Nothing Like The Sun (Remastered) Sting

• 1The Lazarus Heart04:36
• 2Be Still My Beating Heart05:35
• 3Englishman In New York04:26
• 4History Will Teach Us Nothing05:00
• 5They Dance Alone (Gueca Solo)07:12
• 6Fragile03:55
• 7We'll Be Together04:56
• 8Straight To My Heart03:54
• 9Rock Steady04:27
• 10Sister Moon03:46
• 11Little Wing05:10
• 12The Secret Marriage02:09
• Total Runtime55:06

Info for Nothing Like The Sun (Remastered)

Sting was at a crossroads when it came time to record his second solo album, ...Nothing Like the Sun. His debut, Dream of the Blue Turtles, had been a global success, peaking at #2 on the album charts in America. But for his sophomore artist, the recently liberated frontman of the Police was ready to do something different.

Released on October 13, 1987, ...Nothing Like the Sun was a much more somber and low-key affair than his solo debut. The albums melancholy mood was belied by lead single, "We'll Be Together." The upbeat tune cruised all the way to #7 on the Hot 100 for the week of December 5, 1987. The #1 song in America that week: Belinda Carlisle's "Heaven is a Place on Earth."

“I look back on this album, and I realize that the record is about my mother, although I didn’t see it at the time,” says Sting in the liner notes of the new edition. “It’s about mothers and daughters, mistresses and wives, sisters…every song has one of these themes. It surprised me.” Sting’s mother died in late 1986, not long before he and his band started four months of intensive recording sessions at AIR Studios in Montserrat in early 1987.

The album followed the triple platinum success of Sting‘s first solo album, 1985’s The Dream of the Blue Turtles. Its title was a reference to Shakespeare’s Sonnet No.130 (“My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun”). The emotional circumstances determined a largely reflective tone, the exception being the uptempo first single “We’ll Be Together,” which featured Annie Lennox among its backing vocalists and became an instant hit.

Other songs on the album that became enduring signatures for the global star included “Englishman in New York,” Sting’s nod to English expat and raconteur Quentin Crisp, and “Fragile,” written about an American civil engineer who was killed in Nicaragua by the Contras. Lyrical inspiration also came from his participation in Amnesty International’s Conspiracy of Hope Tour in 1986. Notably, “They Dance Alone” addresses those tortured and murdered by the then-military dictatorship in Chile, through the eyes of their wives and daughters.

The album was produced by Sting, Hugh Padgham, Bryan Loren, and Neil Dorfsman, and featured a number of stellar guitarists including Police bandmate Andy Summers on “The Lazarus Heart,” Hiram Bullock on the version of Jimi Hendrix’s “Little Wing,” and Mark Knopfler, Eric Clapton, and Fareed Haque on “They Dance Alone.”

Other collaborators on the set included keyboardists Gil Evans and Kenny Kirkland, saxophonist Branford Marsalis, and drummer Manu Katché. Sting oversaw all arrangements and sang all of the lead vocals, also playing bass and double bass, Spanish guitar on “History Will Teach Us Nothing,” and acoustic guitar on “Fragile.”

Sting, vocals, bass (1-9, 12), Spanish guitar (4), acoustic guitar (6) double bass (10)
Kenny Kirkland, keyboards
Gil Evans, keyboards (11)
Gil Evans and His Orchestra, (11)
Ken Helman, acoustic piano (12)
Andy Summers, guitars (1, 2)
Eric Clapton, guitar (5)
Fareed Haque, guitar (5)
Mark Knopfler, guitar (5)
Hiram Bullock, guitars (11)
Mark Egan, bass (11)
Manu Katché, drums (1-10, 12)
Kenwood Dennard, drums (11)
Andy Newmark, additional drums
Mino Cinelu, percussion, vocoder
Branford Marsalis, saxophones
Renée Geyer, backing vocals
Dolette McDonald, backing vocals
Janice Pendarvis, backing vocals
Pamela Quinlan, backing vocals
Rubén Blades, Spanish vocals (5)
Annie Lennox, backing vocals (7)
Vesta Williams backing vocals (7)

Produce by Sting (all tracks); Neil Dorfsman (Tracks 1-6 & 8-12); Bryan Loren (Track 7)

Digitally remastered

Please Note: We offer this album in its native sampling rate of 48 kHz, 24-bit. The provided 192 kHz version was up-sampled and offers no audible value!

Sting
Born 2 October 1951, in Wallsend, north-east England, Gordon Sumner's life started to change the evening a fellow musician in the Phoenix Jazzmen caught sight of his black and yellow striped sweater and decided to re-christen him Sting. Sting paid his early dues playing bass with local outfits The Newcastle Big Band, The Phoenix Jazzmen, Earthrise and Last Exit, the latter of which featured his first efforts at song writing. Last Exit were big in the North East, but their jazz fusion was doomed to fail when punk rock exploded onto the music scene in 1976. Stewart Copeland, drummer with Curved Air, saw Last Exit on a visit to Newcastle and while the music did nothing for him he did recognise the potential and charisma of the bass player. The two hooked up shortly afterwards and within months, Sting had left his teaching job and moved to London.

Seeing punk as flag of convenience, Copeland and Sting - together with Corsican guitarist Henri Padovani - started rehearsing and looking for gigs. Ever the businessman, Copeland took the name The Police figuring it would be good publicity, and the three started gigging round landmark punk venues like The Roxy, Marquee, Vortex and Nashville in London. Replacing Padovani with the virtuoso talents of Andy Summers the band also enrolled Stewart's elder brother Miles as manager, wowing him with a Sting song called 'Roxanne'. Within days Copeland Senior had them a record deal. But the hip London music press saw through The Police's punk camouflage and did little to disguise their contempt, and the band's early releases had no chart success. So The Police did the unthinkable - they went to America.

The early tours are the stuff of legend - bargain flights to the USA courtesy of Freddie Laker's pioneering Skytrain; driving their own van and humping their own equipment from gig to gig; and playing to miniscule audiences at the likes of CBGB's in New York and The Rat Club in Boston. Their tenacity paid off though as they slowly built a loyal following, got some all important air-play, and won over their audiences with a combination of new wave toughness and reggae rhythms.

They certainly made an odd trio: guitarist Summers had a career dating back to the mid-60s, the hyper-kinetic Copeland was a former prog-rocker, and Sting's background was in trad jazz and fusion. The sound the trio made was unique though, and Sting's pin-up looks did them no harm at all. The band returned to the UK to find the reissued 'Roxanne' single charting, and played a sell-out tour of mid-size venues. The momentum had started. The debut album 'Outlandos d'Amour' (Oct 78) delivered three sizeable hits with 'Roxanne', 'Can't Stand Losing You' and 'So Lonely' which in turn led to a headlining slot at the '79 Reading Festival which won the band some fine reviews, but it was with 'Reggatta de Blanc' (Oct 79) that the band stepped up a gear.

Reggatta's first single, 'Message In A Bottle', streaked to number one and the album's success was consolidated further when 'Walking On The Moon' also hit the top slot. The band was big, but about to get even bigger. 1980 saw them undertake a world tour with stops on all continents - including the first rock concerts in Bombay - and the band eventually returned to the UK exhausted, for two final shows in Sting's hometown of Newcastle. Much of this groundbreaking tour was captured on the 'Police Around The World' video and a BBC documentary entitled 'The Police in the East'

Within weeks, the band were in a Dutch studio recording new material but Sting's stock of pre-Police songs and ideas were wearing out. When 'Zenyatta Mondatta' was released (Oct 80) although it sold well and produced another number one single in 'Don't Stand So Close To Me' and a top five hit with 'De Do Do Do, De Da Da Da' a rethink was required. Sting later admitted that he felt 'Zenyatta' was the band's weakest album but by the end of 1980 the band were undoubtedly the biggest-selling band in the country selling out two shows in a huge marquee on Tooting Bec Common in London. For more please visit www.sting.com

This album contains no booklet.