Twenty-Three
In contrast to this bleak environment, our fourth album is to be recorded in the month of June 1981 at AIR Studios on the Caribbean island of Montserrat. This is the dream; this is the Beatles-a myth we are happy to embrace. We are sure that we will sell millions of the next album, and recording on a Caribbean island is a luxury we can afford. This time we can relax, take our time, get it right. In fact, we are scheduled for six weeks on the island, which by future standards will seem very short, although we never seem to need more than ten days.
After leaving Kate and Layla in Ireland with what I hope is a soulful departure, I head off to Montserrat by way of New York. I arrive in Manhattan around one A.M. and call Belushi. He screams my name into the phone and wants to hit the town immediately, but having just arrived on a long, arduous flight, I decline and say, "How about tomorrow night?" and pass out. At almost six in the morning there's a rapping on my door and I stagger out of bed to see who the hell it is. It's Belushi, with a big grin on his face. "Okay, man, let's go," he says, and walks over to the dresser and lays out twelve lines of coke and just smiles at me as he rolls a bill. "Okay, whaathefuck," I say, and we bend our heads over enough powder to fell a Peruvian llama and do the lot. Like Speedy Gonzalez and his twin brother, we hit the streets of Manhattan at six A.M. in search of a party. Whooping, yelling, and numb, we whip around to several locations, banging on doors as John calls out names. But there ain't much goin' on and despite the blizzard that's raging in our heads, there's nothing to do and by about nine A.M., feeling very wasted, we give up and John says, "Gotta sleep, man. See you tonight." "Yeah, right," I croak. He disappears and sleeps for three days, by which time I'm in Montserrat.
A funky island without the usual tourist glitz Montserrat has a beauty all its own topped off by a volcano that will eventually render two-thirds of the island uninhabitable. We check into the studio and get assigned our own private bungalows for the duration. The heat and lush, verdant topicality of the island drop you like a stone into a state of grooving relaxation, and within a couple of hours you go native. It feels good and it's hard not to laugh out loud at the fortune of all of this as we slip into a luxurious new life of swimming in the mornings, cruising the island, and gathering in the studio after lunch. The other families are here, but Kate has decided not to come; I feel the shadow of her absence under the bright Caribbean light. As I get to know the island I see with a heavy sense of irony that some of the places have Irish names. One village is even called Kinsale.
One of the first things we have to deal with is the fact that Sting has invited a Canadian keyboard player to join us on this album. Stewart and I are incensed, as nothing has been said to us. I feel adamant about not turning our guitar trio into some overproduced, overlayered band with keyboards. But within a day he turns up, a heavily built guy with an oversize ego to match his bulk. He has bamboozled Sting into flying him down from Canada after Sting did a bit of demo recording with him up in Montreal. He is a good player but he's added something like twelve layers of keyboards and synthesizers to one of Sting's songs, "Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic." It's a difficult situation and it's hard for Stewart and nie to talk Sting out of it, so we go into the studio with the keyboards. But here the intruder signs his own death warrant because he smothers everything we play with dense keyboard parts so that we end up sounding like Yes on a bad day. He compounds the problem by leaning over his synthesizer every few minutes and playing us one of his riffs and exclaiming, "Listen to that-boy, if I heard that, I'd love to have it on my album." It's painful. He lasts three days and then even Sting wearies of him and sends him on his way.
After this little debacle we get down to the business of making a real Police record. We begin the process of working our way into the new record by tentatively playing one another our song demos, a painful and difficult moment because each one of us would like to have all his songs recorded. But Sting doesn't want to sing anything unless he has written it, and most of my songwriting in Ireland comes to nothing. I have some good songs that will not get recorded, and I resent it. I have to deal with my own had feeling and try to come out positive, but I can't help thinking that this time one or two of Sting's songs are not as good as mine. Maybe my writing is too close to his or too Police-like for him to feel comfortable. But in the interest of keeping the ship afloat, I go along with it. Sting remarks to Vic Garbarini, a journalist friend of ours, that "Andy is good, too good maybe," and it hurts. We end up recording some songs that in my mind are filler.
However, "Spirits in the Material World," "Invisible Sun," "Secret Journey," and "Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic" are all standout songs, and we get to work on them. "Magic" is a problem because we use Sting's expensive demo as the actual track; Stewart and I just have to try and fit ourselves into it. Strangely enough and despite the fact that it's a great song, it never sounds like a true Police track to one and after the recording we rarely play it in concert. "Spirits in the Material World" is a great new original song inspired by George Harrison. We argue a bit about this one because again Sting has worked it out on a keyboard and wants it on the instrument he wrote it on. The line under the vocal starts with a beautiful extended minor ninth chord. Sting grumbles that it's a bit tricky for the guitar, but I point out to him that in fact I can play the whole part standing on my head if need be-no problem. But he won't budge and we end up with a sort of generic sound that is a mix of guitar and keyboards. Again, it somewhat lacks the true Police sound. "Demolition Man" is a tough rocker that also puts us though a little bit of a power play. I pull off a ripping solo on the outro of the song that should be played loud and clear, but when it comes to mix time it gets played too low and, much to my chagrin, gets lost. Clearly things are starring to move in a weirder direction and it's becoming a fight to keep up the camaraderie. But despite these internal frictions, the truth that Stewart and I have to acknowledge privately is that without Sting's songwriting talent, it wouldn't happen-and this gives him power over the two of us. On the other hand, where would he be without the two of us? It always comes back to the indivisible sum, and in the allpervasive group life, lines like this become an interior monologue. But in this moment and put crudely, it becomes either Sting's way or no way; almost all ideas are carried out on a confrontational basis, and the idea of a group democracy fades. However, one of my songs does make it onto the album. It's called "Omega Man," and in the end Sting somewhat resentfully agrees to sing it even though it's clear that he doesn't really want to. Later Miles plays it at the first A&M meeting about Ghost in the Machine, and they want to release it as the first single, but Sting puts his foot down and will not let it happen-so it doesn't, When I hear about it, it feels like a knife in the back.
This time the studio feels more like a canvas for dirty fighting. The stakes have been raised.. and instead of rejoicing in the unbelievable success we have created together, we lose sight of the big picture and go on in emotional disorder, each one of us battling for his own territory. In the deeper recesses of our collective soul there is a bond between us, but it's getting veiled by the arm wrestling, the internecine battling and striving, the pushy maleness of it all. There are arguments in the studio in which each one of us wants his instrument slightly louder than the others, wants his songs recorded, will not be less than anyone else. It is a combative process, with the poor engineer trying to arbitrate as three sets of hands fiddle with the faders.
For this recording, after sadly letting go of Nigel Gray because of the debacle of Zenyatta Mondatta, we have a new engineer/co-producer in the person of Hugh Padgham, a soft-spoken middle-class sort of chap who is confronted with three raging egos. The drums, the bass, and the guitar are going down onto tape, but his voice is faint as we battle it out. There is a humiliating episode in the studio one day when as a result of all this tension and loss of perspective, Sting goes berserk on me, calling me every name under the sun with considerable vehemence, leaving everyone in the room white-faced
and in shock. It's an excruciating moment. I don't know whether I feel my pain or his pain more, but it is a deep wound, an outward manifestation of the frustration Sting must feel on the inside.
We get past it later with "sorry, man," and "I love you-sorry, mate," because underneath the layers of tension there is genuine affection. But I feel pain because-why? Why the fuck why? How long, [ wonder, how long?
The next morning I get a call from Kate, who tells me with hardly a breath that she wants a divorce. The buzzing flies and drifting palms become a roar in my ears as I sink to the floor. I argue on the phone with her, but it is useless. She is intractable; she has made her decision, that's it. I walk outside into the white light, feeling numb. Gone? She's gone? I can't imagine not waking up next to her-the pyramid of golden hair, the slender waist, the soft voice, the subtle humor, the incisive intelligence, the relationship, our child. The smell of paradise fills my head like a sour perfume, the bushes a few feet away across the small manicured lawn staring back at me like a hellish vision, and it feels as if a beautiful object has just slipped through my fingers and smashed. I feel the urge to return immediately to Ireland to try to rescue the situation, but she doesn't want me to come hack, says she'll see me in Canada to work things out. I stare up at the burning disc of sun and shiver, feel like throwing up.
I go back to the studio as usual that day, but with the sense that I inhabit a different world. I don't feel free, I just feel fucked up. I don't want this, don't want it. Love is the ultimate cruelty.
We work our way through the rest of the new songs: "Invisible Sun," "Hungry for You," "Too Much Information," "Rehumanize Yourself," and "One World." In the studio Sting is going through a phase of playing alto saxophone, and on many of these songs he adds little sax riffs that give the album a more blustery rhythm and blues feel than we have had in the past. One of my favorites this time is "Secret Journey," a song he has extracted from the pages of Gurdjieff's book Meetings with Remarkable Men. In spirit, this one is very much of the sixties, and as if returning to an earlier stance, I try to create the sound of the Himalayas with my Roland guitar synthesizer. In the middle of all the banter, bullshit, and brutality that are par for the course, I fight the desolation in my head with a facade of bonhomie and camaraderie, but it feels thin and I find it hard to concentrate as if I am trying to ignore a bad dream. I know I will have to say something eventually. I can't think of anything except the telephone call with Kate, and I keep going over it in my head. The nights are stifling and now sleepless as my brain races from the song we have just recorded to Kate's voice to the dive-bombing whine of mosquitoes in the oppressively close heat.
Stepping away finally from the Police-speak of the first three albums, this one will be called Ghost in the Machine, inspired by Sting's reading of the Arthur Koestler hook of the same title, which is an essay on the urge to selfdestruct-a hand-in-glove fit with my brand-new life.
We finish up the album with a sense that maybe it is a good one, but we're not entirely sure. Everyone around us seems to like it, but these days people tell us what we want to hear. Personally, I like about half of the album and hate all the tin-Police saxophone shit.
We pack up and head back to the airstrip. We are going to Caracas, Venezuela, for two concerts. The flight across the Caribbean is about two hours, but the only plane we can find to fly us and our equipment is an ancient-looking prop plane. Looking as if it has been repaired with elastic bands and chewing gum, it doesn't appear that it will last one hour, let alone two. Standing on the hot tarmac, we have serious misgivings about getting into this antique, but with a "live fast, die young" attitude, we climb in. With a death rattle the old dear sputters to life and rises like a parrot with a broken wing into the sky. We slowly climb to about ten thousand feet and turn toward South America.
We begin to enjoy it, as it feels as if we are in an old World War II movie. Eventually I get up and plop myself down at the back of the plane, resting against one of my Marshall cabinets casually chained in with the rest of the gear at the back of the cabin, since there is no cargo hold. One thing the Caribbean is known for is hurricane weather, which occurs with some frequency; although we don't exactly fly into a hurricane, it starts to get fierce and from nowhere the plane starts to buffet about, lose altitude, rise again, take sudden dips. It's frightening and it seems certain that we are going to go down. I crawl up the plane from my relaxed position and pull into a seat next to the emergency exit, strapping myself in with a face pale as ash. Seconds later the emergency exit door blows off the plane completely and sails down into the Caribbean. Luckily, I am strapped in-but still only about two inches from a large hole in the side of the plane with the sea ten thousand feet below. The roar of the wind outside is like the scream of death, and I have to move. With a chain of hands and arms gripping me, I unbuckle and crawl away from the gaping banshee mouth until I reach a comparatively stable spot on the other side.
We hurtle on across the Caribbean to Venezuela with the howl of wind drowning out all our voices-though we have gone very quiet as, white faced, and white knuckled, we grip our seats. Finally we cross the coast, but as we gaze down through the gash, the mountains appear like pinpricks and we feel even sicker. We drop down to the runway and shudder to a halt. One of the pilots gets out and kneels on the ground, making the sign of the cross as the other wipes perspiration from his brow. They have both been terrified by the experience, and we wonder what the hell we were thinking. I suddenly see the appeal of believing in a higher power.
That night we play at El Poliedro de Caracas, an arena on the outskirts of the city; it is a wild show, with the warmth and energy typical of South America. After the concert as we walk across the parking area to the transport we become aware of a commotion going on at the entrance to the auditorium. Soldiers in brown and green army fatigues are rounding up teenage boys and shoving them at gunpoint into army trucks to be taken off to the Venezuela-Colombia border to fight in the war. Most of the boys look about sixteen or seventeen years old, and in their bright T-shirts and spiked hair, they look like butterflies being carried off by carrion crows. A few young girls stand on the tarmac, watching and crying as their boyfriends and brothers are hustled off into the night. I trail across the tarmac and throw my stuff in the back of a purring limo and feel useless in front of this. It is a chilling display of the realities that exist in countries outside of Europe and the United States.
In North America Reagan is God and his presidency sets a new scene that will lead in twenty years to an administration that will become servile to polluters, fossil-fuel extractors, and fanatical religious fundamentalists of every stripe except Islam; be hostile to science; embrace fiscal insolvency; and transubstantiate worldwide solidarity into worldwide anti-Americanism. But the eighties will be looked back upon as a golden era. A few years from now as the presidency of Hugo Chavez is challenged, I will spend desperate hours in the airport as a military coup takes place and my equipment gets ripped apart in search of a bomb.
From Venezuela we fly up to Canada, where we are to mix a live album. This time is marked for me by Kate's arrival to discuss the divorce. I nurse a hope that maybe when we are together she will relent, maybe we'll be able to talk it through. But despite my efforts, divorce is what she wants. My attempts to talk her out of it are useless. We lie in the dark, with the wind gently soughing through the pines outside, and I go to pieces. It is a bitter lesson and I bury my head in the pillow, flooded with remorse, devastated that I won't see my daughter as she grows up, gutted that they won't be in my life anymore. But for Kate the marriage no longer exists; I am not there, I am adrift, elsewhere. She wants a genuine supportive relationship-a husband, a father, a partner-but in this gilded moment of excess and the carousel of rock touring, I am not providing it. We do not get specific or even accusatory, but the subtext is that as well as being forever absent, I am succumbing, indulging in all the temptations. It's over, and two days later she leaves, taking Layla with her. I fragment.
We finish mixing the live album and return to the U.S., where we play a couple of shows and then return to England. Because of the ever increasing whirl of activity around the group, the live album gets put away somewhere and sadly is never seen again, never sees the light of day. In London our old flat without Kate and Layla feels empty of everything but memory, and I hate being in it, hate going to the local shops, hate buying groceries just for me, and I take to eating out and being out all the time. I decide to move out of the flat, and I buy a larger house at the other end of Putney.
Twenty-Four
In October Ghost in the Machine is released. With a collective sigh of relief that we haven't blown it, the press give us rave reviews. Zenyatta Mondatta came in for some mauling, as most critics considered it to have one or two singles and a lot of filler. To an extent, they may have been right. We rushed through that recording without time to really think about it. "Invisible Sun" is the first single off this album, and the video is immediately banned by the BBC for political content they don't want to show on the grounds that it is too controversial. Once again the institution shows that it is living in the Stone Age and with a double standard. Our video contains no violent imagery but shows kids in Belfast-the lives of people in Northern Ireland and what they are subjected to. The BBC shows violent newsreels all the time, but when the same subject matter is expressed artistically they prefer to ban it-and by doing so promote it. We make various comments to the press and take a stand, but clearly the BBC does not approve of it as Top of the Pops material. Nevertheless, it reaches number one on the British charts within two weeks.
One Train Later: A Memoir Page 34