Sting– whose sold out first show last night at the Hollywood Palladium was a total knockout– got a Super Bowl surprise from eldest daughter Kate.
“There was a commercial for the new Wolverine movie, Logan,” Sting told me last night at the Roosevelt Hotel’s hip Spare Room club. “Someone was singing Amazing Grace. I thought, I like that voice. I know it, don’t I? The next day Kate calls me and says Did you hear me singing during the Super Bowl?” Sting did a double take for me. “She’s amazing! She recorded it in her bedroom!”
Kate Sumner is one of Sting’s six children; three of them at least are singers. Son Joe Sumner is touring with him right now on his “57th and 9th” tour. Joe is also featured in the show, performing a chilling version of David Bowie’s “Ashes to Ashes” plus a few of his own songs. (I wish he’d do his old Fiction Plane song “I Hate People.”) Plus daughter Coco, aka Eliot Sumner, is having radio rock hits and is on tour with her own band.
The new Sting tour began February 1st in Vancouver and has gotten rave after rave. Tonight is the second show at the Palladium. (They hit New York March 14th at the Hammerstein Ballroom.) Sting is 65 years old but we know he defies gravity and logic. He looks 30 and has the energy and physique to back that up. He and long time band leader Dominic Miller have stocked the stage with a young backing band — the Last Bandoleros– and Miller’s son Rufus. The result is a taut, sharp and muscular sound that recalls Sting’s early days with the Police some 40 — yes, 40– years ago.
The set includes several Police hits including “Synchronicity II,” “Next to You,” “So Lonely” and “Spirits in the Material World,” plus new hits like the very catchy and topical “One Fine Day” and the radio hit “I Can’t Stop Thinking About You.” Sting’s voice soars, supple as ever. His secret? “Apple cider vinegar,” he said on stage, and gargled with it for the audience. “You should try it sometime.”
Well, I think I could drink a gallon of the stuff and it wouldn’t work for me like it does for Sting!
