The Police’s Second No. 1 Hit in the United Kingdom Came From Sting Taking One “Stupid” Thing and Making It Dumber

One of the most important aspects of songwriting is not getting too hung up on details that sound stupid at first. If Paul McCartney had beaten himself up over only being able to think of the line, “Scrambled eggs, ooh, baby, I love your legs,” we might have never gotten the iconic Beatles track “Yesterday”. Similarly, if The Police had written off an idea that came from a drunken stupor one night in Munich, they could’ve missed out on their second No. 1 hit.

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According to bassist, vocalist, and songwriter Sting, he was powering through the spins in a hotel room in Germany when the initial riff for “Walking On The Moon” came to him. “I got up and started walking around the room, singing, ‘Walking ‘round the room, yeah, yeah, walking ‘round the room.’ That was all,” he explained in L’Historia Bandido, per Sting’s website.

“In the cool light of the morning, I remembered what had happened, and I wrote the riff down,” he continued. “But ‘Walking ‘Round The Room’ was a stupid title. So, I thought of something even more stupid, which was ‘Walking On The Moon’.”

That “Stupid” Title Became the Police’s Second No. 1 Hit in the U.K.

After a bit more woodshedding (with a bit less alcohol), The Police arranged a complete version of “Walking On The Moon”. They included the track on their second studio album, Regatta de Blanc, from 1979. And stupid title or not, the song obviously resonated with the general public. The track was a follow-up single to their No. 1 single, “Message In A Bottle”. This follow-up track also hit the top of the charts. “Walking On The Moon” was the band’s second No. 1 hit in the U.K.

The riff that came to Sting’s head while drunk in Munich served as the foundation of the entire song. The motif was only around three or four notes. And with The Police only being a three-piece band, there was a sparseness to the overall arrangement. But that’s where the magic was.

“As a three-piece, what was intelligent about us was, instead of trying to pretend we were a bigger band, we used that limitation to our advantage,” Sting explained to GQ in 1993. “Less is more. There were some big black holes in ‘Walking On The Moon’. You get those on the radio, and people are immediately sucked in. Same with ‘Roxanne’. That guitar chord Andy came up with for ‘Walking On The Moon’ was just mind-blowing.”

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