SPIN: The most powerfully revealing song on the album has to be' Lazarus Heart'. You've told me how the imagery for the lyrics came directly from a dream you had, so there was no chance for the mind to censor whatever the unconscious was trying to send up.
STING: I had this dream about my mother. Almost verbatim, the images were put down into verses. Looking under your clothes and seeing a wound you show it to your mother, because your mother would be the one to help you. Then you realise you've been given this wound by your mother. Then you see a flower grow from the wound. Then you see birds on the roof which is a symbol of death. In the dream I didn't have any stones to get rid of them. It was a real nightmare about my mother's death because I was feeling totally powerless. But at the same time, it's about being given a lot of strength by your mother.
SPIN: A therapist in England told me that 95 percent of the patients he works with have unresolved mother and father projections to deal with. In a way, your relationship with your mother tends to both reflect and influence your relations with all aspects of the feminine in your life - other women, your emotions, intuition, the arts. Can you relate to that?
STING: Oh, absolutely. I quite literally got music from my mother. One of my earliest memories is of sitting under the piano at my mother's feet as they worked the pedals as she played the piano. And it was her who encouraged me to play the guitar, it was her who listened to me. At the same time, it was her who created a lot of tension in me. I was the first child, and I think the first male child has a bigger psychological burden to carry than other children, because it's like a love affair. I speak from the experience of looking at the two women who have borne me male children. And it's love... it's sexual love, without mincing words, it's actual sexual love. And that doesn't have to manifest itself with actual cocks and vaginas, but it's still deep, sexual love. And it's even competitive for the father. That's something I've only recently come to understand about my mother, this kind of love affair, this kind of sexuality. I also thought my mother was extremely attractive. And she was only 18 years older than me. I have to say that I'm very free now, particularly since she died. Largely because I believe that she was trapped in this body that was no use to her. She was a very free spirit... my mother was a scarlet woman, an adulteress and she lived in sin with this guy. But she couldn't stand rules. So now she's free.
SPIN: The Lazarus dream reminds me of a book about the Grail myth called He by a Jungian analyst named Robert Johnson. In the myth the young fisher king receives a wound that can only be healed by finding the Holy Grail. Johnson identifies this wound as a childhood trauma, sometimes associated with the mother or father, that produces a sense of alienation. The unconscious mind often hides the memory of all this till it comes up later in therapy, or dreams, or art or something. The quest for the Grail stands for coming into your real self, which involves gradually bringing these hidden traumas and fears up into consciousness to be healed. Realising this about your mother, might that affect your trust situations with other people?
STING: My mother even in a way encouraged infidelity. When I first left home she was very keen that I should be a libertine. And I'm not particularly faithful... l become my mother occasionally this way sexually. I emulate that, the need to look outside of established relationships, even though they're wonderful.
SPIN: But besides emulating her, could it be her behaviour unconsciously convinced you that females and the feminine in general - including your emotions - are unstable and difficult to trust?
STING: I'm not sure... I don't think I really fear being left. I have absolute faith in the women I've spent time with. I don't trust myself.
SPIN: You mentioned that your mother's death freed you. I think that's also true in terms of your creativity on this album.
STING: Nothing in life is isolated. Everything's connected. And the timing of my mother's death was linked to a lot of other events. It coincided with a time when this album became free of the machinery. Only now are we pulling it out; it's been hidden in the machinery so long. Which is why people were getting uptight and worrying that there wasn't anything there. I don't have any doubts about this record. Although recording digitally was difficult and kind of alienating, it allowed me more flexibility in terms of arrangement... and that drove me crazy. I could change the key, add whole sections to the song when it was already finished, change the tempo, everything. But basically I knew there was a core in each song that worked that you couldn't destroy.
SPIN: The most powerfully revealing song on the album has to be' Lazarus Heart'. You've told me how the imagery for the lyrics came directly from a dream you had, so there was no chance for the mind to censor whatever the unconscious was trying to send up.
STING: I had this dream about my mother. Almost verbatim, the images were put down into verses. Looking under your clothes and seeing a wound you show it to your mother, because your mother would be the one to help you. Then you realise you've been given this wound by your mother. Then you see a flower grow from the wound. Then you see birds on the roof which is a symbol of death. In the dream I didn't have any stones to get rid of them. It was a real nightmare about my mother's death because I was feeling totally powerless. But at the same time, it's about being given a lot of strength by your mother.
SPIN: A therapist in England told me that 95 percent of the patients he works with have unresolved mother and father projections to deal with. In a way, your relationship with your mother tends to both reflect and influence your relations with all aspects of the feminine in your life - other women, your emotions, intuition, the arts. Can you relate to that?
STING: Oh, absolutely. I quite literally got music from my mother. One of my earliest memories is of sitting under the piano at my mother's feet as they worked the pedals as she played the piano. And it was her who encouraged me to play the guitar, it was her who listened to me. At the same time, it was her who created a lot of tension in me. I was the first child, and I think the first male child has a bigger psychological burden to carry than other children, because it's like a love affair. I speak from the experience of looking at the two women who have borne me male children. And it's love... it's sexual love, without mincing words, it's actual sexual love. And that doesn't have to manifest itself with actual cocks and vaginas, but it's still deep, sexual love. And it's even competitive for the father. That's something I've only recently come to understand about my mother, this kind of love affair, this kind of sexuality. I also thought my mother was extremely attractive. And she was only 18 years older than me. I have to say that I'm very free now, particularly since she died. Largely because I believe that she was trapped in this body that was no use to her. She was a very free spirit... my mother was a scarlet woman, an adulteress and she lived in sin with this guy. But she couldn't stand rules. So now she's free.
SPIN: The Lazarus dream reminds me of a book about the Grail myth called He by a Jungian analyst named Robert Johnson. In the myth the young fisher king receives a wound that can only be healed by finding the Holy Grail. Johnson identifies this wound as a childhood trauma, sometimes associated with the mother or father, that produces a sense of alienation. The unconscious mind often hides the memory of all this till it comes up later in therapy, or dreams, or art or something. The quest for the Grail stands for coming into your real self, which involves gradually bringing these hidden traumas and fears up into consciousness to be healed. Realising this about your mother, might that affect your trust situations with other people?
STING: My mother even in a way encouraged infidelity. When I first left home she was very keen that I should be a libertine. And I'm not particularly faithful... l become my mother occasionally this way sexually. I emulate that, the need to look outside of established relationships, even though they're wonderful.
SPIN: But besides emulating her, could it be her behaviour unconsciously convinced you that females and the feminine in general - including your emotions - are unstable and difficult to trust?
STING: I'm not sure... I don't think I really fear being left. I have absolute faith in the women I've spent time with. I don't trust myself.
SPIN: You mentioned that your mother's death freed you. I think that's also true in terms of your creativity on this album.
STING: Nothing in life is isolated. Everything's connected. And the timing of my mother's death was linked to a lot of other events. It coincided with a time when this album became free of the machinery. Only now are we pulling it out; it's been hidden in the machinery so long. Which is why people were getting uptight and worrying that there wasn't anything there. I don't have any doubts about this record. Although recording digitally was difficult and kind of alienating, it allowed me more flexibility in terms of arrangement... and that drove me crazy. I could change the key, add whole sections to the song when it was already finished, change the tempo, everything. But basically I knew there was a core in each song that worked that you couldn't destroy.