Walking on the Moon - Every UK Number 1

The Intro

The bestselling single of 1980 had a controversial subject matter and was The Police’s third number 1. Don’t Stand So Close to Me – the tale of a teacher’s Lolita-like relationship with a pupil – was made all the more eyebrow-raising due to the fact that singer Sting was a teacher before he was a pop star.

Before

Following their second number 1, Walking on the Moon, re-released their fourth single So Lonely, originally issued in 1978. As a pre-fame record it had failed to chart, but this time it peaked at six. A month after its release in February 1980, The Police embarked on their first world tour, performing in countries not used to western pop stars including India and Egypt. To capitalise on their global popularity, UK label A&M released Six Pack, a package featuring their previous five singles (including their first chart-topper, Message in a Bottle), plus an alternate take of album track The Bed’s Too Big Without You.

A&M seemingly couldn’t be satisfied by their biggest group of the moment, however, because they started pressuring The Police for a third album. Recorded in four weeks that July-August, the trio later said Zenyatta Mondatta was too rushed. Nonetheless, it was scheduled for an October release, to be preceded by lead single Don’t Stand So Close to Me on 19 September.

Before he was Sting, Gordon Sumner had taught English at St Paul’s First School in Cramlington, Northumberland. Sting has always understandably stated that Don’t Stand So Close to Me was not about him, but whether it came from experience of a scandal of a colleague, or was just inspired by his teaching career, we don’t know. Anyone who might think a handsome man like Sting may have had no shortage of schoolgirl fans might be right, but nobody has ever claimed the singer has also walked on the moon or been stranded on a desert island.

Review

Opening with a dark and brooding synth, Don’t Stand So Close to Me starts very strong. Sting’s lyrics are compelling and not the subject matter of your average pop song. The first verse is purely focused on the schoolgirl’s desire for the teacher. So far, so very good. But when it gets to the chorus, Don’t Stand So Close to Me goes downhill. While the verses are atmospheric, tense and foreboding, the workmanlike reggae of the chorus is perhaps a sign of the lack of time spent making this album. It’s like a demo recording – as is the instrumental section, featuring some more synth work that screams ‘this will do until we work out what goes here’, but they never went back to it.

Apparently however, The Police and producer Nigel Gray did work on this track for some time, with it initially tried out as a Hammond organ-based soul track. Several complex arrangements were tried, but, perhaps with the ticking of the clock in mind, they were abandoned and the band reverted to an earlier sound.

The second and third verses are strong, detailing the teacher’s lack of torment. However, you could say Sting tries harder to make the listener gain sympathy for the man here, mentioning ‘Temptation, frustration, so bad it makes him cry’. And the definite low point is:

‘It’s no use, he sees her, he starts to shake and cough,
Just like the old man in that book by Nabokov’.

You guessed it! The book in question is Lolita! Terrible, yet Sting later claimed to think it was ‘hilarious’ that he was given so much flak for it.

So the song ends with both student and teacher as the subject of gossip in the classroom and staffroom, and Sting pleading with his pupil to keep away, possibly partly to keep his temptation at bay, but also the rumours. The ending is overlong and if you’re not a fan of Sting’s attempt at reggae singing, Don’t Stand So Close to Me is not going to rank as their best number 1. In a year of so many chart-toppers, with the average duration at the top of the hit parade being only a fortnight, this doesn’t really deserve it’s lofty bestseller status.

The video is a typical Police promo. Sting does a decent job playing the stressed-out teacher, with a young girl hovering around him, while Andy Summers and Stewart Copeland probably revelled in the chance to wind him up by throwing paper aeroplanes and smoking in the classroom. This is intercut with the trio skanking around a schoolroom, with Copeland looking particularly silly holding his drumsticks. Mind you, Summers gives him a run for his money by dropping to his knees for a guitar solo that isn’t actually there. Sting’s adoring fans will have particularly enjoyed their hero getting his top off at one point (bit harsh him telling the girl to keep away when he’s behaving like that).

Don’t Stand So Close to Me has aged better than other similar Lolita-style songs, such as 1968 chart-topper Young Girl, but any sensitivity in which Sting broaches the subject matter quickly evaporates with that terrible rhyme, and nothing is resolved.

After

The melody to Don’t Stand So Close to Me found its way on to another huge 80s hit, when Dire Straits asked Sting to sing on the epic intro to Money for Nothing. Sting sang ‘I want my MTV’ to the tune, and after the release of the LP Money for Nothing, he received a co-writing credit.

The Outro

In 1984 The Police went on hiatus. Two years they reconvened, but the chance of a new album was doomed when Copeland broke his collarbone before they’d had chance to jam. Their final single was Don’t Stand So Close to Me ’86. Copeland and Sting fell out over what to use as drums, the former won out with his Fairlight CMI over the latter’s Synclavier. Unfortunately, while the idea of a reworked version showed a desire to breathe new life into an underworked song, this version is actually inferior. The production is too 80s, and the chorus less catchy. The video, directed by 10cc’s Godley and Creme, is one of the most comically mid-80s things you’ll ever see. The single made it to 24 after the group disbanded.

The Info

Written by

Sting

Producers

The Police & Andy Gray

Weeks at number 1

4 (27 September-24 October) *BEST-SELLING SINGLE OF THE YEAR*

Trivia

Births

5 October: Motorcycle racer James Toseland
13 October: Football player Scott Parker
14 October: Actor Ben Wishaw

Deaths

27 September: Banker Sir Michael Turner
28 September: Pianist Horace Finch
29 September: Labour Party MP Peter Mahon
30 September: Botanist James Wyllie Gregor/Conservationist George Waterston
6 October: Actress Hattie Jacques
7 October: Designer Sir Gordon Russell
10 October: Conservative MP Evelyn Emmet, Baroness Emmet of Amberley/Cricketer Wilfred Hill-Wood
11 October: Singer Cassie Walmer
12 October: Actress Ambrosine Phillpotts
14 October: Labour Party MP Arthur Pearson
15 October: Writer Katharine Mary Briggs
19 October: Radio producer DG Bridson
20 October: TV personality Isobel, Lady Barnett/Tennis player Phoebe Holcroft Watson
24 October: Conservative MP Sir Richard Glyn, 9th Baronet

Meanwhile…

3 October: The 1980 Housing Act came into effect, which gave council house tenants of three years or more in England and Wales the right to buy their home from their local council, at a discount.

6 October: Express coach services were deregulated.

8 October: British Leyland launched the Austin Metro.

10 October: Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher made her infamous ‘The lady’s not for turning’ speech at conference, after being warned her economic policy was to blame for the recession and record-breaking rising unemployment.

15 October: Former Prime Minister James Callaghan resigned as Labour Party leader after four and a half years in the job.
Also this day, former Prime Minister Harold Macmillan and union leaders criticised Thatcher’s economic policies.

17 October: Queen Elizabeth II became the first British monarch to make a state visit to the Vatican.

22 October: Lord Thomson announced The Times and Sunday Times would close within five months unless a buyer was found.

24 October: MG car production ended.

The Intro

Hot on the heels of their first number 1, Message In a Bottle, new-wave/reggae three-piece The Police were ruling the charts once again with this follow-up. And in a year of really hip number 1s, Walking on the Moon is one of the coolest.

Before

Their second album, Regatta de Blanc (which loosely translates into French as ‘White Reggae’) had been recorded between February and August. Although their label, A&M Records, had wanted to capitalise on their band’s growing wave of support with a bigger budget and more famous producer, The Police insisted on returning to Surrey Sound in Leatherhead with co-producer Nigel Gray.

Unlike their first album, Sting, Stewart Copeland and Andy Summers struggled to find enough new material to record and considered remaking debut single Fall Out. Digging out old material from before they were a band, they added new elements to flesh out the songs. Walking on the Moon, however, was brand new.

Sting came up with it while drunk one night in a Munich hotel following a gig. Slumped on the bed, the room spinning around him, he got up and started singing ‘Walking round the room, ya, ya, walking round the room’. In the morning he remembered the riff and wrote what he had down, but realised it was a rather dull premise for a song, so he changed the lyrics. He later admitted the song became the recollection of his first girlfriend, Deborah Anderson, and likened leaving her house in a loved-up state was akin to walking without gravity. Sting was a keen jazz buff, and one of his favourite tunes was John Coltrane’s Giant Steps, so the title also found its way in naturally to the opening line.

Originally conceived and demoed as a rocker, The Police and Gray decided a song about space should sound spaced out. Rather than delve into reggae as they often did, Walking on the Moon became a very successful experiment in dub. This genre, originally an offshoot of reggae, had been developed by pioneering producers including King Tubby, Augustus Pablo and Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry in the late-60s. They would reshape songs, often removing vocals and laying emphasis on the rhythm section, adding echo and reverb. It sounds brilliant when stoned.

A key instrument used in dub was the Roland RE-201 Space Echo unit, and The Police bought one with the money from their first hit, Roxanne. Drummer Copeland added the Space Echo to Walking on the Moon, using it to repeat not the preceding note, but the one before that. Doing so on the rhythm track created the wobbly, stuttering effect that makes it so atmospheric. The combination of Sting’s memorable three-note bass line with the drums was more than good enough on its own, but the icing on the cake was Summers’ idea to add the clanging guitar echo after the bass notes throughout.

Review

Were it not for Every Breath You Take, Walking on the Moon would easily rank as my favourite Police number 1. I love dub, in small doses, and it makes for great headphone music. Sting gets a mostly free pass for his often irritating vocal here, so great is the bass. If you think too much about it, the way he sings the title could still annoy – it is a cod-Jamaican accent, there’s no escaping it. It’s there again on the ‘Keep it up’ refrain at the end too. However, his least annoying performance comes in the least successful element of the song – the ‘Some may say/I’m wishing’ my days away’. The lyrics to this section don’t really fit the rest and just seem like rhymes for the sake of it.

I love the idea of likening new love to being as amazing as stepping out on to the Moon. The music is in complete contrast to that idea though, sounding edgy and mysterious. I guess there is a good comparison to be had with the great unknowns of what happens next in a love affair and moonwalking. Anyway, I’m rambling. I just wish there was a 12-inch version, which could have explored the outer reaches even more, really emphasising the echo.

Taking a literal approach for the video, Sting, Copeland and Summers were recorded at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida on 23 October 1979. They’re mostly pretending to play live, although Sting has an electric guitar rather than a bass, and Copeland is whacking his drumsticks against a Saturn V rocket. As with their last video, Derek Burbridge directs and Sting looks rather menacing, until all three crack up while dicking about inside.

After

Walking on the Moon very nearly made it to Christmas number 1, which would have made for a distinctly un-festive chart-topper and final number 1 of the 70s. What replaced it was even less cheery.

The Info

Written by

Sting

Producers

The Police & Nigel Gray

Weeks at number 1

1 (8-14 December)

Trivia

Births

14 December: Footballer Michael Owen

Deaths

9 December: Boxing promoter Jack Solomons

Meanwhile…

10 December: Stunt performer Eddie Kidd performs an 80ft motorcycle jump.

14 December: Doubts are raised over the convictions of the four men in the Carl Bridgewater case. Hubert Vincent Spencer is charged with murdering 70-year-old farmer Hubert Wilkes. The farmhouse where Wilkes was murdered was less than half a mile away from the one where Bridgewater had been killed.