Sting fights the stuffiness in a trio, like The Police

A trio, a more reduced format than in previous visits to Catalonia; with The Police's repertoire well represented; overflowing with charisma, and with a voice that challenged intonation at times. This is how Sting carried on with Tuesday's concert at the Jardins de Pedralbes, as part of the Les Nits d’Occident festival. The audience, who had paid up to 300 euros, was up to par from the start. With an ovation, they received the first notes of Message in a bottle, one of many songs by The Police that he is playing on this tour, which he shares with guitarist Dominic Miller and drummer Chris Maas. The British singer and bassist, 74 years old and with a jovial appearance, quickly realized the good predisposition of the spectators and allowed them to sing the first verses of Englishman in New York. “Catalonia!”, exclaimed Sting at the end of a song that he performed with more rock thunder than jazz embellishments. 

Fans tried to quell the heat on a very stuffy Barcelona night while the calmer passages of Every little things she does is magic played, and the same fans accelerated the rhythm, in time with the song's acceleration. “Good evening everyone”, he said in Catalan before introducing Fields of gold and explaining that he has a house near Stonehenge. The more relaxed cadence suited his voice well, less strained than in The Police's songs. He even made a joke about the hydration breaks of the football World Cup to justify sitting on a stool to perform Never coming home, more recited than sung and with space for bass improvisation. And also for Miller to draw a guitar solo in the center of the stage. Mad about you suited his darker vocal range, a tone he also sought in Wrapped around you finger, by The Police, which he began by projecting mystery and melancholy, well accompanied by the resources the drummer deployed.

The rock-jazz filled the center of the concert, as if it were precisely a necessary hydration break for the audience to show all their impetus in the final third of the performance. The good understanding between the three musicians, and especially the good work of the guitarist, made songs like A thousand years more digestible, at the end of which a child handed him a sign that said it was his first concert. It is worth saying that most of the Pedralbes audience went to their first concert a long time ago… Some had even gone to the Narcís Sala Stadium in Sant Andreu when The Police performed there on October 1, 1983. Some of the songs he played on Tuesday are from that era. For example, two from the album Outlandos d'amour (1978): Can’t stand losing you, again with the voice brushing the danger zone, and a So lonely especially lively and finished with force. 

Sting's undeniable charisma achieved an indestructible connection with the audience, among whom was the president of F.C. Barcelona, Joan Laporta. The silence with which everyone followed Shape of my heart (and the number of phones filming) was eloquent enough of the admiration the British musician arouses. He responded by bringing this hit from his solo repertoire to the realm of emotion, well accompanied by Miller on second voice.

The audience decided to get out of their seats at the end of Brand new day, as if sensing the climactic moment was approaching, and maintained the delivery in the debatable orientalist exoticism of Desert rose. In this final stretch there was room for Every breath you take, one of the most terrifying breakup songs in history, which the audience sang from head to toe. It was the step before the encore, in which they played Roxette, the song that in 1978 established The Police's style as a reggae-infused New Wave and which at Pedralbes included progressive and funk derivations that did not spoil the spirit of the original, and Fragile, one of the ballads from Sting's second album, Nothing but the sun (1987), which in the nineties was covered by Julio Iglesias. In Fragile, Sting switched from bass to acoustic guitar while rocking the melody with a summery calm. It was the final point to an hour and forty minutes of Sting in a trio, like The Police.