In 1982, The Police were honoured with The Best Rock Instrumental Performance at the 1982 Grammy Awards for their Zenyatta Mondatta track ‘Behind My Camel’.
Guitarist Andy Summers recently sat down with Classic Rock Magazine, in an interview that revealed that despite the critical acclaim that surrounded ‘Behind My Camel’, Police frontman Sting completely despised the song. So much so that he tried to destroy it.
In an interview with Revolver back in 2000, Sting admitted “I hated that song so much that, one day when I was in the studio, I found the tape lying on the table. So I took it around the back of the studio and actually buried it in the garden.”
When asked about the drama that surrounded the recording, Summers passed it off as “typical band stuff.”
“I was always much more interested in weirder stuff,” admits Summers. “And the commercial hit songs always seemed to come out of Sting anyway.”
He continued, “We didn’t have enough songs to fill the album, and I had this ‘Behind My Camel thing’. I said: ‘How about doing this, then?’ And Sting said: ‘I’m not playing on that!’ I actually believe he did bury the tape in the garden.”
Zenyatta Mondatta, which boasts beloved hits like ‘Don’t Stand So Close To Me’ and ‘De Do Do Do, De Da Da Da’, reached number 1 in the UK upon its release in October 1980. With the aforementioned singles both achieving Top 10 success.
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‘Don’t Stand So Close To Me’ earned a Grammy Award for Best Rock Performance by a Duo or Group in 1982, though the unexpected success of ‘Behind My Came’ was very much a “how do you like them apples?” moment for Summer and The Police, much to the chagrin of Sting we assume.
“I loved the irony,” quipped Summer. “I’m sure there was some smug self-satisfaction: ‘’See? I fucking told you!’”
Check out ‘Behind My Camel’ by The Police:
