Sting's "Every Breath You Take", released with The Police in 1982 and now a staple choice for weddings, was actually written while his own marriage was collapsing. The singer has repeatedly described the track as dark, controlling and even "sinister and ugly", noting that listeners have widely misread it as a tender love song when it was intended to convey obsession and surveillance rather than romance.

Sting wrote the song while staying at a friend's Jamaican estate to escape a public affair and the breakdown of his marriage to actress Frances Tomelty, whom he had wed in 1976 and with whom he had two children. The couple divorced after Sting began a relationship with Tomelty's close friend, Trudie Styler, who later inspired the more genuinely affectionate Police song "Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic". Sting has said he was thinking about "Big Brother, surveillance, and control" when writing "Every Breath You Take", and has cautioned that its lyrics reflect jealousy and possessiveness rather than romantic devotion.