‘Love Over Gold’: the Dire Straits album Mark Knopfler thought he ruined
Every band or artist’s main ambition with a record is to ensure that the end result is as perfect and representative of the sound they wanted to go for, and Mark Knopfler, being the meticulous crafter of songs that he is, is no different.
Over the course of their six studio albums, he was always the driving force behind Dire Straits, and as they developed as a group, his approach to things became increasingly focused on having everything as precise as it could possibly be, hence why so many of their later records have this sheen about them. Of course, there’s nothing wrong with polishing your work, but there are certain limitations to this that can lead to a potential downfall.
The thing is, overworking a record to the point where it loses some of its bite and personality is a grave danger, and there comes a time when you need to tell yourself that keeping things simple in the production process may actually be beneficial. If things are sounding vibrant while the minute errors and imperfections are being kept in, then tinkering and adding more may not actually be the solution, and accepting what you’ve got could be the answer to creating the best example of your work.
On some of Dire Straits’ records, there isn’t as much of a polished feel, especially in their earlier years as a group, but when you’re looking to push yourself further and develop your sound from its primitive origins, the temptation to meddle is always going to be there. Having begun life as a blues rock outfit, they quickly outgrew their sound, and there was a growing need to create something that felt reflective of not only modern styles but also their artistic development.
By the time they reached their fourth record, Love Over Gold, they’d been gradually moving away from their origins as a roots rock outfit and more towards being a knotty art rock project, but there were downsides to this, as Knopfler acknowledged in a 1984 interview with Guitar Player.
Talking about the recording and production process, Knopfler was asked about the use of overdubs, which he explained his position on. “We end up keeping quite a lot of the live takes, actually,” he said of their normal approach, but conceded that this particular album had been somewhat anomalous. “Love Over Gold was a heavily worked-on record. Too much attention was paid to that, I think, in a lot of respects. But it was interesting to have done it that way. I don’t think I’d like to do another record that was so heavily produced, though.”
Dire Straits would end up putting out Brothers in Arms the following year, which is arguably an even more polished record than its predecessor, but ultimately, it was worth it, as it only cemented their position as one of the most beloved pop rock groups of their era. If their ambition was to adapt their sound and focus more on production elements, then Love Over Gold ought to be seen as a transitional album rather than one that managed to perfect this development instantly, and Brothers in Arms is where everything that they’d tried and failed to do before fell into place.
