It’s been a good while since Sting strapped on his bass for a straight-ahead rock ‘n’ roll tour, but that’s how fans found him on Wednesday for the first of two nights at the Hollywood Palladium, salting songs from his new album, “57th & 9th,” perhaps the catchiest pop collection he’s done in two decades, between older solo hits and a healthy dose of classics by the Police.

At 65, the British rocker has written his musical, done his classical album, even gone through the late-career lute phase that most rockers do — kidding! — and now seems perfectly happy to go back to the basics for a bit, with a show that revisited all of the irresistible melodies laid atop rock and reggae and jazz and pop that long ago made your favorite Police chief a star in the first place.

And with 22 songs scattered across an hour and 45 minutes, the crowd in the sold-out Palladium surely got to hear most of what of what they came for, the eight new tunes matched with eight Police songs, the rest of the set made up of solo songs and a Bowie cover.

Of course many the crowd probably only heard 21, because if you didn’t know the structure of the night — Sting serving not only as headliner but host and cheerleader, too — you might not have been there when he strolled out on stage by himself at a few minutes after 8 p.m. to play a new number, “Heading South On The Great North Road,” a lyric based on the only road out of his northern England hometown, before the opening band, the Last Bandoleros, arrived for their set.

Before he played it, though, he told the first of many stories by way of introducing songs and their history, remembering how he and the Police had first played Los Angeles at the Whisky A Go Go in March 1979, and how this Englishman in L.A. flipped out over the first palm tree he’d ever seen.

“I said, ‘Guys, stop the van!’ and they looked at me like I was crazy because I got out and hugged the palm tree,” Sting said.

When he returned an hour later he’d shed the dapper jacket and acoustic guitar for a T-shirt, jeans and his usual well-worn bass, jumping right into the past with a pair of Police hits, “Synchronicity II” and “Spirits In The Material World,” which as we’ve already noted, showed he’d come to rock and rock hard.

His current band features longtime guitarist Dominic Miller, who’s played with Sting for nearly three decades now, Miller’s guitarist son Rufus, who’s been in the band at least since the last rock show Sting played here, a short run at the Wiltern Theatre in 2011, and Orange County’s Josh Freese on drums proving himself more than up to the challenge set by Police drummer Stewart Copeland’s work on the original versions of these songs.

Sting’s activism on various fronts is well-known but with one or two exceptions he stayed away from explicit commentary on recent changes in American leadership. That said, “There is no political solution,” the opening line of “Spirits In The Material World” got a huge cheer from the crowd, as did other lyrics in that song, and his introduction to “One Fine Day,” a climate change-inspired song from the new record, made clear what the rock star thinks of policies affecting that aspect of the world’s health.

“I would love to live in that world where climate change is a hoax,” Sting said. “I would happily be wrong in what I have believed for the last 30 years … but it’s a (bleeping) joke. William Blake, the great English poet said a man who persists in his folly will one day become wise. Let’s (bleeping) hope he’s right.”

Other high points early in the set include the older solo tune “Englishman In New York,” which opened with a slinky reggae-fired bass line from Sting, and the new single, “I Can’t Stop Thinking About You.”

Various members of the Last Bandoleros sang backing vocals with Sting’s son Joe Sumner throughout the set, and the accordionist for that band of young San Antonio musicians also popped out periodically to add a touch of Tex-Mex to Sting’s sound.

“I’m So Happy I Can’t Stop Crying,” a country song Sting wrote a few years back, resurfaced in a reggae arrangement. Country reggae probably isn’t going to be the next big genre but it was fun to see him experimenting with the different sounds that long have interested him.

New song “Petrol Head” rocked harder than anything he’s done in decades and “50,000” — a song he wrote after the death of Prince last year, which was preceded by a cover of David Bowie’s “Ashes to Ashes” sung by Joe Sumner — was a touching commentary on the mortality of aging musicians from the rock star’s point of view.

“Shape of My Heart” from the 1993 album “Ten Summoner’s Tales” featured the delicate guitar picking of Dom Miller and on Wednesday filled a spot in the set where earlier stops on this tour the equally gentle “Fragile” was played.

But other than the Arabic-tinged “Desert Rose,” thrilling in its percussive abandon, the last stretch of the show offered one fast-paced rock number after another, classic police hits such as “Walking On The Moon,” “So Lonely,” and the set-closing mash-up of “Roxanne” and Bill Wither’s “Ain’t No Sunshine.”

The first encore kept that fast pace with the early Police number “Next To You” after which arrived “Every Breath You Take," one of that band’s biggest hits. Both earned huge sing-alongs from the crowd, as did many songs in the night.

After another very short break, Sting returned to stage by himself for a final song, sitting down to play acoustic guitar and sing “The Empty Chair,” the just-nominated candidate for the Oscar for best song, a composition he wrote for the documentary “Jim,” which tells the story of James Foley, the American journalist murdered by ISIS.

“This guy was a true American hero,” Sting said in introducing the number. “Compassionate, inclusive, kind.”

The Last Bandoleros opened with a rousing set of roots-based rock and roll, often with touches of the Tejano music that flourishes in their hometown of San Antonio. They were a whole lot of fun and seem poised for bigger things, and the belief that Sting has in them was reflected when he and his entire band came out to join in on their debut single, “Where Do You Go,” Sting singing backing vocals into a mic shared with the Bandoleros’ bass player.

Joe Sumner, whose band Fiction Plane had a few albums out over the past decade, played a solo acoustic set of three songs, mentioning as he introduced his song “You You You” that the lyrics it shares with the Police’s “De Do Do Do De Da Da Da” were his childhood invention.

That’s true, Sting said later in his set, grinning at his oldest son. “He never did get any royalties, though,” he said. “It’s too late now, the statute of limitations has run out.”

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