke up in my clothes again this morning... After the first verse, the rest of the band joins in with a more upbeat version of this "world music" and quite simply one of the best songs I've ever heard, "Shadows In The Rain". From what I've seen, many people just don't like this song (it actually originated amongst the Police), but I love it. It's a tenderly humorous piece about suffering from delusions, accompanied by the most playful, upfront yet bluesy mirage of all kinds of organ and synth effects. Lyrical samples wouldn't really do any good; you have to hear the entire song to get the gist of it.

The political messages start coming back with "We Work The Black Seam", further indication that Sting's sound, while not fully developed at this point, still hasn't changed that much between then and now. The song is deceptively upbeat, but the drummer keeps the percussion down by half -- rather than predictably hitting the drums every other beat he refrains until every fourth beat. We've all heard the trick used before, but it works especially well with the tone of this song.

One day in a nuclear age
They may understand our rage
They build machines that they can't control
And bury the waste in a great big hole
Power was to become cheap and clean
Grimey faces were never seen
But deadly for twelve thousand years is carbon fourteen
We work the black seam together

"Consider Me Gone" is a seemingly "tuneless" song, until about 3/4 in when the drums kick in and turn it into an upbeat tuneless song. Not exactly one of my favorites, but nice in that it doesn't distract. This leads into the instrumental title track which is just plain funny music. The song veers in between synthesizer bursts of random gobbledygook to a piano solo that sounds like something played during a funny part of a cartoon (I actually used the song during a funny part of a movie I made). It's only about a minute long.

Then we have "Moon Over Bourbon Street", an ingeniously crafted piece that wouldn't feel out of place on a classical record. Although it's got a relaxing kind of melody, the lyrics are autobiographical about a guy who only goes out at night. Possibly a werewolf of some sort? But you can't blame Sting for having a little fun with his imagination; he would go on to sing about being a prostitute, so quite frankly this pales in the weirdness department.

The album finishes with a song that has easily sealed its place amongst my Top 10 Favorite Songs of all time. If you don't mind, I'm going to plagiarize myself because I just couldn't describe this song any other way.

"Fortress" has a foreign feel to it. It is the last track from Sting's first solo album, The Dream of The Blue Turtles. The rock influence of The Police was still with him at the time, but this song was sort of a foreshadowing of what was to come in his later works.

It is a hauntingly upbeat number with some eclectic keyboard chords hanging in the background. The key changes about a dozen times before finally he settles in on a G, and the rest of the band joins in for what becomes an incredibly romantic highlight, the chorus. And if I built this fortress around your heart, encircled you in trenches and barbed wire, then let me build a bridge, for I cannot fill the chasm, let me set the battlements on fire. My take on the lyrical meaning of the chorus is that he has attempted to protect his lover from something (perhaps another boyfriend), and in the process, he built a fortress around her heart and blocked himself out as well. How appropriate that he uses a battlefield as the proverbial setting for such a situation. This song is the epic story of Sting's attempt to get back in.

I am simply delighted to see all the well-deserved acclaim this song has been getting on the internet. Not so much from critics, but from the random page that lets people vote on how good the songs are on this CD. On one page, "Fortress" had gotten a 4.6 out of five, with the second best song ("Moon") barely making it over four.

The political messages might make some uncomfortable, but Sting is never condescending in his approach, and the music he uses to accompany the songs is always comforting. Even when it fits the mood of the song, it remains cohesive with Sting and his voice and rarely "pushes" itself onto you.

I'm not prone to idolizing celebrities, but Sting is one of the rare exceptions. He is one of the most brilliant musicians alive, and this is just the tip of the iceberg.

Great Music To Play While: Browsing for other Sting CD's online

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