“We are the Sultans of Swing”: the song that turned Dire Straits from a joke into a global force
During their Brothers In Arms tour, which ran between 1985 and ‘86, Dire Straits could confidently look out over the vast crowd their music had accumulated and firmly tell themselves that they had made it.
They played to 55,000 people in Adelaide, who had all descended upon Football Park to see the Newcastle band in action. A year prior, in ‘85, they had played to 72,000 at Wembley Stadium for Live Aid, where a mammoth crowd of music fans sang the words of ‘Sultans Of Swing’ back to them.
This was a dream come true for this rather obscure and unlikely rock and roll band, whose tale is one of true rags to riches. Of course, the ‘70s were awash with bands who had lifted themselves out of poverty through the power of their music, but I would imagine Dire Straits quietly wondered if that fate awaited them, for they weren’t your average rock band whose profile rose off the back of wild charisma.
But their musicality got them there, and ‘Sultans Of Swing’ was truly imperative to that. It showcased the virtuoso style of guitar playing that their fearless leader, Mark Knopfler, possessed, and so infected the brains of a rock-hungry audience. But the moment they played that song to a vast Live Aid crowd was particularly pertinent, because it was the song they rode while surviving in the very depths of destitution.
“We were living on next to nothing and weren’t even able to pay the gas bill,” John Illsley says, adding that they weren’t called Dire Straits for nothing. “The first time I heard Mark playing a version of Sultans Of Swing was in that flat, but the song was completely different.”
Illsley continued: “One day he said to me: ‘Remember that song I was fiddling about with the other day? I’ve completely redone the chord structure.’ He played it, and it sounded pretty good. The whole thing is incredibly simple, it’s the playing that makes it intriguing. It’s that rolling rhythm on the guitar and a very simple bass and drums approach. Then, of course, it’s a story. And let’s face it, all good songs have a story.”
While the instrumental composition had been kicking around Knofler’s headspace for a while, the vocal hook came to him from a chance encounter with a late-night jazz band. In 1977, he poked his head into a rather deserted pub and watched a relatively lousy jazz band perform a set.
To the tiniest of crowds, this band continued on, subtly inspiring Knopfler with their determined sense of grit, and when they finally finished, they looked out and said, “Goodnight and thank you. We are the Sultans of Swing.”
Inspired by their resilience, Knopfler injected the phrase into the song he was yet to find a vocal hook for and in one fell swoop, delivered his band their biggest hit. Just under a decade later, when they found themselves on stage at Live Aid performing to 72,000 people, Knopfler would have hopefully spared a thought for the band and vicariously played their namesake song for them.
