The Police – Every Breath You Take

“Every Breath You Take” – Single by the Police from the album Synchronicity. Released May 20, 1983.

This is one of the most misinterpreted songs ever. It is about an obsessive stalker, but it sounds like a love song. Some people even used it as their wedding song.

In America, this was the biggest hit of 1983, according to Billboard’s year-end chart. It stayed at #1 for eight weeks, longer than any other song that year (Michael Jackson’s “Billie Jean” was #2, with a seven-week stay).

Sting wrote the song in 1982 in the aftermath of his separation from Frances Tomelty and the beginning of his relationship with Trudie Styler. Their split was controversial. As The Independent reported in 2006, “The problem was, he was already married – to actress Frances Tomelty, who just happened to be Trudie’s best friend. Sting and Frances lived next door to Trudie in Bayswater, West London, for several years before the two of them became lovers. The affair was widely condemned.”

To escape the public eye, Sting retreated to the Caribbean. He started writing the song at Ian Fleming’s writing desk on the Goldeneye estate in Oracabessa, Jamaica.[13] The lyrics are the words of a possessive lover who is watching “every breath you take; every move you make”.

The video was very influential as it was one of the first to sequentially blend numerous faces of different ages and races from one to another as they mimed the lyrics to the song. Godley & Creme directed it themselves, making sure to position the subjects (obtained from the London Ugly Agency) in the same part of the frame.

The technique used to get from one face to the next is sometimes referred to as “morphing,” with it was really just dissolves and soft switcher wipes – technology that had been around for decades. The innovation was the concept.

The original plan for the video was to have the English ice skating champions Torvill and Dean skate to the song, but they weren’t available.
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