Artist: Various

Album: Policia! - A Tribute to the Police

Label: The Militia Group

Tracks: 12

 

Most of you probably don’t remember the good old days of MTV--the days when music videos were actually played, and not dim-witted shows about spoiled brat-face 16 year olds.   With the exception of ‘Wild Boyz’, and an occasional episode of ‘Newlyweds’, I refuse to turn my tv to that channel.  But way back when, when times were good, when bands like ‘Limp Bizkit’ and ‘Good Charlotte’ ceased to exist, my friend Kristin and I would stay up late on those Sunday nights we didn’t have school the next day and watch MTV’s greatest show ever – ‘120 minutes’.   That show exposed me to some of my favorite bands of all time—The Jesus and Mary Chain, Depeche Mode, New Order, The Psychedelic Furs, and...The Police.  I remember the night the video for The Police’s ‘Don’t Stand So Close to Me – ‘86’ came on.  Even though we both almost had a seizure (you’ll know what I’m talking about if you’ve ever seen the video), we both agreed Sting was one of the most beautiful rock stars we’d ever seen.  More importantly however, we discovered what a great band The Police were.  Synchronicity easily became one of my favorite albums at the time, and still ranks in my top 25 albums of all time. 

 

Needless to say, I was interested in listening to the Police tribute comp—‘Policia’ put out by the Militia Group earlier this year.  I wasn’t expecting much—as the last tribute album I listened to was the Guns N’ Roses tribute which was total crap. 

Tracks include:

 

1. King Of Pain - Brandston     
2. Roxanne - Fall Out Boy     
3. Truth Hits Everybody - Motion City Soundtrack     
4. Synchronicity II - No Motiv     
5. So Lonely - Limbeck     
6. Next To You - Big Collapse     
7. Murder By Numbers - Maxeen     
8. Walking On The Moon - The Pale     
9. Wrapped Around Your Finger - Underoath     
10. Every LIttle Thing She Does Is Magic - Anadivine  11. Message In A Bottle - Watashi Wa     
12. Every Breath You Take - Copeland

I was curious to see if bands would be able to pull The Police’s songs off.

 

To my surprise, a lot of them did.

 

The comp opens with Brandtson’s version of ‘King of Pain’— easily one of the best songs on the album.  A good cover stays true to the original, yet respectfully adds that little something-something—little things that make it more of a tribute than just some impassive cover.  Brandtson does just that—this version opens with the same exact feel as the original with the synth and piano.  The vocals are perfect, especially the background vocals which are an almost dead-on replica of the original.

 

Fall Out Boy’s cover of ‘Roxanne’ is another great tribute.  They speed it up and make it rock which takes away the original’s dare I say, ‘annoyance factor’.  By the way, if you’ve never heard the version of ‘Roxanne’ from the movie ‘Moulin Rouge’, go do so now. 

 

No Motiv does an impressive cover of ‘Synchronicity II’.  Vocally, it’s the best performance on the album.  Vocalist Jeremy Palaszewski takes an extremely difficult melody and makes it sound all so easy.

 

Motion City Soundtrack, Maxeen, and The Pale all do great jobs on their covers as well. 

 

The weakest tracks on the comp – Limbeck’s repetitive version of ‘So Lonely’(not necessarily their fault, just a bad song to begin with), Anadivine’s version of ‘Every Little Thing…where they leave out the best parts of the original’s melody,  and finally, yes Underoath’s cover of ‘Wrapped Around Your Finger’.  ‘Wrapped Around…’ is probably my favorite Police song.  Sting’s verse melody is incredible, and the song just has this great ambience about it—but all of that is gone with this version.  Of course there's the screamo stuff--but even the singing parts aren't even close to the original's melody.  The song is just too beautiful in its original form to stray so far. 

 

My biggest surprise was Watashi Wa’s cover of ‘Message in a Bottle’.  While listening to their cover, I realize I never really had given proper appreciation to lead vocalist Seth Alan Roberts —his voice is so smooth, it sounds incredible. 

 

To close out the album--Copeland’s version of ‘Every Breath You Take’ will have all the ladies and gentlemen swooning.  Subdued yet sweet, Copeland takes an iconic song and makes it their own--while still paying homage to the original.  My only complaint--I wish they would have covered ‘Tea in the Sahara’ instead.

 

To add to that… I was really surprised there was no cover of ‘Don’t Stand so Close to Me’.

 

So other than my few meager complaints, this really is a great tribute album.  Good job guys. Thank you for not allowing any covers of ‘De Do Do Do, De Da Da Da’ make it on the comp.