From the start it was one of those albums that sold by the skip-load to people
Posted in General on 23. Aug, 2010
From the start, it was one of those albums that sold by the skip-load to people who don’t usually buy albums, so – 15 years on – can there be anyone left who doesn’t own a copy of this soundtrack to red-braced Thatcherism, this CD-defining album?
Dire Straits burst out of Deptford during the saliva-soaked summer of punk, but the band always had more in common with the pub rockers – more Ducks De Luxe than The Clash. In that age of three-minute-heroes and bondage-trousered vandals, Mark Knopfler was a bona fide, plectrum-picking, string-snapping guitar-hero; and “Sultans of Swing” one of those songs you felt you’d known for half your life.At first, “Sultans of Swing” was kept off the Radio 1 playlist because – Knopfler can laugh now – “it had too many words”; but when it did eventually hit, it hit big-time. The band’s popularity was reinforced by albums such as Communiqué and Making Movies, and before long, Knopfler was also much in demand as a session gun- for-hire (Van Morrison, Bryan Ferry, Steely Dan); film composer (Local Hero, Cal, The Princess Bride); and record producer (Bob Dylan, Aztec Camera, Randy Newman).Even then, there was nothing to indicate, to Knopfler or anyone else, that Brothers in Arms would cement itself as one of rock’s all-time bestselling albums: 20 million and counting, last time anybody sat down with a calculator. But as with any album that hits that big (Thriller, Bridge Over Troubled Water, Dark Side of the Moon) the follow-up proved problematic, and Dire Straits fans waited six years for On Every Street and the accompanying world tour.Since then, aside from greatest hits packages and archive releases, Knopfler has quietly wound down Dire Straits.
“It’s been the same basic crew pretty much since the beginning,” he says, “but then it gets so big – extra guys coming in, extra trucks… Once we got to the point of carrying our own stage, I felt the whole thing was just too big.”I think it’s wonderful for people who like that, and can do it, and enjoy it But it’s a trap that I just wanted to get out of. I needed to do something else, to try to improve as a writer and as a player. And I don’t think being stuck in that kind of circus is where that’s going to happen.”In conversation, Knopfler is engaging and laconic, a delightful companion, apparently far more interested in talking about your activities than his. This curiosity about the mechanics of your craft is more than mere politeness – though it is undeniably flattering. But, whether by accident or design, it also gets seriously in the way of getting to him.Although his hair is greyer now, the Geordie accent is still marked – and the manner almost painfully self-effacing. You have to keep reminding yourself that the unassuming chap slipping out for more coffee really is Mark Knopfler, guitar hero to a generation; the man who led a bunch of south London misfits to become the most successful British band since Pink Floyd – and the creative force behind Britain’s best-selling album after Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Heart’s Club Band.However, summer 2000 finds Knopfler preoccupied with matters other than the staggering success of a 15-year-old album, or indeed the promotion of his new record, Sailing to Philadelphia.
The fact uppermost in his mind, and the achievement of which he is proudest, is that he has, finally, given up smoking.”I really like it in jazz clubs: somewhere like Ronnie Scott’s, if there’s good air-conditioning. But if you’ve been to a restaurant, say, and you’re surrounded by it you really do feel it the next day.”Patches certainly don’t work Alan Carr didn’t work. I went to see a woman in Swiss Cottage, who deals in eating and smoking, and she said it’s a mental trick: you have a choice. And if you choose not to, it’s quite a different thing to saying ‘I mustn’t’.”I said to her, ‘I don’t know how I’m going to get through my first session, never mind after with the boys’, and she said, ‘well, your first session will be your first. Your second will be your second…’ The physical symptoms disappeared after three days. I’m proud of myself – I’m probably prouder of that than of anything.”This seems like the perfect moment to bring the conversation back to the new album, but on this subject Knopfler modestly reserves his enthusiasm for his co-star’s rather than his own achievements (“James Taylor is in great shape.. he’s really on top of his game He was fantastic on the session. Really, really good.”)Nevertheless, Sailing To Philadelphia is a rewarding voyage, and a marked improvement on 1996’s solo début, Golden Heart: Knopfler’s playing is as fluid as ever, his vocals as beguilingly smoky, but the songwriting is more focused, carrying the material confidently into new territory.In the past, Knopfler has talked of his love of research, his delight in unearthing details of distant and different lives.