Did Paul Weller really spit on Sting?

Posted On August 15, 2025August 15, 2025

Paul Weller has never been one to mince his words.

Some of the former Jam and Style Council frontman’s withering putdowns are bang on. Margaret Thatcher was indeed a “tyrant”, and his decline of a CBE because he “don’t like the royal family” does any good socialist proud. Outside the political realm, Weller gets really personal. “I’d rather eat my own shit,” he once quipped when quizzed on the prospect of duetting with ‘You’re Beautiful’ drip James Blunt.

Weller aims his pot shots high. Calling Freddie Mercury a “cunt” for patronisingly wishing to bring ballet to the working classes, The Cure’s Robert Smith a “fucking knob end” possibly for his dissing the Red Wedge efforts, and allegedly telling Live Aid impresario Bob Geldof to “fuck off” for reasons not entirely clear considering his appearance on the Band Aid single.

But surely Weller hasn’t spat on anybody?

Well, no, not in person. However, backstage at 2007’s Teenage Cancer Trust show at London’s Royal Albert Hall, Weller allegedly targeted a projectile gob straight at the framed kisser of Sting hung on the wall, labelling The Police songwriter and Tantric sexpert a “fucking twat” for good measure. Weller’s been perfectly vocal in making his dislike for Sting more than apparent, telling Uncut the year before: “Fucking horrible man. Not my cup of tea at all. Fucking rubbish. No edge, no attitude, no nothing”.

Sting does appear to inspire serious loathing. As well as serving as a perennial celebrity punchline in Viz—one immortal ‘article’ detailing U2’s Bono passing the twat crown to Sting after “ten years as the country’s premier tit”—former Police members Stuart Copeland and Andy Summers have at times been barely able to share the same room as the former frontman, John Lydon excoriated The Police’s 2007 reunion tour as “soggy old dead carcasses”, and DC hardcore legend Henry Rollins put things plain and simple: “When someone hands you The Best of Sting, you realise that you are dead”.

It’s true that Sting followed a very wet solo career. After The Police’s implosion in 1986, Sting would play the rainforest Ewok for much of his career, rubbing everyone up the wrong way with his eco-smug and naming albums such rancid titles as The Dream of the Blue Turtles. Before long, he was telling The Guardian that “cancer is the result of undigested dreams”. He needn’t care, selling solo albums by the bucket load and having countless Grammys thrown at him.

Even the most committed Sting hater can’t deny those early songs, however. While it’s hard to extricate oneself from pub jukebox ubiquity or stale rock radio curation, ‘Roxanne’, ‘Message in a Bottle’, and ‘Walking on the Moon’ all crackle with infectious riffs and a gargantuan dub bass riff teeming with engulfing groove. The Police would stand as the premier band of the Second British Invasion, beating the likes of The Clash and Eurythmics as the decade’s leading UK act for the MTV age.

Whatever Weller’s ultimate gripe beyond just thinking his music’s shit, The Jam frontman chased a very different path, one that remained planted in the working-class anchorage of Thatcher’s Britain, and proud of its pop counter to the political turmoil of the decade. Perhaps that’s what subconsciously fuelled Weller’s hocker at the mere sight of him, a contempt toward a star who did everything to run away from his humble Newcastle roots and drifting off into commercially successful yet artistic irrelevance.

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