Setlist

01	Message In A Bottle
01	Walking On The Moon
02	Demolition Man
03	Voices Inside My Head
04	When The World Is Running Down
05	Don't Stand So Close To Me
06	Driven To Tears
07	Hole In My Life
08	Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic
09	Wrapped Around Your Finger
10	De Do Do Do, De Da Da Da
11	Invisible Sun
12	Can't Stand Losing You
13	Roxanne
14	King Of Pain
15	So Lonely
16	Every Breath You Take
17	Next To You

Police are workable, not great...

Just before the house lights dimmed Tuesday night at American Airlines Center, Bob Marley's 'Get Up, Stand Up' wafted over the speakers.

As if the damp, sold-out crowd needed to be told, the moment Sting, Andy Summers and Stewart Copeland, collectively known as the Police, materialized from the darkness, the throng stood up and stayed there.

The influential band, performing its first Dallas gig in 23 years and the first half of a two-night stand, launched into 'Message in a Bottle', drawing enthusiastic cheers and the assistance of 20,000 backup singers. Sting, whose lithe frame belies his 55 years, sounded as youthful as he did in 1979, when 'Message' first appeared.

The Police sounded loose, even if their on-stage demeanor didn't exactly scream, "It's good to be back!" as Sting said before the opening riff of 'Walking on the Moon'.

Indeed, much of the evening's set displayed a peculiar tension: The classics were often reworked in ways imaginative (the exotic, liquid version of 'Wrapped Around Your Finger') and curiously inert (a slow-burn recast of 'Don't Stand So Close to Me' drained much of its urgency), yet the lesser-known cuts - the searing and still relevant 'Truth Hits Everybody' and the pensive 'Invisible Sun' - didn't elicit much response, with most concertgoers using unfamiliar songs for beer runs.

It's an inescapable dilemma for bands making the reunion rounds: How do you placate the fans who shelled out several hundred dollars to hear their favorites while keeping the performances artistically satisfying? The Police seemed to solve that as best they could by painting the classics with subtle new colors and wedging a few of the favorites into the mix.

Workable, perhaps, but not necessarily invigorating. The crowd was ecstatic throughout, but the same couldn't be said for the men of the hour.

© Star-Telegram by Preston Jones

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