Lyrics by Sting Summary and Reviews
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Book Reviews of Lyrics
Book Review: Mephistopheles is NOT his name
Summary: 5 Stars
I have just come back in from the garden, back from the bonfire i made of all the books in the house, including my wifes & our two daughters, Hilary [7] & Margerine [5].
And they didnt want me to, i can tell you.
I am dazed & glassy-eyed, blackened with ash & soot but strangely at peace. Why? Because half an hour ago i sat down in the gazebo & opened up the pages of this book:
'LYRICS' by sting.
My mind raced, my pulse quickened, my stomach lurched. I got scarcely further than the introduction before realizing, with all the clarity & incontinent zeal of the reborn, that this single volume would - & has - made all other books obsolete, now & for all time. What other book could compare? What sonnet of Shakespeare,for instance, could hold a floodlight to:
"I've had a thousand girls or maybe more
But I've never felt like this before
But I just don't know what's come over me
You took me over, take a look at me
So many times I used to give a sign
Got this feeling, gonna lose my mind
When all it is is just a love affair
You took me over, baby, take me there"
Here sting depicts the delirium of new love, the disturbing senseless chatter of the damp & deranged. Each line is carefully weighed to recreate precisely the tiresome, nonsensical, time-wasting thoughts that gallop through the head of a 27 year old bass-playing english teacher who has slept with a thousand women. Maybe more.
Here sting not only SPEAKS without thinking, he WRITES. And that is a rare talent indeed.
I could go on, but to polish even one of these is to leave an ugly brown stain on ones sleeve. To shine a light upon just one of Stings 'naked wares' is an ugly, unforgiveable insult to all the others, & all of this is wasted time away from this nest of treasures - for both of us, dear reader - so i'll leave it there.
Burn all your books, come follow me. A new world order is at hand, & its bible is 'LYRICS' by Sting.
P.S - I thought 'behind my camel [instrumental]' was particularly good.
Book Review: NOTHING LIKE THE ....BOOK
Summary: 4 Stars
THE BOOK WAS GREAT TO MAKES SOME SENSE OF SOME OF THE MOST BEAUTIFUL LYRICS IN THE MODERN MUSIC .
IN ORDER TO GRASP THE ESSENCE/SOUL OF THE SONGS YOU HAVE TO PLACE THEM IN THE CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER AND UNDERSTAND THE TIMES AND THE WRITTER'S LIFE ET THE MOMENT IT WAS WRITTEN. I WILL NOT PRETEND TO KNOW ANYTHING ABOUT STING, BUT I SOMEHOW FEEL A LOT CLOSER AND I HAVE DEVELOPPED A NEW APPRECIATION OF THE MUSIC THAT WAS ALREADY DEAR TO ME.
SOME OF THE LYRICS WILL SURVIVE ON THEIR OWN WITHOUT THIER "SHELL" THAT THE MUSIC SEEMS TO PROVIDE,OTHERS WILL REMAIN BETTER WITH IT.
BUT YOU CANNOT DENY THE TALENT OF ONE OF THE MOST TALENTED LYRICIST OF THE 20TH CENTURY.
Book Review: Still in the Dark
Summary: 3 Stars
It is difficult for me to admit this, since I am a big fan of Sting and his work, but this book is a real disappointment.
Granted, I'm happy enough to have it on my shelf. It's nice to have all Sting's lyrics collected in one place. It's interesting to see how I've misinterpreted some things over the years; particularly, some of the harder rocking songs of the early era of The Police, when it was more difficult to make out the words. Still, I was hoping for much more.
The biggest problem, I think, is that there's so little here beyond the lyrics themselves. I guess of was hoping for much more in terms of background, interpretation and self-criticism of the work. That would have made this volume must-have interesting. But most of the songs have nothing extra in the way of commentary by Sting and those that do are little helped by what he does have to say.
For some reason, Sting still wants to cast darkness over his years as a successful musician. His autobiography, Broken Music, is wonderful--insightful and reflective--but he stops his tale as The Police are forming. In this book he once again had an opportunity to shed some light through the lens of his lyrics and he passed it by. Hopefully, someday he'll be willing to settle down and give us his impressions of his life since the late 1970's. For now, his fans will still have to wait.
Book Review: Sting shows early signs of Alzheimers
Summary: 4 Stars
I like Stings music, most of his lyrics, and this book does a great service to both. However, as stated in the title of my review, Sting's memory is faltering.
Kenny Kirkland, not David Sancious, played keyboards on Mercury Falling. How in the world could Sting forget this? He makes this mistake twice- the first in his introduction to the Mercury Falling album when he names David Sancious along with Vinny Colaiuta and Dominic Miller as the band.
The second is in the introduction to the song he wrote about Kenny. He lists the names of the albums Kenny played on - Blue Turtles, Nothing Like the Sun, and the Soul Cages. No mention of Mercury Falling.
Sting is getting old! Yoga and Police reunions will not save him from dementia.
Book Review: What a Pompous Windbag
Summary: 1 Stars
Wow. How rare is it that, without even reading a book, you can tell merely from the author's introduction -- which, presumably, is meant to cast the author in the best possible light -- how truly awful it will be. It is difficult to imagine a more self-absorbed and pedantic "artiste" than Sting, and thank God he doesn't let us down here. Reading the lyrics of such deep chestnuts as "Do Do Do Do Da Da Da Da," "shorn of the very garments that gave [it its] shape in the first place" (Sting's words), is -- to extend The Great Man's metaphor -- a little like spending time against one's will in a nudist colony of very "ordinary" looking people. Emperor's New Clothes, indeed.