Learn English with "Every Breath You Take" by The Police

Sting wrote Every Breath You Take in 1982, not long after separating from his first wife, the actress Frances Tomelty, and at the start of his relationship with Trudie Styler — who, in one of pop music's odder coincidences, had been Tomelty's close friend. Wanting to escape the pressure of the breakup and the band's punishing schedule, Sting retreated to Goldeneye, the Jamaican estate once owned by James Bond author Ian Fleming, where he woke in the middle of the night with the song's central line already forming and wrote the rest at the piano within the hour.

The Police released it as a single on 20 May 1983, ahead of their fifth and final studio album, Synchronicity, which followed on 17 June 1983. It became the band's biggest hit by far: eight weeks at number one on the US Billboard Hot 100, two weeks atop Canada's RPM chart, and a fourth spell at number one in the UK — the band's fifth chart-topper there. Billboard later named it the best-selling single of 1983.

At the 26th Annual Grammy Awards in February 1984, the song won Song of the Year and Best Pop Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal. Sting wasn't there to collect either trophy — the Police were on tour in Australia — so Bob Dylan and Stevie Wonder accepted Song of the Year on his behalf.

Guitarist Andy Summers' rippling, arpeggiated guitar figure is as much a part of the song's identity as the vocal melody; Summers has said plainly, 'Without that guitar part there's no song,' and drummer Stewart Copeland has credited him with finding the exact shape that ties the whole arrangement together.

Despite its gentle, romantic surface, Sting has repeatedly explained that the lyric is not a love song at all. He has called it 'a nasty little song, really rather evil,' built around jealousy, surveillance and possessiveness rather than devotion — a duality that still surprises people who have heard it played at weddings for over forty years.

The black-and-white music video, directed by Godley & Creme and inspired by the 1944 jazz short film Jammin' the Blues, won cinematographer Daniel Pearl the very first MTV Video Music Award for Best Cinematography at the inaugural ceremony in September 1984 — and by 2022 had passed one billion views on YouTube, decades after its original release.

If you liked this, we recommend:

• Total Eclipse of the Heart — Bonnie Tyler (Welsh English, another 80s power ballad about obsession and longing)
• Stay With Me — Sam Smith (British English, a modern gospel-soul take on need and vulnerability)
• Blinding Lights — The Weeknd (Canadian English, an 80s-revival synth-pop cousin decades later)
• Perfect — Ed Sheeran (British English, the calmer, unambiguously romantic side of a love song)