Reggatta de Blanc-- Album Quiz #2

Answer: True

The band's manager and Stewart's brother, Miles Copeland, created this title, just as he had the title of the band's first album. According to Ray Nikart's 1984 book "Sting and The Police," Miles Copeland combined his interest in boat racing and "the band's flair for reggae" to create "Reggatta." "de Blanc" is significant for two reasons, as well. First, it represents the inspiration that Richard Hell's punk anthem "Blank Generation" had on the band, but more importantly, the French words, meaning "of white," refer to the "whiteness" of The Police's version of reggae.

Answer: Sting's face

The faces of the three band members--Stewart, Andy, and Sting--appeared bathed in a blue light and were sandwiched between wide blue (or sometimes black)upper and lower borders. "The Police" was written in grey and cater-cornered in the upper left while "Reggatta de Blanc" was written in cursive at a slant in the lower black border.

Answer: 1979

The Police released "Reggatta de Blanc" on October 5, 1979, and it eventually reached number one on the UK charts and number 25 in the US. "Rolling Stone" ranked the album as number 369 in its list of its 500 Greatest Albums of all time.

Answer: Message in a Bottle

First released in September of 1979 (before the album itself), "Message in a Bottle" climbed to number one in the UK charts but only to number 74 in the United States. This song, which like "Roxanne" is very much associated with this band, is a personal favorite of both Sting and Andy Summers, and many critics have argued that the percussion represents the best ever recorded from Stewart Copeland.

In his 2007 book "Lyrics," Sting wrote: "I'd been carrying this guitar riff around in my head for a year. I used to play it over and over again to my dog in our basement flat in Bayswater, and he would stare at me with that look of hopeless resignation dogs can have when they're waiting for their walk in the park. Was is it that hopeless look that provoked the idea of the island castaway and his bottle? I don't know . . . ".

Answer: The Bed's Too Big Without You

"The Bed's Too Big Without You" is actually one of Sting's oldest compositions; he wrote it in the mid-1970s while he was a member of the band Last Exit. A mono version would be released in June 1980 as one of the songs in the "Six Pack" collection, a re-issue of The Police's previous five 45 rpm single releases plus a sixth 45 with "The Bed's Too Big Without You" and a live version of "Truth Hits Everybody."

Answer: Reggatta de Blanc

The song "Reggatta de Blanc" emerged as a lengthy instrumental interlude for the song "Can't Stand Losing You" from The Police's debut album "Outlandos d'Amour." While it was recorded as a separate song on the "Reggatta de Blanc" album, The Police frequently played it during "Can't Stand Losing You" when they were performing live.

It is one of two songs on the "Reggatta de Blanc" album that was collaboratively composed by all three members of the band.

Answer: Bring on the Night

"Bring on the Night" was released as a single in December 1979 in Europe only. According to rumor, it is about Gary Gilmore, who in 1979 was the first person to be executed in the United States after the Supreme Court upheld states' rights to perform executions. Gilmore's execution is, of course, the subject of Norman Mailer's "The Executioner's Song." The second line of the song is somewhat of a paraphrase of the second line of T. S. Eliot's "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock," which begins, "Let us go then, you and I, / When the evening is spread out against the sky / Like a patient etherised upon a table." In his book "Lyrics," Sting claims that he "shamelessly lifted" the line from Eliot's poem and makes the following comment: "What was it Eliot said? 'Bad poets borrow, good poets steal'?"

Answer: It's Alright for You

"Wake up / Make up / Bring it up / Shake up / Stand by / Don't cry / Watching while the world die . . . " "It's Alright for You" is most definitely a punk-influenced song. Of course, this influence is most likely a result of the collaborative process that went into the composition of the song; Stewart Copeland wrote the music while Sting wrote only the lyrics. So much of The Police's music contains a reggae sound.

However, in Ray Nikart's "Sting and The Police," Sting claims that he rarely listened to reggae and that the West had "already assimilated it into our own style, our own whiteness, so that now we have a hybrid that has little to do with reggae."

Answer: No Time This Time

"No Time This Time" was written by Sting and was actually released in November of 1978 as a B side for the single "So Lonely" from the "Outlandos d'Amour" album. Obviously, it found its way onto the "Reggatta de Blanc" album as well. The chorus is "If I could / I'd slow the whole world down / I'd bring it to its knees / I'd stop it spinning round / But as it is / I'm climbing up an endless wall / No time at all / No time this time."

Answer: On Any Other Day

"On Any Other Day" is the only song on any of The Police's five studio albums in which Stewart Copeland sang lead. Of course, he also wrote the song. At the very beginning of the song he is heard speaking, "The other one's a complete (censored). You want something corny? You got it." He goes on to sing about a man who's having an extremely bad day as he cuts off his fingers in the door of his car and he learns that his wife has had several affairs.

Answer: Does Everyone Stare

"Does Everyone Stare" is one of the album's three songs written completely by Stewart Copeland. He actually sings the first verse before turning over the lead vocals to Sting.

Answer: Deathwish

"Deathwish" and the song "Reggatta de Blanc" were both composed by all three members of the band: Andy Summers, Stewart Copeland, and Sting. Sting was primarily responsible for the lyrics.

Answer: Walking on the Moon

"Walking on the Moon," a song about the feeling of being in love, was released in November 1979. It became The Police's second number one hit in the United Kingdom after "Message in a Bottle" and reached number nine on the Australian charts, but it did not chart in the United States.

In Hugh Fielder and Phil Sutcliffe's 1981 book "The Police l'historia bandido," Sting claims that he wrote the song while he was drunk in a hotel room in Munich. A guitar riff occurred to him, and as he was circling around the room, the words "Walking around the room" came to him. Fortunately, those words evolved into something else. Later in his own book "Broken Music," written in 2003, Sting would claim that the real inspiration for this song came from walking back from his first "real" girlfriend's house back in his early days. Sting wrote, ". . . [B]eing in love is to be relieved of gravity."

Answer: Contact

"Contact" is one of the three songs on the album to have been composed by Stewart Copeland alone. While he sings lead completely during "On Any Other Day" and for one verse on "Does Everyone Stare," he does not on "Contact."

Answer: Nigel Gray

In 2003's "Broken Music," Sting explains that Nigel Gray was initially in the medical profession when he decided to dabble in music production and engineering. He used one floor of "an old converted dairy" to open Surrey Sound Recording Studios. Miles Copeland, Stewart's brother and The Police's manager, worked out a deal with Nigel for a "favorable studio rate" in exchange for "coproduction credit." Sting describes him like this: "Nigel is only a little older than Stewart and me but in his shy manners, neatly parted school haircut, and painfully straight clothes, he seems far more like an eccentric country doctor than someone at home among the bohemian jumble of the studio."