The Police "Zenyatta Mondatta" [1980]

Here's the big secret about new-wave popsters The Police: they were sell-outs from the very beginning. That their third album, "Zenyatta Mondatta" (a title almost as meaningless as the tunes themselves), finally actually charted more than one single only proves that they were slow learners, and their ultimate wretch-inducing effort wouldn't come for a couple more years (with the inexcusably intolerable "Synchronicity"). Show-offy drummer Stewart Copeland and aural wallpaper-purveyor Andy Summers back up Sting, a jumpy hypochondriac of a lead singer who's apparently tied off his nut-sac with a rubber band to hit such dog-whistle pitches (which would also explain his claimed success with tantric sex: coitus for 8 hours straight? his poor wife!). Anyway, "Zenyatta Mondatta" is music for people who are too white to appreciate reggae and too stupid to listen to anything but Top 40 radio. The Police are, ultimately, an on-the-nose representation of the rampant corruption within the music business.