WCSX Classic Cuts : Message in a Bottle
WCSX Classic Cuts The Police: “Message in a Bottle” The Hook: Stewart Copeland calls it the group’s “finest hour.” Album: Reggatta de Blanc Year: 1979 Writer: Sting Stats: Although it…
The British rock band The Police perform onstage, circa 1980. Left to right Sting, Stewart Copeland and Andy Summers. (Photo by A & M Records/Courtesy of Getty Images)
Credit: Hulton Archive / GettyimagesWCSX Classic Cuts
The Police: "Message in a Bottle"
The Hook: Stewart Copeland calls it the group's "finest hour."
Album: Reggatta de Blanc
Year: 1979
Writer: Sting
Stats: Although it was a Top 5 single in many countries, the U.S. wasn't one of them. It only reached number-74 on the Billboard Hot 100.
Background: Drummer Stewart Copeland thinks very highly of "Message in a Bottle." He tells just how highly, and how the song came about.
Police drummer Stewart Copeland on "Message in a Bottle." OC:...and everything. :24
"I believe The Police's finest hour. We just played it around and around, I think, three or four times, just kept playing and kept building up momentum and miraculously, the tempo stayed more or less the same. And then we cut together sections of the different things and put it together to create that track, and then overdubbed all kinds of drum parts and guitar parts. It was sort of like the 'Good Vibrations' of The Police, where we discovered overdubbing and everything."
