Brothers In Arms: Dud... or do you know different?

Anyhoo, I quite like it, but mainly its second side. Top shag stuff, especially its title track.

a while ago I realised I hadn't listened to Brothers in Arms in many years, and started feeling nostalgic towards it, thinking that it was actually quite a good record which became more unpopular than it deserved.

Then I listened to it and realised it was overproduced shite.

Has anyone else heard Ronnie Drew's cover version of 'Brothers In Arms'? That's Ronnie "wheh wheh wheh" Drew of the Dubliners. It's on his album "Dirty Rotten Shame".

Cue discussion of how justifiable it is to have "the sort of people who like a record" enter into discussion of whether the record is good or not.

That said, if I never hear that particular song again I will die without regret. I wonder what it would be like if we could hear it fresh again, stripping the paint of overplay off of its once-brig surface. "Walk of Life" was less overplayed, but is even more chipper/bouncy and probably more potentially annoying, if that makes sense.

"So Far Away" and "Why Worry" and above all "Brothers in Arms" (the song) can all still make me happy at times. So I'd still rank this record as a classic.

Is it me or does one of these names kind of stick out?

I like this album OK, but over the years it's become clear to me that Making Movies is really all the Dire Straits I need (altho if I could trade the awful "Les Boys" for something off Love Over Gold or Brothers, I'd be happy).

I always think of liked the lyrics in "One World" where Mark sings about not being able to find sleeves for his records. Dire Straits were great in their time.... zt

I recently came to a very similar conclusion.

I remember breaking from that state when in town I told my dad I wanted Live after death instead of alchemy live...

you could see it in his eyes that this was the beginning of the end....

Actually no, in Europe we got the same video. "Ah those crazy yanquis cannot play real football, etc."

I HATE that song btw. Brothers in Arms, the song, on the other hand is pretty amazing.

I had a dream recently about the 'Money for Nothing' video, which now reminds me of the question that has puzzled me since about 1989: why does the nondescript 'So Far Away', rather than the epic drift-in and riff-up 'Money For Nothing', open the LP?

I don't think it's as good as the previous DS albums but I still like it despite the fact it's overly slick, sometimes smug and a bit Patrick Bateman.

I love the first 5 tracks the best.

is romeo & juliet on it?

Nope

That Dom review was spot on up there.

"Dire Straits songs come in two flavours: anthems and album closers. They end with six album closers here..."

Still think Knopfler had something going on here re. tone....wouldnt be MY tone but whatever

not following up BIA for years = classic

So Far Away = classic

Non singles in this>>> non singles on Tango in the Night.

Been listening to them quite a bit lately and am amazed such a downbeat band could be among the world's biggest at the time. Like a secular Pink Floyd.

tell u what at Live Aid (and bang in the middle of a world stadium-and-arenas tour) they were tight. as. fuck.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NyVDIOnieAg

The title track to Brothers in Arms is very much in the Pink Floyd building ballad mold, which they did quite a few. I like that one quite a bit, although I like those same bits on Love Over Gold more.

from Marcello's reappraisal:

But there is, overall, a terrible mixture of indolence and arrogance about this music, and how it is played. The second and far less well-known side of the record is largely about war, but skilfully avoids naming any names or identifying any real causes or cures, such that, by the closing title track – Dave Gilmour covering “Bird Of Paradise” – all that we have learned is, essentially, that war, war is stoo-peed and pee-pul are stoo-peed. And despite the folky touches on two of these songs, Knopfler is so far away from being Dick Gaughan, or even the Billy Bragg of “Between The Wars.”

Mixed with this arrogance is a world-weariness which you don’t feel Knopfler has really earned. It is a record of entitlement, smugness and assumed superiority. On “Money” he sneers that he shoulda learned to play the gee-tar, but on “Walk Of Life” he is sneering even at the poor sod busking for pennies in Tottenham Court Road tube station. He has a go at the one-night stand he bumps into on “Your Latest Trick,” even complains at the hapless lover on the other end of the telephone on “So Far Away” as if it were her fault that he was successful and on a world tour.

http://nobilliards.blogspot.com/2014/07/dire-straits-brothers-in-arms.html

boring album. the best bits are when it tryes to mimic avalon.

what's with the font on the first response in this thread??

That was his thing for a while iirc

'your latest trick' wiki info:

The saxophone introduction to the song is widely used when people are trying out saxophones at music shops,[1] just as Led Zeppelin's Stairway to Heaven is widely used when trying out guitars. It was also used in the theme music for the TVB series File of Justice.

I love this album but I always skip over "Money for Nothing" because it sounds like a belch compared to the rest of the album.

wtf is going on with the font on kodanshi's first above?

Yeah I didn't think you could choose your font on here. If you can't, how did he do it?

like an ancient yellowed scroll from the early days of ilx

alright, lets make this a real ILX discussion - when bands cover "Money for Nothing" should they just sing the "see the little faggot" part or just mumble over it, Knopfler-style?

why would you cover money for nothing???

BECAUSE YOU'RE A SHIT COVER BAND PLAYING COUNTY FAIRS!

when bands cover "Money for Nothing" they shouldn't sing any of the lyrics except "what's that? Hawaiian noises?"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Ihqk7iapM8

Is there a collective noun for rolled up sleeves? Dire Straits seem to be setting some records for it in that Live Aid vid.

crut OTM.

^^^

Whenever I listen to this album, I'm always surprised by how downbeat it is, with the exception of 'Money For Nothing' and 'Walk Of Life' - although I guess 'One World' is musically upbeat, but lyrically not. It's the melancholy tracks that have aged the best, I think. I could easily live without hearing 'Money For Nothing' again, and I have always hated 'Walk Of Life' with a passion. There's something about that keyboard lick that makes me feel like I never want anyone to catch me listening to it.

Also the full versions on the CD > the edited versions on the vinyl edition.

There's something about that keyboard lick that makes me feel like I never want anyone to catch me listening to it.

was always a bit too close to the birdy dance for me

This album really is the gold standard in "million-selling super massive records that nobody really cares about anymore" isn't it?

which is kind of ironic, considering I think all of its predecessors have come back into fashion, to an extent.

This is news to me. Dire Straits seem as uncool as ever at the moment.

See one: War On Drugs, indie band of the moment.

Wild Nothing really aped Dire Straits on the track Nocturne

WTF? I don't hear Dire Straits on that Wild Nothing LP at all!

"Walk of Life' like a lot of other songs from that era sounds like it was meant to be played as commercial bumper music for baseball games circa 1985-1987. "Money For Nothing" is a joke that no one really got, soundwise i guess it's "Paradise City" for the people who spawned the alt-right. the rest of the tracks are a lot better. it's not a bad album, but when people joke about eighties shit they should joke about this, it's such a relic.

video for "walk of life" was a montage of sports bloopers

this album sounds really great, even if the songs are mostly pretty unremarkeable

Building on the initial post in this revive: Dire Straits is possibly the only split-up major 70s-80s band that there is no clamour whatsoever for a reunion.

The Notting Hillbillies on the other hand, now, why won't Knopfler answer my postcards?

I thought this was just great when it came out but fuck if I can listen to it now.

When that War on Drugs album was released in 2014, the incorrect Dire Straits comparisons were hysterial.

Hysterical too

It's in there for sure, along with the Bruce. Incidentally, it's amazing how much the presence of Rot Bittan on the "Making Movies" album really bridges Mark to Bruce.

I still find this endless amusing:

http://www.wolproject.com

fwiw I think the DS influence in WoD can mostly be heard in the melancholy lead guitar noodling and synths, though the latter also seem to be referencing later Springsteen as well.