Sting regrets The Police’s reunion.

The 69-year-old singer reunited with bandmates Andy Summers and Stuart Copeland in 2007, 19 years after they split, and then embarked on a global tour in 2008 but the ‘Every Breath You Take’ hitmaker admitted the experience didn’t leave him feeling the way he’d hoped it would.

In an interview with Reader's Digest magazine, he said: “At the time I labelled the tour an exercise in nostalgia. That was simply how I felt and is still how I feel today.

“I think it’s OK to be honest about your feelings and that was the way it went for me.

“That’s not a slight on the people I was with or the way things panned out, it’s just how I saw it by the end, and let’s be honest, that’s not how I wanted to remember it.

“If I thought that would be the emotion I’d be leaving with, I wouldn’t have done it in the first place.”

Sting loves working as a solo artist because of the “total freedom” it offers.

He said: “I think there is a freedom in being a solo artist.

“It’s not a power thing, at all, it’s just about producing exactly the brand and style of music that feels right for you.

“Music, in every form, is a collaborative process, but never more so than in a band, where you have to consider other people almost more than you do yourself.

“To have total career freedom is, for me, the ultimate thrill of being a solo artist.”

The ‘Fields of Gold’ singer thinks it’s “great fun” to have a hit record, but he isn’t motivated by chart success.

He said: “It’s great fun to have a hit record, it really is, but it’s not why I make records and it never has been, to be honest.

“It’s easy to get swept along in the excitement of the charts – a lot more so in the eighties than it is today – but the truth is I make records out of love and curiosity, even if it’s always nice to have something on the radio.”