Zenyatta Mondatta (studio album) by The Police

This was the first Police album I listened to again couple of years back. It was one of the early Police albums that I did not buy. Despite this, it does contain some of their very best songs.
The opening track remains a true classic and Driven to Tears really starts my musical arteries bubbling. It is, however, the second side of the album, where I am not so familiar with the tracks, that my enjoyment reaches its climax.
The fact that I still like the music Sting is releasing in the 21st century more than that of other 20th century rock legends shows me that despite the fame and fortune, Police were as good as they seemed at the time. Copeland & Summers both had enough talent and imagination to keep good albums rolling. That Sting, the male vocalist, is now more in the limelight than Copeland probably says more about the way popular music is packaged than about talent.

Overall Rating: 4.59

From Jboy56 12/22/2021 16:13

Good Police work from Police. The album is well-produced and it sounds so good, and the band plays extremely tightly together.
Picks: When the world is running Down, Don't stand so close to me, Canary,, Voices Inside My Head.
This album is a solid piece of modern fusion of rock, funk and reggae.

Despite being rushed, this is a solid album. "Behind My Camel" and "The Other Way of Stopping" are instrumentals that get a bid repetitive, and "Voices In My Head" is borderline obnoxious. But the rest of the album is all good, and underrated as a whole.

From IanFrance 03/20/2020 02:17

Riding the post-punk wave, The Police made their music stand out by leaning more heavily towards reggae than many of their contemporaries. The result was a fairly uncompromising career, even if some of their better known hits have been overplayed somewhat. This is a very good album, full of exciting sounds and virtuoso playing, and whilst it added little new to the Police's palette, it stands as a triumph in their catalogue.
High Points: When The World Is Running Down, You Make The Best Of What's Still Around; Don't Stand So Close To Me; Canary In A Coalmine

Enjoyable. Not as good as their previous efforts, but nice new wave/reggae-rock

It is all about the music. In this case there are no clever lyrics to distract. For me it works grand, just to sing along and feel good. The Police were a really good band. This is actually my favourite.

As I recall, this was one of those albums that ushered in the sound we later called, "new wave". It seemed as though the formatted radio stations didn't know quite what to do with it. But "Don't Stand" was too good to ignore. Not sure if the Police made it to the hall of fame. If they have, this record is one of the reasons why.

From poppmusic 03/05/2017 08:58

Tracks 1-4, 7: Killer
Tracks 5-6, 8-11: Filler

It starts with the power of a thousand suns and continues with the boredom of a thousand fillers.

Ends up being just average.

From discojets1 06/29/2016 21:39

This album is my favorite Police album. It is also number #14 on my greatest album chart. The only problem with this album is that 1/3 of the album is filler tracks that are normally instrumentals