Entertainment

POLICE BRUTALITY

THAT the Police can stand to be in the same room with one another is amazing; that the seminal punk, reggae and pop band is reuniting Sunday for the Grammys is a miracle.

For fans know that the trio had anything but synchronicity in their final years together.

Every breath they took could have been their last, with all the arguments among the three bandmates – frontman Sting, drummer Stewart Copeland and guitarist Andy Summers.

The end finally came in 1985, after the Police’s world tour for “Synchronicity,” when the band – formed in London in 1977 – went on a so-called sabbatical that has lasted more than two decades.

By the end of their eight-year run, the three were fighting like brothers in a dysfunctional family, with stories of broken ribs and even knives pulled.

When they recorded “Synchronicity,” the men were in three different rooms on different floors.

It became a “weird symbol of where and what we’ve become,” wrote Summers in his memoir “One Train Later.”

Reportedly, they even recorded at different times – Sting did his parts during the day and Copeland at night – and once, when Sting was out of town, Copeland erased all of the parts Sting recorded, which led Sting to erase all of Copeland’s.

Copeland, who went to extremes to avoid Sting, has called recording their last album “a living hell.” Onstage, the musician was said to have positioned his drum kit backward or strategically place a cymbal so he wouldn’t have to look at Sting. And, the stories go, he’d scrawl “f – – – off” on his drum kit and imagine he was banging Sting’s head while pounding out a beat.

As they attempted to re-record their greatest hits in 1986, Sting was rumored to have pulled a knife on Copeland. They aborted the project.

The rivalry reached a symbolic pinnacle when Copeland broke Sting’s rib – accidentally, while brawling – landing the singer in the hospital in 1983, dimming the afterglow of the Police being one of the few rock bands to play at Shea Stadium since The Beatles.

Veteran punk-rock deejay Meg Griffin, now on Sirius, says that concert was remarkable.

“Tension often creates better art, even if temporarily,” she explains. And how: While together, the Police sold 40 million records and won five Grammys.

In Melbourne, Australia, on the last night of that final tour, Jim Vallance, the drummer for supporting act Bryan Adams, says the Police were presented with a large “end-of-tour” cake.

“Sting started to make a speech, then paused midsentence and dumped the entire cake on Stewart’s head. Stewart and Andy grabbed handfuls of cake and smeared Sting’s face, and a brief food fight ensued,” writes Vallance, who says, on his Web site, the food fight was all in good fun.

In Copeland’s tour documentary, “Everyone Stares: The Police Inside Out,” Maria Milito, a deejay at Q104, says: “They’re beating each other up, but they’re laughing as they do it, so I don’t know. But, they’re getting back together, so it’s awesome.”

During the difficult sessions for “Synchronicity,” Summers even turned to Beatles producer George Martin, no stranger to squabbling bandmates, because they were “at one another’s throats” at a studio in the Caribbean.

The fighting had mostly to do with egos and creativity. The songwriting had become less collaborative by as early as the third album, “Zenyatta Mondatta.”

Copeland admitted Sting could do everything – composing and playing. “Andy and I had ideas of our own, but, by the time we got there, Sting had figured everything out,” Copeland said, as he promoted his film.

“At first he was prepared to compromise, but gradually he became less patient about it . . .”

At the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony in 2003, when they played their first concert in 18 years, Summers joked, “There’s absolutely no ego in our band whatsoever.”

Then, Sting quipped that Copeland complained that there wasn’t enough drumming in the songs Sting had wanted to play.

But Copeland has also hinted that the legendary stories had been blown out of proportion.

“We certainly had screaming matches, like any band, but somehow ours became part of the story,” Copeland told Vue Weekly last fall. And if they can survive the Grammys, the ongoing Police story may even include a reunion tour.

marymhuhn@nypost.com