The rock sound diminished on Dire Straits fifth album ‘Brothers In Arms’, that pushed the band’s established work into a pop setting and became immensely successful, quickly becoming the biggest selling LP in the UK during the 80s, a double Grammy award winning album in 1986 and spending nine weeks at No 1 in the US charts, while the single, Money For Nothing, was a worldwide No 1 single.

The album is full of top quality tracks such as Walk Of Life that is dominated by an organ riff and the slow build up to a crescendo of a track that young people have come to swear by, dancing the swing to the tune at almost every party.

Whether you talk about songs like Money for Nothing (with Sting), So Far Away or Your Latest Trick, or even the title track, ‘Brothers in Arms’ is an album that has loads of hits.

The album is a forever classic album and still continues to sell. Having a copy of this album in your collection is like having a part of a treasure that you won’t want to part with. The album is the band’s biggest seller, it made Dire Straits a stadium rock-act and even today the band that came up with successive albums thereafter, still continues to rock the house. The band existed just for this album, as most of their other songs were not that top of the line material compared to this album.

Dire Straits were not just a good band, they had great songwriters, great guitarists and of course some great vocalists too. Club it all with a dash of rock and over the top pop and what you have is a fantastic album reeking of hits.

The LP album cover that displayed an electric guitar flying high into the sky, with a sky blue effect, puts you in a mood for music just like Dire Straits that bring you. The real truth of the album is that the guitar on the cover is actually that of Mark Knopfler's 1937 14-fret National Style "O" Resontar. The Style "O" line of guitars was introduced in 1930 and discontinued in 1941. The photographer was Deborah Feingold.[13] The back cover features a painting of the same guitar, by German artist Thomas Steyer.

Over thirty years later, the LP won another Grammy as the best surround sound album. The band were inducted into the Rock and Hall of Fame in 2018.

Rating: ****

Label: Vertigo

Year: 1985

Reviewed by Verus Ferreira