Sting Nothing Like the Sun released

Nothing Like the Sun Sting

Released: October 13, 1987 Peak: 9 US, 11 UK, 3 CN, 3 AU, 110 DF Click for codes to charts. Sales (in millions): 2.0 US, 0.3 UK, 9.5 world (includes US and UK), 18.43 EAS Genre: rock

Tracks: Click on a song titled for more details. The Lazarus Heart [4:35] Be Still My Beating Heart [5:34] Englishman in New York [4:27] History Will Teach Us Nothing [5:07] They Dance Alone (Gueca Solo) [6:48] Fragile [3:58] We’ll Be Together [4:53] Straight to My Heart [3:54] Rock Steady [4:28] Sister Moon [3:57] Little Wing [5:03] The Secret Marriage [2:02] Total Running Time: 54:45 The Players: Sting (vocals, bass, guitar, arrangements) Mike Egan (bass) Hiram Bullock, Andy Summers, Eric Clapton, Fareed Haque, Mark Knopfler (guitar) Kenny Kirkland, Ken Helman (keyboards/piano) Manu Katche, Kenwood Dennard, Andy Newmark (drums) Mino Cinelu (percussion, vocoder) Brandford Marsalis (saxophone) Gil Evans & His Orchestra (on “Little Wing”) Janice Pendarvis, Dolette McDonald, Renee Geyer, Pamela Quinlan, Vesta Williams, Annie Lennox (backing vocals) Ruben Blades (spoken Spanish on “They Dance Alone”)

Rating: 4.310 out of 5.00 (average of 21 ratings) Awards: (Click on award to learn more).

About the Album “If Dream of the Blue Turtles was an unabashedly pretentious affair, it looks positively lighthearted in comparison to Sting’s sophomore effort, Nothing Like the Sun, one of the most doggedly serious pop albums ever recorded.” AM Some critics, such as The Village Voice’s Robert Christgau, thought Sting was still pretentious on this record. Trouser Press’s Ira Robbins called it “self important…a tedious, bankrupt and vacuous cavern of a record.” WK On the flip side, AllMusic.com’s Stephen Thomas Erlewine calls this “one of his better albums.” AM This is an album which overall “is too measured, calm, and deliberately subtle to be immediate…So, why is it a better album than its predecessor? Because Sting doesn’t seem to be trying so hard. It flows naturally, largely because this isn’t trying to explicitly be a jazz-rock record. Thank the presence of a new rhythm section of Sting and drummer Manu Katche for that.” AM This is an album which effortlessly “explores the genres of pop rock, soft rock, jazz, reggae, world, acoustic rock, dance rock, and funk rock.” WK Rolling Stone’s Anthony DeCurtis wrote that “musically he is stretching without straining.” WK He said the album represented an “impressive growth for Sting. His voice is rich, grainy, and more mature; his ideas are gaining in complexity.” WK This is an album which also features a number of well-known guests, including Eric Clapton, Gil Evans, Mark Knopfler, Annie Lennox, and former Police drummer Andy Summers. “The melodies are insinuating, slowly working their way into memory, while the entire record plays like a mood piece – playing equally well as background music or as intensive, serious listening.” AM, yet calls of ‘Hey Mr. Pinochet’ also strike an uneasy chord,” AM but often “his lyricism shines.” AM The Songs Here’s a breakdown of each of the individual songs.

The Lazarus Heart Sting

Writer(s): Sting Released: Nothing Like the Sun (1987) First Charted: 11/28/1987 as an album cut Peak: 30 AR, 29 CO, 9 DF Click for codes to charts. Sales (in millions): -- Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, -- video, 3.75 streaming About the Song: “The Lazarus Heart” was originally written to be the musical finale of the 1988 film Who Framed Roger Rabbit? In an earlier version of the movie, Roger Rabbit was killed. When Disney changed the ending, the song was deleted. WK

Be Still My Beating Heart Sting

Writer(s): Sting Released: January 1988 a single, Nothing Like the Sun (1987) First Charted: 1/16/1988 Peak: 15 BB, 20 CB, 13 RR, 37 AC, 2 AR, 4 CO, 94 AU, 6 DF Click for codes to charts. Sales (in millions): -- Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, 7.0 video, 12.70 streaming About the Song: “Be Still My Beating Heart” was nominated for Grammys for Song of the Year and Best Male Pop Vocal Performance. That song and “The Lazarus Heart” “approach the subjects of life, love, and death.” WK

Englishman in New York Sting

Writer(s): Sting Released: 2/5/1988 as a single, Nothing Like the Sun (1987) Peak: 84 BB, 80 CB, 48 AC, 32 AR, 7 CO, 15 UK, 1 DF Click for codes to charts. Sales (in millions): -- Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, 141.00 video, 433.63 streaming

Awards: (Click on award to learn more).

About the Song: “Sister Moon” and “Englishman in New York” continue the jazz-rock sound that Sting employed on The Dream of the Blue Turtles. The latter song was written in honor of English writer, raconteur, and artist Quentin Crisp. WK

History Will Teach Us Nothing Sting

Writer(s): Sting Released: Nothing Like the Sun (1987) Peak: 17 DF Click for codes to charts. Sales (in millions): -- Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, -- video, 2.80 streaming About the Song: There are times “Sting’s words can still grate” AM such as in “the stifling pompousness of History Will Teach Us Nothing, the clearest example.” AM

They Dance Alone (Gueca Solo) Sting

Writer(s): Sting (see lyrics here) Released: 8/31/1988 as a single, Nothing Like the Sun (1987) Peak: 16 CO, 94 AU, 1 DF Click for codes to charts. Sales (in millions): -- Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, 8.20 video, 14.74 streaming

Awards: (Click on award to learn more).

About the Song: Inspiration for Nothing Like the Sun came from the death of Sting’s mother and his participation in Amnesty International’s Conspiracy of Hope tour. He saw parts of Latin America ravaged by civil wars and governments which oppressed its people. He also saw a story new story about women in Chile who danced the Gueca, a traditional dance expressing grief about their disappeared loved ones who had been tortured and murdered by the country’s military dictatorship. WK They would either hold, or pin to their clothes, photographs of their husbands, sons, fathers, and brothers who were gone. Sting called the song a protest against Augusto Pinochet, the dictator of the country. From 1973 to 1990, his regime killed thousands of people. Not surprisingly, the song was banned in Chile. However, after a new government took over, Sting received a medal and citation. SF U2’s “Mothers of the Disappeared” – released the same year on The Joshua Tree – covered the same territory. Sting said, “I never tackle political issues head-on. With something like ‘They Dance Alone,’ and the Pinochet regime, the metaphor was of the poor women dancing alone in front of government buildings; you could understand that metaphor whether or not you knew the political issues. I’ve never set out to write a song that is about, for example, the environment. Songwriting is much more veiled that that. The meaning reveals itself as you go into it.” SF Singer Jackson Browne told Rolling Stone in 2008 that “’They Dance Alone’ is one of my favorite examples of how to speak to people. He magnified an appropriated image and passed it on to the world.” SF The song included some heavyweights such as Eric Clapton and Mark Knopfler on guitar and Branford Marsalis on saxophone. Sting also recorded a version in Spanish.

Fragile Sting

Writer(s): Sting Released: 4/1/1988 as a single (UK), Nothing Like the Sun (1987) Peak: 18 AA, 22 CO, 70 UK, 6 DF Click for codes to charts. Sales (in millions): -- Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, 78.00 video, 144.23 streaming

We’ll Be Together Sting

Writer(s): Sting Released: 11/1/1987 as a single, Nothing Like the Sun (1987) First Charted: 10/9/1987 Peak: 7 BB, 7 CB, 8 RR, 20 AR, 4 CO, 41 UK, 13 AU, 5 DF Click for codes to charts. Sales (in millions): -- Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, 2.70 video, 6.88 streaming About the Song: “This is an album where the only up-tempo track, the only trifle – the cheerfully stiff white-funk We’ll Be Together – was added at the insistence of the label because they believed there wasn’t a cut on the record that could be pulled as a single, one that would break down the doors to mainstream radio.” AM

Straight to My Heart Sting

Writer(s): Sting Released: Nothing Like the Sun (1987) Peak: 30 DF Click for codes to charts. Sales (in millions): -- Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, -- video, 2.37 streaming

Rock Steady Sting

Writer(s): Sting Released: Nothing Like the Sun (1987) Peak: 1 DF Click for codes to charts. Sales (in millions): -- Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, -- video, 1.81 streaming

Sister Moon Sting

Writer(s): Sting Released: Nothing Like the Sun (1987) Peak: 10 DF Click for codes to charts. Sales (in millions): -- Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, -- video, 9.49 streaming About the Song: The album title was taken from the line “my mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun” from Shakespeare’s Sonnet No. 130. Sting uses the line in the song “Sister Moon.” Sting says he quoted the line to a drunk who asked, “How beautiful is the moon?” WK

Little Wing Sting

Writer(s): Jimi Hendrix Released: Nothing Like the Sun (1987) First Charted: 10/24/1987 as an album cut Peak: 11 AR, 25 CO, 8 DF Click for codes to charts. Sales (in millions): -- Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, -- video, 5.72 streaming About the Song: Jazz legend Gil Evans is featured on Sting’s cover of Jimi Hendrix’s “Little Wing.”

The Secret Marriage Sting

Writer(s): Sting, Hanns Eisler Released: Nothing Like the Sun (1987) Peak: 29 DF Click for codes to charts. Sales (in millions): -- Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, -- video, 2.29 streaming

Resources/References: AM AllMusic.com review by Stephen Thomas Erlewine SF Songfacts page for “They Dance Alone” WK Wikipedia page for Nothing Like the Sun WK Wikipedia page for “They Dance Alone” Related DMDB Pages: First posted 3/24/2008; last updated 8/14/2025.