Police Stories #1—Stewart Copeland: Dear Isakandar

Putting together each tribute, I come across more stories than I can possibly tell in a single concert. Thank goodness someone invented the internet so that I have a place to share them. There'll be plenty more tales to tell when we take the stage at SPACE in Evanston on August 7th.

—bandleader William Lindsey Cochran

Dear Iskandar,

A lot has happened since we broke that branch off of old Abu Tannous's olive tree, behind the Tarazi palace.  Do you remember our little town in the Lebanese hills overlooking Beirut?  That was back in 1965.  The Russians had just made it into outer space and I was playing in my first band.  I wonder what you and your mom are up to now.

We parted rather suddenly when my dad evacuated us after his CIA cover was blown.  Do you remember that English kid?  Well, his dad's cover was blown, too—as a double agent for Russia!

So we got pulled out of the American Community School in Beirut, and I was packed off to boarding school in England.  Out in the misty wilds of Somerset, I kept on blasting on the drums whenever I could.

I got pretty good at it.  By the time I left college, I could get into a semi-famous group, and pretty soon I could break out with a little band of my own.  We were called The Police and ended up playing huge stadiums.  Our songs were glued to the charts.  It was a blast!  We struggled for two years, surged for four years, and then just sat there at the top of the world for another two years before walking away.

—excerpted from a letter written by Stewart Copeland to a childhood friend in 2009