"The Dream Of The Blue Turtles" by STING – July 1985 UK Debut Solo Album on A&M Records [ex The Police] featuring Guest Musicians Branford Marsalis, Omar Hakim, Darryl Jones, Kenny Kirkland, Eddy Grant and Frank Opolko (November 1998 UK A&M Sting Remasters Series with Bonus Video Content) - A Review by Mark Barry...

 

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This Review And Many More Like It 

Available In my Kindle e-Book (June 2022 Version)

 

LOOKING AFTER NO. 1 

Volume 2 of 2 - M to Z...

 

Your All-Genres Guide To

Exceptional CD Reissues and Remasters 
For Music from 1956 to 1986

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"...Beast In A Gilded Cage..." 

 

In my twenties and along with most of my mates who had loved all of The Police albums (de do do, de da da or not) - Sting's debut solo was always going to be an event. And it was. With eleven tracks, July 1985's "The Dream Of The Blue Turtles" managed five singles stretching well into the Spring of the next year where it even got nominated in 1986 for Album of the Year. 

 

He had musically progressed and its Jazz-Rock sensibilities both appalled people and turned them on. Sting was intelligent, a great songwriter and applied brains to his ludicrously catchy rhythms. And when I listen in May 2022 to "Russians" and its dire warnings of 'a growing feeling of hysteria' and 'historical speeches' and 'bury you' threats - it has a staggering and worrying place in our present war-footing in the Ukraine. 'There's no such thing as a winnable war, it's a lie we don't believe any more...' 

 

The original 1985 LP was quickly followed by CDs in 1986, 1990 and so on - but The Sting Remasters Series finally saw his catalogue upgraded - hidden gem tracks like "Children's Crusade" suddenly got the uplift they had always need - all that quality original Production brought to the audio fore. Poppies for young men. To the details...

 

UK released November 1998 - "The Dream of The Blue Turtles" by STING on A&M Records 540 992-2 (Barcode 731454099226) is part of The Sting Remasters Series - The Album Digitally Remastered with One Enhanced CD Video added on as a Bonus Track. It plays out as follows (41:44 minutes):

 

1. If You Love Somebody Set Them Free [Side 1]

2. Love Is The Seventh Wave 

3. Russians 

4. Children's Crusade 

5. Shadows In The Rain 

6. We Work The Black Seam [Side 2]

7. Consider Me Gone 

8. The Dream Of The Blue Turtles 

9. Moon Over Bourbon Street 

10. Fortress Around Your Heart 

Tracks 1 to 10 are his debut solo LP "The Dream Of The Blue Turtles" - released June 1985 in the UK on A&M Records DREAM 1 and in the USA on A&M Records SP 3750. Produced by STING and PETE SMITH - it peaked at No. 3 in the UK and No. 2 in the USA on the Rock LP charts. 

 

ENHANCED CD VIDEO (Mac or PC):

11. If You Love Somebody Set Them Free  

 

The inner sleeve photos and lyrics of the original LP are all reproduced in the double-sided fold-out inlay - fourteen faces in total. Musician credits are there of course and instructions as to how to access the Video - but it's a shame that apart from the words Digitally Remastered running down the see-through spine of the jewel case - there is no history or context for interviews illuminating. 

 

DAVE COLLINS has done the Remasters at A&M's Mastering Studios in Hollywood - and the subtle muscle is so evident when you crank that shuffle in "Consider Me Gone" - clear but not overpowering - just how you'd want it. Shame A&M didn't include those tasty associated B-sides "Another Day" for "If You Love Somebody Set Them Free", the live version of "Consider Me Gone" on the flipside of "Fortress Around Your Heart" or "Gabriel's Message" on the back of "Russians". Can't help thinking fans would have wanted those on an Audio CD format rather than a CD-Video track they'll probably never access more than once.

 

Forgiving the short doodle and nonsense title track over on Side 2 - the whole LP is brimming with intelligence and clever hooks. The effect of history repeating itself in the words of the dark and doomy "We Work The Black Seam" alongside music that digs into your consciousness as you listen is still there - the Remaster only making you appreciate it more. I can probably go without hearing "If You Love Somebody Set Them Free" ever again, but tracks like "Love Is The Seventh Wave" and "Consider Me Gone" feel like goodies aching to be rediscovered. The jazz of "Moon Over Bourbon Street" gives way into the Synchronicity-sounding "Fortress Around Your Heart" - a brilliant ending to a unique debut. 

 

Sting would go to even greater heights with October 1987's double-album "...Nothing Like The Sun" and March 1993's "Ten Summoner's Tales" where practically ever song could be considered as single potential and his subsequent Greatest Hits sets are filled with them. And yet he's been derided too - become un-hip - seen as a know-it-all and even pretentious - all of which I think is knob. 

 

Sting has always produced music of quality and with a rare intelligence in-tow - and this Enhanced CD Remaster of his stunning debut "The Dream Of The Blue Turtles" only hammers that point home on re-listen more than ever. 

 

"While the armies all are sleeping, beneath the tattered flag we'd made, I had to stop in my tracks, for fear of walking on the mines I've laid..." he sang on "Fortress Around Your Heart". Smarts and musicality - what a combo...