Before Bocanada marked Gustavo Cerati’s emergence as a solo artist, he took on a different kind of challenge: reworking a song by one of the British bands that had helped shape his musical imagination. The result was Tráeme la noche, a Spanish-language version of The Police’s Bring On the Night, recorded with the band’s guitarist, Andy Summers, and drummer Vinnie Colaiuta. The collaboration brought together Latin rock’s most distinctive voices and musicianship rooted in one of new wave’s defining groups.
The original song was written by Sting and appeared on The Police’s 1979 album Reggatta de Blanc. Cerati chose it for its harmonic and melodic structure, as well as its memorable guitar work. Rather than simply translating the lyrics and recreating the arrangement, he reshaped the song around a darker, more atmospheric mood, giving the Spanish version a character of its own.
The recording took place in Los Angeles in February 1998, while Cerati was finishing Bocanada, his first solo studio album after Soda Stereo’s breakup. He took on vocals, guitar and bass, while Summers contributed guitar and Colaiuta played drums. According to Summers, the chemistry was immediate. Cerati even changed the tuning of the song, a decision that surprised the British guitarist but helped make the arrangement distinctly his own.
The track was included in Outlandos d’Americas, a Latin-rock tribute to The Police released on September 8, 1998. The project featured Spanish-language reinterpretations by artists from across Latin America, with members of The Police involved in several recordings—but Sting himself was not part of Cerati’s version. The collaboration was more than a guest appearance: it connected Cerati with musicians whose work had influenced his generation, at a moment when he was preparing to explore new territory on his own.
Cerati later recalled that the song’s mood suggested something almost vampiric. That approach suited the nocturnal atmosphere of the Spanish lyrics, which preserve the central idea of the original while adding the texture of his own musical sensibility. The result sits somewhere between tribute and reinvention: recognizable as a Police composition, yet unmistakably shaped by Cerati’s creative instincts.
The collaboration also raised the possibility of a live tour with Summers and Colaiuta. Summers wanted Cerati to join them on the road, but the Argentine musician remained focused on completing Bocanada and moving forward with his solo career. The tour never materialized, leaving Tráeme la noche as a fascinating snapshot of what could have become a larger musical partnership.
On Vitrola Stereo's TOP15 it reached number 4 on December 5, 1998.
Tráeme la noche captures a meeting of musical generations without making either artist disappear into the other’s shadow. Cerati approached a song he admired not as a museum piece, but as material to reinterpret—and the presence of Summers made that creative exchange tangible.
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