If you were alive and conscious in 1979, you probably remember the song “Roxanne” by The Police better than anyone. The new wave outfit’s charting hit was absolutely everywhere. An addictive reggae-rock tune with some pretty taboo lyrics, “Roxanne” hit No. 12 on the UK Singles chart in 1979 and No. 32 on the Hot 100. Honestly, you might be surprised to learn that it wasn’t at the very top of the charts. Radio stations loved this song, and it was inescapable for a while. It’s still a very popular tune today.
Funnily enough, “Roxanne” by The Police was close to never being the career-defining hit it is today. In fact, when it was first released on this very day, April 7, 1978, the song was more or less a huge flop. It wasn’t until a rerelease in 1979 that the song took off.
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“Roxanne” Was Slow To Appeal to Audiences Until a Rerelease in 1979
“Roxanne” first dropped on this day in 1978 off of the album Outlandos d’Amour. Sting wrote the song about a man who falls in love with a sex worker after seeing the women who worked outside of the band’s hotel in Paris back in 1977.
It was the song that caught the attention of Miles Copeland III (The Police drummer Stewart Copeland’s brother), even though the band themselves weren’t very thrilled with the tune. Copeland became their manager then and there. He scored the band a deal with A&M Records, and the song would be their first single via the label.
“[Copeland] took it to A&M and got a contract for one single,” The Police guitarist Andy Summers said of the song. “I don’t think it ever broke the Top 40 in America, but eventually it became The Police[‘s] signature tune.”
That was the truth. The single did not chart at all when it was first released. Then, on April 12, 1979, “Roxanne” was released in North America as The Police’s first single on our side of the pond. The song was a smash on the Billboard Hot 100 chart and did similarly well in Canada. The success of the song encouraged a rerelease in the UK as well. There, “Roxanne” went all the way to No. 12 there.
Photo by Fin Costello/Redferns/Getty Images
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