Sting Following a very successful
career with The Police, lead singer Sting (Gordon Matthew Sumner)
ventured out on his own and embarked on an even more lucrative
solo career. It was in 1984, after The Police took a permanent break
from each other, that Sting began experimenting with new musical genres.
The result was a powerful first solo album, Dream Of The Blue Turtles
(1985), for which he enlisted jazz musicians Branford Marsalis and
Omar Hakim. This album saw Sting moving away from the standard pop
fare of the Police into a more a socially aware, jazz-based state
of mind.
1. lucrative: adj. 有利的
Dream Of The
Blue Turtles sold two million copies thanks to three Top Ten
hits, "If You Love Somebody Set Them Free," "Fortress Around Your
Heart" and "Love Is the Seventh Wave." When Sting took to the road
to promote the album, he realized the success of the tour and thanked
his fans by releasing Bring On The Night, a somewhat self-conscious
tour documentary. A double-live album of the same name was also
released. This collection not only showed Sting performing his own
new material, but also jazzed up versions of already popular Police
songs.
It was also around
this time that Sting became heavily involved with Amnesty International
and major concert events like Live Aid and Band Aid, both which
helped aid the famine in Ethiopia.
1. famine: n. 饥荒
In 1987 Sting was
still riding high on political strife and released his second
solo studio album, Nothing Like The Sun, featuring a bevy
of superstar rocksters including Eric Clapton and Dire Strait's
Mark Knopfler. Following the release of Nothing Like The Sun,
Sting stepped up his involvement in various social causes, including
Amnesty International and the Rainforest Foundation, which he founded
with girlfriend Trudy Styler to publicize the plight of the
Brazilian rainforest.
1.strife: n. 斗争, 冲突, 竞争
2.bevy: n. 一群鸟, 一群(少女或少妇), <俗>一堆东西, 一群
3.plight: n. 情况, 状态, 困境, 盟誓(婚姻)
Sting's next studio
effort, The Soul Cages (1991), was a dark album that saw
him battling demons over the death of his parents and his
Newcastle childhood.
1.demon:
n. 魔鬼, 极残忍的人
The 1993 release,
the hit Ten Summoner's Tales, showed a lighter side of the
ex-school teacher as he sang about love and relationships. The album
produced two Top 20 hits, "If I Ever Lose My Faith in You" and "Fields
of Gold." The same year he teamed up with Bryan Adams and Rod Stewart
to record "All For Love" a sappy love song for the Three Musketeers
soundtrack that shot to the top of the American charts. The success
of these three singles solidified Sting's transition from new wave
rock star to adult contemporary recording artist.
At the 42nd Annual
Grammys, he won an award in the Best Male Pop Vocal Performance
category for his 1999 album Brand New Day.
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