Dire Straits - Self Titled

Do you remember 1978? I sure don't. But I can tell you that a certain band dropped their first album that year - and it contained one of my favorite songs of all time. That band is Dire Straits. That track is 'Sultans Of Swing'. You have to remember that in the late 70's, stadium rock was starting to his the airwaves. You had a band like Van Halen coming out and melting people's faces off with hard guitar solos and loud in your face lyrics. Dire Straits is anything but loud, and in your face. They might have a face melting solo or two - but that's where the similarities end. Everything about their sound is stripped down. Straight up bluesy guitar, simple drum beats and attention to lyrics. Nothing controversial like stadium rock, but well thought out and well written stuff. This album today is a meager 2x platinum, but I think that's mainly due to lack of single success after 'Sultans'. There are a couple other nice tracks on here, but nothing that showed the sustainability of the big hit. Another interesting tidbit, this album came out in '78 in England (they are a British band) but didn't catch over in the states until mid '79. Took that long to get across the pond. The cover art is also a painting by Chuck Loyola, but I'm not an art person, so I have no idea who that is. Anyway, I like their style. I think for the time in which they dropped music, they were unique. They converted a little to poppish when they put out a track like 'Money For Nothing', but I'll get to that another day. You NEED TO check out Sultans, everything else you could forget about. Happy Friday!

TRACK LISTING:
1. Down to the Waterline
2. Water of Love
3. Setting Me Up
4. Six Blade Knife
5. Southbound Again
6. Sultans of Swing
7. In the Gallery
8. Wild West End
9. Lions

Listen To Samples

Top 3 Tracks:
1. Sultans Of Swing
2. Down To The Waterline
3. Six Blade Knife

FINAL RATING:
3.75 out of 5 stars