The music video for ‘Every Breath You Take’ by The Police has officially surpassed 1,000,000,000 YouTube streams, making it the 225th video to achieve this milestone.
Released in 1983 but uploaded top YouTube just 12 years ago, ‘Every Breath You Take’ is the seventh music video from the 1980’s to have secured one billion views. In 2019, The Police single was named the Most Performed Song at the BMI Pop Awards with 15 million radio plays, from BMI’s catalogue of over 14 million musical works and last year, the title was also added to Spotify’s ‘Billions Club,’ having amassed over 1 billion streams on the platform.
Shot in black and white, the video features the British trio performing the song, with frontman Sting (born Gordon Matthew Thomas Sumner) singing and playing the double bass, Andy Summers on guitar, and Stewart Copeland drumming, accompanied by a four-piece string section and grand piano.
One of the best-selling bands of all time, The Police trio have sold 75,000,000+ records worldwide. They became a global touring sensation throughout the early 1980s and are a multi-award-winning group with two Brit Awards, six Grammys and an MTV Video Music Award for ‘Every Breath You Take.’ In 2003, the band was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
Recording only five studio LP (four of which were included in Rolling Stone’s 500 Greatest Albums of All Time list), the band produced an extraordinary number of commercial successes and critically acclaimed hit singles. Their musical range and deft musicianship, paired with Sting’s astute lyrics, successfully mixed punk, reggae, jazz and rock influences into a melange of hit songs that have stood the test of time.
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Author: Al Denté
Photo: Lionel Urman