Reports in Britain have caused Police fans to hold every breath they take.

What began as curiosity, boiled into speculation, and then bubbled over with rumors and Internet chatter about a possible reunion of the pop trio. The possible 2007 shows would be the band’s first since 1986, and would also mark the 30-year anniversary of the release of “Roxanne,” the song that broke The Police in the States.

But things don’t seem to be starting on the right foot.

First, Billboard reported that – though the claims in the British press are legitimate –no member of the band will not comment publicly until all the details are finalized. This sounds like Nick Saben denying he’s interested in the coaching vacancy at the University of Alabama. “No comment… I’m not interested… no comment… I’m staying here… No comment… I’ll take the job.”

If the reports are legit, what’s the point in not commenting? Are Sting, Andy Summers and Steward Copeland afraid of pulling a Van Halen – when the band paraded David Lee Roth out with them on stage during the 1996 MTV Video Music Awards in preparation for a reunion tour that ended up never taking place?

The thing that is most troubling about the Police possibly getting back together is not my disdain for reunited acts (see columns “I Want My Favorites To Stay Away” pt. 1 and 2 from March 12 and 30, 2006 respectively) nor is it that The Police were never a great band to begin with.

It’s that the three members have apparently learned nothing form their 20-year hiatus.

Guitarist Summers, who has always been the most level-headed of the three, is sitting by the wayside the same as he use to. Sure, he had his volatile moments, but often they were in response to bickering between Copeland and Sting.

It’s the other two that still aren’t seeing eye-to-eye – and some would argue they never did.

The Police was always a power struggle between a great drummer and his charismatic frontman. And the battle was always over the same thing – which should lead the band?

Sting seemed like a logical choice – given his budding public persona and the fact that he wrote almost all of those radio-friendly tunes, including all the staple tunes.

Well, he seemed like a logical choice to everyone but Copeland – who felt he should call the shots because he started the group, and his brother was its manager. Coincidentally, Miles Copeland still managed Sting’s solo career long after The Police debacle.

In typical Copeland form, the legendary drummer still has a chip on his shoulder… even on the brink of a possible reunion.

He told Billboard, “The more rational approach would have been, ‘OK, Sting, go make a solo record, and let’s get back together in two or three years.”‘

Do you see what he’s doing here? He’s taking the blame for the band’s demise! All these years, he’s claimed that Sting was the person who broke up the band, and he swore he could have continued. But now, it was apparently his own stubbornness to keep Sting as only a Police member that was the final straw.

This would be a good time to state that I subscribe to the thought that Sting is an extremely overrated songwriter, a boring performer, and egomaniac that actually did cause the split in his band.

But that doesn’t excuse Copeland’s recent change.

All along he’s played the card of the good guy. But now, when Sting has publicly said he has no interest in a Police reunion – which ultimately makes him responsible for the band’s future – Copeland claims it is he, not Sting, that called the band’s final shot.

It’s like people who blamed Paul McCartney for officially breaking ending The Beatles, but now praise him for euthanizing that band. The drummer is trying to do the same thing.

He went on to say, “I’m certain we could have (continued). Of course we could have. We were definitely not in a creative dry space. We could have easily carried on, and we could probably still be there. That wasn’t to be our fate. It went in another way. I regret we never paid it off with a last tour.”

So not only is he taking responsibility for the end of the band – affectively making him “the man” – but he’s also playing up for the fans, stating that the trio should have given it one more go-round.

This reunion will never work. Rarely do they ever.

Sting is still pompous and likes be courted as much as he likes writing music. Copeland still suffers from “little man complex,” and feels the need to puff out his chest and remind everybody how powerful he was more than 20 years ago. And Summers is still content to let these two stand toe-to-toe.

This is going to be a train wreck. In fact, it will be a bigger train wreck than it was in 1986, when the guys were young and vibrant. Now they’re just bitter, old men.

If tickets are actually affordable – and not bracketed for the Dockers-clad, nostalgia hounds that are sure to make up the bulk of the audience – I might go… front row center… just so I have a great seat when Copeland “accidentally” riffles a drumstick at the back of Sting’s head. Or when Sting coincidentally tells the sound guy to lower the drum levels so that Copeland is inaudible.

They really are the kings of pain.

Daily Herald BEEP, Jan. 4, 2007