The band splits up

-   “To be honest, it’s not easy” said Sting gently.
We were at Paul’s, sitting in the living room where the heat was overwhelming. Sting was bare-chested under his sempiternal dungarees, as if he had nothing else to wear. He’d just driven me home from Bazza’s studio in his 2CV, where we’d just recorded the new Police single, Vision of the Night, with John Cale. It was the first Sting composition that Stewart had accepted.
-  “I swear, I can’t cope… We can’t cope…” he continued.
-  “Yes, I know”.
 -  “No, I don’t think that you, you really do know”.
I don’t like confrontations. Well, not those imposed on me - it puts my back up. I’ve always reacted in this way; I suppose it’s wrong of me. I know I shouldn’t react on heat, but there you go.
 - “Come on, spit it out! What’s the problem?” 

Sting has always been a nice guy, but he had changed a lot since we’d first met. The group too had changed. There was now Andy. Andy was the new one. He was thirty-four, ten years older than us. I thought he was a good guitarist, but a bit boring… Too old, man!

We’d been together nearly a year. We had started out as a three-piece and we were now a four-piece, but we weren’t any better than we had been at the start. Andy’s arrival had added nothing. Quite the opposite.

The Police that followed the original band that we had been became probably the biggest popgroup in the world. They gave immense pleasure to millions of people, and allowed Sting, Stewart and Andy to dazzle us with their talent. Awesome!

But the fact remains that, when Andy joined, he destroyed the group that we had been. He didn’t do it deliberately, he was not wicked and he actually played really well.  But that which we had started, could not continue. I’m talking about “Police Punk Rock”, or rather, the Police that wanted to be a punk band.  I honestly do not have the pretension to try to say that we were any better. Obviously not!  I don’t even know whether we were a good band.

In the context of my new emancipation and the mad vortex into which I had plunged, I was living this adventure passionately, like a first love affair…

At the time, no-one could have imagined that The Police would become what they became. Certainly not us, and even less so Andy. So yes, I had held it against him when he arrived and just destroyed our group, my first real group, the one which had made me want to dedicate my life to rock. 

Today, I can only pay homage to him for having transformed the Police in such a way. With hindsight, I see that it was a fantastic chance for the public, for Sting, for Stewart, for Andy, and even for me. And without his attitude, I probably wouldn’t now be in the process of writing this book.

Without his attitude, my name would probably never have been one of the answers in the game Trivial Pursuit. To the question: “What is the name of the guitarist that Andy Summers replaced in the band “Police”, people naturally have to answer “Henry Padovani”. The same question was recently asked on French national television, on the program “Questions pour un Champion” (a gameshow similar to Who Wants to be a Millionaire). That time, it was my father who was really proud when all his family and friends phoned him having seen the program. Even more so because the contestant had actually known the answer! Amazing! Maybe it’s asked throughout the world on similar programs. If that’s the case, I hope people win because of me. It would be a lie to say that it doesn’t give me a lot of pleasure. Like my father said: “He made our name known throughout the world”. And making your father proud – that’s priceless isn’t it?

-  “You know, I’m broke”… We’re not getting anywhere” Sting said, trying to calm me.
He could see that I was getting agitated and he didn’t like it. But I continued on the same level, annoyed that he was telling me what I already knew.
 -   “What do you think? That I don’t know? Me neither, I have no money.”
 -   “Yes, but for you, it’s not the same”.
-    …
-    “Yes, for you it’s like being on holiday. You’re not from here. If nothing happens, you can go home. Me, I can’t go home.”
-      “I don’t want to go home”
 -     “You don’t understand…”
-   “ Listen,” I interrupted, “I understand everything. I’ve always understood and it’s not because I’m a foreigner that I don’t understand.”
-   “That’s not what I was trying to say…You, you’re having a ball. You’re in a heady spiral of freedom and madness. Me, I’m not having any fun. Every day I ask myself how I’m going to feed my family. Do you understand that?”
Sting was already a great bassist and a great singer. In addition, he was particularly good on stage. But he hated being penniless, and probably also the success that wasn’t coming, the lack of recognition….
-     “I know. Why do you think I always bring food when I come by your place?”
 -         “I appreciate it, but…”
-      “OK, I spend everything I earn, I jump on anything that moves, I smoke and take anything that’s going… So?”
-      “I’m not trying to get all moralistic on you…
-   “Sting, occasionally, yes you do get moralistic! It’s not important, because I love you the way you are. But you do wind me up when I go off with girls after a concert – you go on about fidelity, love… Remember when we were in Paris and I brought that girl back to the hotel room, you were happy enough to participate that night weren’t you?
-     “What do you want me to reply to that?”
-    “Nothing. There’s nothing to say”.
The subject had relaxed the atmosphere a bit
-      “It might be stupid of me to bring this up , but in that hotel room, you and I had a good time that night didn’t we?”
-       “You were completely pissed. You even fell off of the bed while you were messing around behind her…”
We fell about laughing at the memory, but I sensed that he was desperately trying to talk to me about something.
  -        “Sting…”
-      “What?”
 -      “I know you want to tell me something”
We looked at each other and I added:
-      “Go on, spit it out. It’s about Andy isn’t it?”
He took a deep breath and drank another sip of tea.
-     “Look, I was trying to tell you… It’s not easy! Andy’s got plans; he wants to do some sessions that would involve us.
-      “You mean all of us?”
-    “No Henry, just Stewart and me.”
 -     “That seems fair enough to me, you’re both very good musicians...”
 -      “And he wants the group to continue… But as a three piece. Without you.”
I’d been expecting this for some time. And obviously Andy had some ideas. I wondered what Stewart thought of it. As if reading my mind, Sting continued:
-       “You know, Stewart didn’t agree at first. When Andy spoke to us, when we were doing that stuff with Mike Howlett in Paris…”
That was the time we had first met Andy. Mike Howlett had put together a temporary group, Strontium 90, for a concert at the Hippodrome in Paris, in honour of Gong. He’d been looking for session musicians and had engaged among others Andy, Stewart and Sting. After the concert, Andy had joined the Police.
I tried to laugh it all off but the discussion was important to him. Me, I was not following anymore. I didn’t want to talk about all this. I could feel it coming. OK, so they wanted to continue the three of them. I found this stupid. I felt that we could have continued as a four-piece. I don’t like stopping halfway. I never have. Why give up? Life is always complicated.
-       “Excuse me, carry on…”
-        “When Andy mentioned his project to us, Stewart refused. He wanted for us to try it out  as four. Me too. And we tried, didn’t we?”
I didn’t reply
-      “But the thing is, with Andy, we’ll have more opportunities. It’s hard to say it! And me,  I’ll manage to place in my songs. You see, Andy, he’s pushing me to write more stuff, he likes what I’m doing.”
He was going round in circles.
-     “It’s true, he’s very supportive of you, and he is really good with all the chords he knows”
I was helping him out. I didn’t like seeing him in that state. I realized that the others had given him the chore of breaking the news to me.
-     “Exactly! You, you’re rock and roll and one day you’ll be a great guitarist, but for the moment, you’re still learning. He’s played with loads of different people and he knows jazz like the back of his hand. You know that’s important to me”.
-      “I realize that it won’t work with the four of us. I am sure it would be better as a three piece: you, Stewart and Andy. You saw the argument at Mont-de-Marsan and today with John.
-   “That John Cale is such a cretin. He didn’t have to do that to Andy. Anyway, he was drunk. He was taking the piss out of us".
-     “I liked the guy”.
-      “That doesn’t surprise me. He’s your type. I’m sure you’d get on well with him. But what he did to Andy wasn’t very cool."
-   "How about Stewart? What did he think?"
-     “He wasn’t happy either. He felt we’d wasted the session”.
-       “OK. And Andy?”
-     “What do you think? He wanted to kill him! And you, you were laughing, like always, and when John asked you to do the solo, you didn’t understand…”
-     “Why should I have said anything? I was happy. He liked my guitar playing and that made me happy. Especially since Andy wanted to do all the guitar parts by himself… And you didn’t say anything either… Anyway, all that’s in the past…”
Sting stared down at his teacup.
I carried on:
-     “And when John said to Andy, ‘OK, you want to play the solo? Play it on Henry’s guitar!’ The look he gave…”
As there was no still no reaction from Sting, I helped him out:
-      “They sent you as a messenger to tell me that the group is finished?”
He lifted his head and looked me in the eye:
-     “Yeah”
-    “You know what? It’s OK. No worries, Sting, it was on the cards.”
-    “I’m so sorry. Stewart and I, we love you.”

 -      “You saved my life! I’ll never forget that”.
 -      “Stop. Anyway, I saved mine at the same time”.

There, it was done. Sting felt better, and so did I.
I knew exactly what I was going to do. I’d go to Corsica, spend some of the summer in the sun, spend some time with my parents, my brother, my sister and my friends. It had been over a year since I had left, saying I’d be away for a fortnight…
I also knew that I would return to London. Very quickly. I could only but miss all that Rock and Roll.