OK this is were it gets REALLY embarrassing somehow . . . . . . . .so dated now but boy we liked this album and yes, I did buy this first 'Police' album along side a fine bootleg of a live performance when it came out here and 'Roxanne' was on every freaking radio you turned on it seemed like


Now not so much . . . . . . I don't believe I have played this album since the year it came out and yet it still has a place in my vinyl collection 

On this day in music history: November 2, 1978 - “Outlandos d'Amour” the debut album by The Police is released. Produced by The Police, it is recorded at Surrey Sound Studios in Leatherhead, Surrey, UK from January - June 1978. Recorded at engineer Nigel Gray’s studio (a converted village hall), the finished album costs just £2,000 ($3,189 US dollars) to make. It initially fails to make any impact in the UK due to the BBC banning the singles “Roxanne” and “Can’t Stand Losing You” (being about prostitution and suicide respectively). Both are re-promoted and hit #12 and #2 on the UK singles chart respectively. The band promote the record in the US with the now legendary “low budget tour”, flying over on Laker Airways (now defunct), with The Police crisscrossing the country in a van, playing small venues and college campuses. The relentless tour schedule helps push the album and “Roxanne” on to the US charts, the latter becoming the bands first US top 40 single (#32 Pop) in April of 1979. Originally released on CD in 1983, it is remastered and reissued in 1995. It is remastered and reissued again in 2003, in standard jewel case packaging, and limited edition digi-pak. Out of print on vinyl since in 1989, it is remastered and reissued as a 180 gram LP in 2009 as part of UMe’s “Back To Black” vinyl reissue series. It is reissued again on vinyl in 2014, and as a single layer SHM-SACD by Universal Japan. “Outlandos d'Amour” peaks at number six on the UK album chart, number twenty three on the Billboard Top 200, and is certified Platinum in the US by the RIAA.

thanks to Jeff Harris' excellent blog Behind The Grooves