Brothers in Arms is the fifth studio album by the British rock band Dire Straits, released on 13 May 1985 through Vertigo Records internationally and Warner Bros. Records in the United States. It is credited with being the first album in recorded history to sell over one million copies in CD format.
Brothers in Arms spent a total of 14 non-consecutive weeks at number one on the UK Albums Chart (including ten consecutive weeks between 18 January and 22 March 1986), nine weeks at number one on the Billboard 200 in the United States and 34 weeks at number one on the Australian Albums Chart. It was the first album certified ten-times platinum in the UK and is the eighth-best-selling album in UK chart history. It is certified nine-times platinum in the United States by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) and is one of the world's best-selling albums, having sold more than 30 million copies worldwide.
The album won a Grammy Award in 1986 for Best Engineered Album, Non-Classical and Best British Album at the 1987 Brit Awards; the 20th Anniversary reissue won another Grammy in 2006 for Best Surround Sound Album. In 2020, Rolling Stone placed Brothers in Arms at number 418 on its "The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time" list. Q magazine ranked Brothers in Arms number 51 on its list of the "100 Greatest British Albums Ever".
Brothers in Arms was recorded from November 1984 to February 1985 at AIR Studios on the island of Montserrat, a British overseas territory in the Caribbean. The album was produced by songwriter Mark Knopfler and Neil Dorfsman, who had engineered Dire Straits' 1982 album Love over Gold and Knopfler's 1983 soundtrack album Local Hero.
Brothers in Arms was one of the first albums recorded on a Sony 24-track digital tape machine. The decision to move to digital recording came from Knopfler's constant striving for better sound quality. "One of the things that I totally respected about him," Dorfsman observed, "was his interest in technology as a means of improving his music. He was always willing to spend on high-quality equipment."
Before arriving at Montserrat, Knopfler had written all the songs and rehearsed them with the band. The studio lineup was Knopfler (vocals, guitar), John Illsley (bass), Hal Lindes (guitar), Alan Clark (keyboards), Terry Williams (drums) and keyboard player/backing vocalist Guy Fletcher, who was new to the band. Lindes left the band early on in the sessions, and was replaced in December 1984 by Jack Sonni, a New York-based guitarist and longstanding friend of Knopfler. (Sonni's only contribution to the album was the guitar synthesizer on "The Man's Too Strong", with all the other guitar parts played by Knopfler).
The studio itself was small, with a 20-by-25-foot (6 m × 8 m) recording space that offered virtually no isolation. "It was a good-sounding studio," Dorfsman later recalled, "but the main room itself was nothing to write home about. The sound of that studio was the desk," referring to the Neve 8078 board. Knopfler and Dorfsman utilised the limited space to best effect, placing the drum kit in the far left corner, facing the control room, miked with Sennheiser MD 421s on the toms, an Electro-Voice RE20 and AKG D12 on the kick drum, a Shure SM57 and AKG C451 with a 20 dB pad on the snare, 451s for overheads and the hi-hat, and Neumann U87s set back a little to capture "some kind of ambience". They placed the piano in a tight booth in the far right corner of the studio, miked with AKG C414s. The Hammond B3 was placed nearby, with its Leslie speaker crammed into an airlock next to the control room. Illsley's bass amplifier was recorded inside a small vocal booth with a Neumann FET 47 and a DI unit. Knopfler's amplifiers were miked with 57s, 451s, and Neumann U67s. Fletcher's synths were placed in the control room.
During the recording of "Money for Nothing", the signature sound of Knopfler's guitar may have been enhanced by a "happy accident" of microphone placement. Knopfler was using his Gibson Les Paul going through a Laney amplifier. While setting up the guitar amplifier microphones in an effort to get the "ZZ Top sound" that Knopfler sought, guitar tech Ron Eve, who was in the control room, heard the "amazing" sound before Dorfsman was finished arranging the mics. "One mic was pointing down at the floor," Dorfsman remembered, "another was not quite on the speaker, another was somewhere else, and it wasn't how I would want to set things up—it was probably just left from the night before, when I'd been preparing things for the next day and had not really finished the setup." What they heard was exactly what ended up on the record; no additional processing or effects were used during the mix.
According to a Sound on Sound magazine interview with Neil Dorfsman, during the first month of the recording sessions at Montserrat the performance of Terry Williams was considered to be unsuitable for the desired sound of the album. According to Williams himself, he had recorded all his drum parts to a click track, which he felt hindered his ability to channel the rhythmic feel he wanted. About six weeks into the sessions, after listening to a playback of what had been recorded so far, he voiced his disappointment to Mark Knopfler over some of his own playing. Shortly after this, he was dismissed from the sessions.
Dorfsman and Knopfler made the decision to erase Williams' contributions. Williams was replaced in the sessions by jazz session drummer Omar Hakim, who re-recorded all the album's drum parts during a two-day stay before leaving for other commitments. All of the drumming on the final album was performed by Hakim, with the exception of the improvised crescendo at the beginning of “Money for Nothing”. (In another interview, Dorfsman has said that Williams' fills and tom-toms were also used in the rest of “Money for Nothing”). Both Hakim and Williams are credited on the album.
A defective batch of recording tape at AIR Studios resulted in the loss of part or all of three album tracks, leading to follow-up sessions being recorded at the Power Station in New York during early 1985 (including the addition of a Jack Sonni guitar synthesizer part to “The Man's Too Strong”). During this time, overdubs were recorded with further New York musicians including Michael and Randy Brecker, Mike Mainieri (who'd previously contributed vibraphone to Love Over Gold) and percussionist Jimmy Maelen, plus trumpeter Dave Plews and Average White Band saxophonist Malcolm Duncan.
When Illsley broke both elbows after a fall whilst jogging in Central Park, several prominent New York studio bassists were hired to record or re-record several basslines on the record. Tony Levin contributed to “Why Worry”. Saturday Night Live house band bassist Neil Jason was brought in for a week's work which included takes on “So Far Away”, “Walk of Life”, “Ride Across the River”, “Your Latest Trick” and “The Man’s Too Strong”, although the only fully confirmed released results from the Jason sessions were the slap-style funk bassline on “One World” and "slides on my fretless — almost like a Syndrum effect" on the intro to the extended version of “Money for Nothing”.
Although Andy Kanavan was briefly recruited as Dire Straits' new drummer, Terry Williams ended up rejoining the band for the promotional concert world tour which lasted until April 1986. All the music videos that were released from the album featured Williams.
Brothers in Arms has been described musically as a pop rock album. The music video for "Money for Nothing" received heavy rotation on MTV, and it was the first to be aired on MTV Europe when the network launched on 1 August 1987. It is one of only two Dire Straits songs on a studio album not to be solely credited to Knopfler (the other being "The Carousel Waltz", which opens Making Movies), with guest vocalist Sting given a co-writing credit due to the melody of the repeated "I want my MTV" (sung by Sting) in the song's fadeout echoing the melody of the Police's "Don't Stand So Close to Me".
"Walk of Life" was a number two hit in the UK Singles Chart in early 1986 and a number seven hit in the US Billboard Hot 100 later that year. The song was nearly left off the album, but was included after the band out-voted producer Neil Dorfsman.
On the second side of the album, three songs ("Ride Across the River", "The Man's Too Strong" and "Brothers in Arms") are lyrically focused on militarism. "Ride Across the River" uses immersive Latin American imagery, accompanied by synthesized pan flute, mariachi trumpet, a reggae-influenced drum part and eerie background noises. "The Man's Too Strong" depicts the character of an ancient soldier (or war criminal) and his fear of showing feelings as a weakness. Written during the 1982 Falklands War, "Brothers in Arms" deals with the senselessness of war. In 2007, the 25th anniversary of the war, Knopfler recorded a new version of the song at Abbey Road Studios to raise funds for British veterans who he said "are still suffering from the effects of that conflict."
The guitar featured on the front of the album cover is Mark Knopfler's 1937 14-fret National Style "O" Resonator. The Style "O" line of guitars was introduced in 1930 and discontinued in 1941. The photographer was Deborah Feingold. The back cover features a painting of the same guitar, by German artist Thomas Steyer. A similar image was also used, with a similar colour scheme, for the 1989 album The Booze Brothers by Brewers Droop.
Brothers in Arms was one of the first albums directed at the CD market, and it was a full digital recording (DDD) at a time when most popular music was recorded on analog equipment. It was also released on vinyl (abridged to fit on one LP) and cassette. Producer Neil Dorfsman says the digital multitrack was mixed on an analog board with the resulting two track mix re-digitized via a Prism A/D converter and recorded on a DAT machine.
Brothers in Arms was the first album to sell one million copies in the CD format and to outsell its LP version. A Rykodisc employee subsequently wrote, "[In 1985 we] were fighting to get our CDs manufactured because the entire worldwide manufacturing capacity was overwhelmed by demand for a single rock title (Dire Straits' Brothers in Arms)."
It was remastered and reissued with the rest of the Dire Straits catalogue in 1996 for most of the world outside the United States and on 19 September 2000 in the United States, the remastering for both reissues was done by Bob Ludwig at Gateway Mastering using the Super Bit Mapping process. In 2000, it was released on XRCD2 format, this edition was remastered by Hiromichi Takiguchi using K2 20bit technology. A 20th Anniversary Edition was issued in Super Audio CD on 26 July 2005 (becoming the 3000th title for the SACD format), it featured a 5.1 surround sound remix done by Chuck Ainlay at British Grove Studios, it was mastered by Bob Ludwig at Gateway Mastering. The 5.1 mix was also released on DualDisc format with DVD-Audio 24 bit/96 kHz track on 16 August 2005. Ainlay's 5.1 remix won a Grammy for Best Surround Sound Album at the 48th Grammy Awards ceremony. In 2006, a half-speed-mastered vinyl version of the album was issued. Mastered by Stan Ricker, this version consists of four sides on two 33 1/3 rpm discs, containing the full-length songs on vinyl for the first time. In 2013, Mobile Fidelity Sound Lab released a hybrid SACD mastered from the original tapes by Shawn R. Britton, it includes the original stereo mix only. In 2014, a new master was released in Japan on SHM-SACD - it's made from the original analogue master tapes and contains the original LP length of the album: 47:44 min, this edition was transferred by Mick McKenna and Richard Whittaker at FX Copyroom using Direct Stream Digital. On May 19, 2014, Vertigo reissued the album on double 180g vinyl, this edition contains the full-length songs of the album, it was mastered by Bob Ludwig, Bernie Grundman and Chris Bellman from the original analogue and digital tapes, this version was also included on The Studio Albums 1978 - 1991 the previous year. In 2015, Mobile Fidelity also released the album on double 45 RPM vinyl, this edition was mastered by Krieg Wunderlich. The same year, the album re-entered the UK Album Charts at #8 following the record being made available at a discounted price on digital music retailers. In March 2021, a new half-speed mastered edition was released, mastered at Abbey Road Studios by Miles Showell. The release was a double-LP, 45 rpm, 180 gram edition, with the complete version of the album, for only the second time (the first being issued by Mobile Fidelity Sound Lab in 2015). The album has spent a total of 356 weeks on the UK Album Charts.
Track listings
All songs written by Mark Knopfler, except "Money for Nothing", written by Knopfler and Sting. The CD and cassette versions feature full versions of "So Far Away", "Money for Nothing", "Your Latest Trick" and "Why Worry". Because of this, side two of the cassette version has about 10 minutes of blank tape.
Brothers in Arms CD and cassette track listing
- "So Far Away" A1 5:12
- "Money for Nothing" A2 8:25
- "Walk of Life" A3 4:12
- "Your Latest Trick" A4 6:33
- "Why Worry" A5 8:31
- "Ride Across the River" B1 6:58
- "The Man's Too Strong" B2 4:40
- "One World" B3 3:40
- "Brothers in Arms" B4 6:59
Total length: 55:15
Mark Knopfler – producer
Neil Dorfsman – producer, engineer, mixing
Dave Greenberg – assistant engineer
Steve Jackson – assistant engineer
Bruce Lampcov – assistant engineer
Bob Ludwig – mastering at Masterdisk (New York City, New York, USA)
John Dent – mastering at The Sound Clinic (London, UK)
Thomas Steyer – cover painting
Sutton Cooper – sleeve design
Deborah Feingold – photography
In the Netherlands, the album broke the all-time record for most weeks on chart, with 269 non-consecutive weeks (since overtaken by Adele's 21 and the Buena Vista Social Club's eponymous debut album).
In the UK, the album spent 14 weeks at number one on the UK Albums Chart, and as of August 2018 has spent 271 weeks on the chart.
In the United States, the album reached number one on the Billboard 200 and remained there for nine weeks.
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