So, it was with that same excitement 16-year-old me felt that I headed to the Atkinson to see Police drummer Stewart Copeland in conversation, but not before attending a ‘meet and greet’ with the great man, for which I paid £85. On arriving at the venue, it turned out there were 93 other people just as excited as me who had also booked a ‘meet and greet’. I got to meet Stewart, have my photograph taken with him, and have him sign a couple of those old records of mine.
So, to the main event. The stage was set with two armchairs and side tables, one each for Stewart and the interviewer (sorry, I didn’t catch her name). Stewart was asked to describe his early life, particularly growing up in Beirut which, at the time, was a rat’s nest of spies, espionage, and counter-espionage. Stewart’s father, Miles, was indeed a spy working for the CIA. His task had been to install Gamal Abdel Nasser as president of Egypt. Stewart was oblivious to his father’s work, attended school and had friends just like any other boy his age. One of his friends was John Philby, son of the notorious double agent Kim Philby.
It was while he attended the American Community School that he picked up drumsticks for the first time after watching his older, cooler brother play with a band called the Black Knights. He listened to his brother rehearse and realised he wasn’t very good, so he decided to slip into his brother’s room and try the drums for himself. It turned out he was a natural, and he was soon recruited to join the Black Knights. He didn’t last long, though, following Kim Philby’s defection to the Soviet Union, his father was posted to London.
He was then asked how his musical career started with the hippie band Curved Air and then how The Police got together, a story he told with great delight. It was here we first heard him call Sting “Stingo,” something that had the audience laughing out loud.
Stewart is a terrific raconteur who could make eating a bowl of Corn Flakes into an entertaining anecdote, so I won’t go into every detail of The Police’s formation. But after seeing Sting’s band, Last Exit, play, he knew he wanted to work with him. He persuaded Sting to leave the band and move down to London, where they could cash in on the burgeoning punk rock movement. The pair met Andy Summers while working as session musicians, and he eventually asked to join Stewart’s band. Thus, The Police were born.
The Police didn’t catch fire immediately, so Stewart made some records of his own under the pseudonym Klark Kent. He even made it onto Top of the Pops with the single “Don’t Care,” with Sting backing him in a gorilla suit and Andy in a Leonid Brezhnev mask. It wasn’t long before The Police went stratospheric, and by 1983 they were the biggest band on the planet.
This was a convenient point for the interval, during which there was a rush to the merchandise stall where signed copies of Stewart’s book were on sale.
The second half of the show was a deep dive into The Police breaking up, Stewart’s post-Police career, their eventual reunion, and some questions from the audience.
It was only after some band therapy ahead of their reunion tour in 2007 that Stewart and Sting came to understand their musical differences, differences that had been the “special sauce” that made The Police great but also drove them apart.
After The Police disbanded, Stewart established a career composing soundtracks for films and television, while also branching out into opera, ballet, and even computer games.
There were many other fascinating and funny anecdotes that I won’t recount here, but if you want to know more, I suggest you buy the book. After all, this is what nights like this are for in the end: selling something.
Stewart Copeland’s Have I Said Too Much tour continues through to November 2025.Tickets can be bought direct from venues or via the link below,
https://www.ents24.com/uk/tour-dates/stewart-copeland
Reviewer – Adrian Cork
On – 24.09.2025
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