Bring on the Night

Album: Reggatta de Blanc (1979)
Play Video

Songfacts®:

  • Written by Sting, this is the fourth track from the band's second album. Drummer Stewart Copeland lists it as one of their best album cuts.
  • Sting borrowed lyrics from "Carrion Prince (O Ye of Little Hope)," a song he wrote for his previous band, Last Exit.
  • This was released as a single in the US, France and Germany, but only charted in France, where it peaked at #6.
  • The second line of this song, "when the evening spreads itself against the sky," is taken from T.S. Eliot's 1920 poem "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock." Sting noted in Lyrics By Sting: "What is it Eliot said? 'Bad poets borrow, good poets steal'?"

    Something like that. What Eliot actually said (from his 1920 collection of essays The Sacred Wood): "One of the surest of tests is the way in which a poet borrows. Immature poets imitate; mature poets steal; bad poets deface what they take, and good poets make it into something better, or at least something different. The good poet welds his theft into a whole of feeling which is unique, utterly different from that from which it was torn; the bad poet throws it into something which has no cohesion."

Comments: 1

  • AnonymousPrescient lyrics in view if the CCPs bucket of s--t (opp.s tunnel) where 6300 people were drowned in their cars. and trains. and buses. Whuf
see more comments

Editor's Picks

Dave Edmunds

Dave EdmundsSongwriter Interviews

A renowned guitarist and rock revivalist, Dave took "I Hear You Knocking" to the top of the UK charts and was the first to record Elvis Costello's "Girls Talk."

Barney Hoskyns Explores The Forgotten History Of Woodstock, New York

Barney Hoskyns Explores The Forgotten History Of Woodstock, New YorkSong Writing

Our chat with Barney Hoskyns, who covers the wild years of Woodstock - the town, not the festival - in his book Small Town Talk.

Real or Spinal Tap

Real or Spinal TapMusic Quiz

They sang about pink torpedoes and rocking you tonight tonight, but some real lyrics are just as ridiculous. See if you can tell which lyrics are real and which are Spinal Tap in this lyrics quiz.

John Kay of Steppenwolf

John Kay of SteppenwolfSongwriter Interviews

Steppenwolf frontman John Kay talks about "Magic Carpet Ride," "Born To Be Wild," and what he values more than awards and accolades.

Bob Daisley

Bob DaisleySongwriter Interviews

Bob was the bass player and lyricist for the first two Ozzy Osbourne albums. Here's how he wrote songs like "Crazy Train" and "Mr. Crowley" with Ozzy and Randy Rhoads.

Francis Rossi of Status Quo

Francis Rossi of Status QuoSongwriter Interviews

Doubt led to drive for Francis, who still isn't sure why one of Status Quo's biggest hits is so beloved.