Sultans
Ask any Dire Straits fan what their favorite Straits tune might be, or which tune introduced them to the group, and the answer more often than not will undoubtedly be, “Sultans”.
For this writer, that would not be the case. My ‘official’ introduction to the group came several years after Sultans of Swing first wowed listeners back in 1977. The song that did the trick for me was Money For Nothing, the second track from the band’s fifth studio album, Brothers in Arms, which was released in 1985. That tune was that album’s biggest hit, and probably the band’s biggest hit in the USA. I was just a young teen when that album came out; still in my formative years on many levels, including that of musical taste.
My continuing journey of discovery along the musical trail began when I first heard that heavy guitar riff at the opening of Money For Nothing. I could not get enough of that song, or the other Straits tunes that burned through sometimes heavy static on the radio, or the videos on MTV. My sister, bless her, noticed this, and bought me the Brothers in Arms album on cassette, either for my birthday or Christmas, and my parents got me a walkman for Christmas.
I listened to that entire tape over and over.
And over.
I have come to avoid using the word ‘amazing’ in any form, because it is overused these days and, quite frankly, nauseatingly so, eroding its true meaning. But I shall use it here, and properly. Upon listening to the entire Brothers in Arms album for the very first time, I was absolutely amazed. It was a collection of numerous and widely varying musical styles, all brought together by the equally varying infusion of a contemporary sound of the day. I dunno what it was, or how to describe it other than to say that Brothers in Arms sounded like a 1980s album, yet… it didn’t.
One day, my Dad approached me while I was listening to that cassette for the seventy-two-millionth time. I forget exactly how the conversation went, but he was carrying a couple’a LPs in his hand and said something along the lines of, “If you really like that album, why don’t you try listening to these. Maybe you’ll like them, too,” and handed the records to me. “Start with this one,” he said, tapping the one that had a white jacket. On the cover was an understated painting of a girl leaning up against a pillar in a large, empty, windowed room. That painting, brushed by a fella name Chuck Loyola, instantly spoke to me, though I did not know exactly how or why at the time. I’m not sure that I know now. But maybe that’s something I should ponder for a future keyboard tapping session.
I spent some time looking over both LPs, admiring the jacket art and photos, reading the lyrics and credits. If the painting of the girl on the cover of the ‘White Album’, as I have come to know it, fascinated me, it was something at the bottom of the rear cover of this album that soon came to hold me absolutely mesmerized; both stylistically in its artistry, and as something of a mysterious talisman, representative of musical magic.
I stared at this little red guitar logo for what seemed like ages, wondering exactly why this particular motif had been chosen, and if there was anything cooler in the entire universe.
After pulling my gaze away from that little red guitar, I then ventured over to my Dad’s stereo system, lifted the cover to the turntable, pulled the record sleeve out of the jacket, and carefully slid the big, black, vinyl disc out of the sleeve, setting it down gently on the platter. I then switched the player on, watching that beautifully grooved vinyl spin; slowly at first, but within a second or so it was turning at the prescribed 33+1⁄3 rpm.
Gingerly, I unlocked the stylus and set it down on the outer edge of the disc. Catching the lead-in to that one long, continuous groove, I watched it jog ever so slightly, then travel the short distance over the remaining lead-in, ‘til it settled serenely into that tightly wound, micro-jagged section of the groove that so mystically held the sounds, embarking on its roughly twenty minute journey across the entire surface of the album’s first side.
Those twenty minutes were unlike any other my thirteen or fourteen year old self had experienced; this now fifty-something guy has relived those twenty wondrous minutes countless times, as well as the twenty or so minutes that followed upon flipping the record.
‘Twas after that flip that I became immediately entranced by an aural bliss that lasted three-hundred and forty-seven seconds.
Sultans of Swing has often been discussed by music reviewers, Youtube reactors, and others, and I’ve heard many try to decode the song’s lyrics and extract from them some sort of overly profound or abstract meaning. People do that, don’t they? They try to analyze and dissect everything, to find greater purpose or some sort of hidden meaning in things.
Before or perhaps while continuing this read (if you’re still reading, that is), I invite you to take a listen to the album track, if you’re inclined:
I admit that I often chuckle when I listen to folks discuss some of the songs written by Mark Knopfler, Dire Straits’ frontman. Some of his stuff is indeed worthy of the aforementioned analysis and decoding efforts. But some of them don’t require any of that hubbub at all. Some of them are simply stories told by one man of his experiences.
Sultans is one such song.
The lyrics are artfully written and arranged, true. They not only tell a story, but set the scene, helping you to paint those pictures in your mind. Well-written lyrics can be magical, and these are that, in this writer’s opinion. But well-written or not, ‘magical’ or not, there is nothing truly mysterious about this song, so far as the story that it tells. Knopfler himself has marveled at some of the debate surrounding the song’s meaning, and I have seen and read interviews where he explains that the lyrics are simply a telling of the story of a night he spent in a dusty old pub in the middle of dusty old Deptford, a rundown area of South London.
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There was a band playing in that pub, a dixieland jazz band. And they were indeed called The Sultans of Swing. And the guitar player’s name really was ‘George’. And the piano player’s name really was ‘Harry’. And there really were some young, drunk kids in the corner wearing baggies and platform soles who were shootin’ pool and didn’t seem to care at all for the music. And at the end of the night, one of the band really did go up to the microphone and say, “Well, that’s it. It’s time to go home. We are the Sultans of Swing.”
Here’s an amusing short clip where Mark explains some of what happened that night to Brian Johnson, of AC/DC fame:
The lyrics and the story grabbed me. At the time, being the young’n I was, I didn’t necessarily understand all of it, but it was still pretty straightforward in my mind, and was quite magical to me in its descriptive nature. I don’t think I had heard such storytelling in a song before.
If I found and still find the song to be lyrical magic, musically this tune is downright mystical wizardry to me, even to this day. When first released in 1978, Sultans, and indeed the entire album, was shockingly and refreshingly different from everything else that was being sent across the airwaves at the time. It was a mix of rock, jazz, blues, country; a unique fusion of genres the likes of which had not really been heard by the masses up to that time, and which has inspired many a musician over the course of the forty-five or so years that have followed.
One reason for this musical magic is the drummer’s performance. David ‘Pick’ Withers was a force within the band. Some say that, without an inspired musical score, great motion pictures are merely good or decent movies. Similarly, I think that some of the great bands are great only because of the guy or gal swingin’ the sticks and kickin’ that bass pedal. To me, Dire Straits would have been great without Withers. But with him and his rock steady time-keeping, impossibly laced with well-balanced rhythmic runs and delicate stick-tapping subtleties that defy description, they were ‘legends’. Oh geez, there’s another word I usually avoid for the same reason as ‘amazing’. But it certainly does fit, here. So there it is.
That said, the true driving force behind the Straits was Mark Knopfler. Remember that little red guitar logo I showed y’all earlier? I initially wondered why that design was chosen to represent the band. Sultans of Swing alone explains things perfectly, there. Mark Knopfler wrote all the band’s songs, and sang them, too. His vocals were gritty and ugly at times. But they were real, and that voice fit the music perfectly. However, it was MK’s guitar playing that truly defined the band throughout its entire history, regardless of the wide variety of genres that Knopfler embraced in his songwriting. The man was a master of the six-string, and still is. Like ‘Guitar George’ in the song, he truly enjoys playing rhythm, but unlike George, he also loves to make it cry and sing. And that, he most definitely do. MK is left-handed, and therefore quite a bit more dexterous on the frets than many, if not most other players, and can effortlessly do certain things with those strings that others can only dream of.
If you think that I’m a highly-biased gushing fanboy, well… you’re right. But I’m not the only one who has worshiped the man and his band over the decades. There are tens of millions of Straits fans worldwide. And Knopfler’s talents as a songwriter and guitarist were also clearly appreciated by a fellow named Charlie Gillett, a DJ on Radio London during the 1970s who had a program called Honky Tonk. Dire Straits had recorded several demo tracks and were able to put the Sultans demo into Gillett’s hands. He wound up playing it on the air in 1977, and even before the track had finished, half the A&R men in London were jamming up the phone lines, wanting to know more about the band and how to contact them.
You can listen to that demo of Sultans here:
Anyhoo, as I mentioned at the beginning of this ramble, Sultans of Swing is neither the first tune by Dire Straits that I heard, nor is it my favorite song by the band. To be entirely truthful, I don’t know if I do have one single favorite. As a hardcore fan, I don’t think that it’s a possibility for me. But early on, Sultans was certainly responsible to a great degree for turning me into the Dire Straits fan that I have become, and continues to contribute to the maintenance of my fandom today.
As a guy who has now entered the part of his life where he has lived longer than he shall continue to live, I write these words not only to share my love of this wonderful music, but also in the hopes that maybe someone will read them, take a listen, and perhaps become the next Straits fan. I guess it’s an attempt of sorts to pass on my legacy of fandom.
Oh, and if you are interested in the music, here’s a really high-energy live rendition of the song from the band’s first live album, released several years after that first studio album. ‘Pick’ Withers had by this time moved on to other things, but his replacement, Terry Williams, was just as much a force within the band, albeit somewhat more… forceful. His drumming on this track is, dare I say, amazing; overshadowed only barely by MK’s unparalleled, masterful command of that red Schecter Strat. This is, in my opinion, among the very greatest live rock performances of all time.
Eh, screw diplomacy. It’s the best ever. Period.
Enjoy.
Fade to Black…
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© Steve Donacik 2024
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