30 July 1983
‘Every Breath You Take’ at least had that guitar riff, and ‘Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic’ a bright piano. But ‘Wrapped Around Your Finger’ has no redeeming features whatsoever; it’s relentlessly dreary.
The three worst things about any Police track are Sting’s singing, Sting’s lyrics, and Sting. Here, he sounds as dour and joyless as ever, but this time it’s his lyrics that are particularly awful. We know he’s a former teacher, and he wears his learning like an overcoat: mentions for Scylla & Charibdis so we know he knows Greek mythology, and Mephistopheles because that’s longer than saying “the devil”. The ol’ rhyming dictionary is out again: knowledge and college; tuition and fruition; and worst of all, alabaster and master. Sting seriously doesn’t seem to understand that these polysyllabic rhymes always come across as laboured and pretentious – or maybe that’s actually what he’s aiming for. He really is that unlikeable.
