Bands like to end on a high, but few did it with as much panache as the Police. Having amassed increasing success since they formed in 1977, in 1983 the band issued their final album, Synchronicity – which was their biggest and, many would argue, best. It topped the charts in the UK and US, as did the single Every Breath You Take, and as well as being named one of the 500 greatest albums of all time by Rolling Stone, Synchronicity was selected last year by the US Library of Congress to be added to the National Recording Registry for being “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant”.
On 26 July it will be reissued in multiple formats with varying degrees of lavishness, most notably a six-CD box with 55 previously unreleased tracks including demos, alternate mixes and unheard originals, and a live album recorded in Oakland in 1983.
