Published on Dec 31, 1998
I think that many people of my age got hooked on Dire Straits
thanks to their groundbreaking video “Money For Nothing,” and found
a lot to like on their then-current album
Brothers In Arms.
But the further you dig, the more one realizes just how
drop-dead boring Dire Straits can be. While the Mark Knopfler-led
group constantly prove themselves to be talented musicians, the
performance of their music is quite sterile. This leads us to
1993’s
On The Night, the second live album from the British group
(and, the way things have been looking, the last album from them,
save for another greatest hits repackage).
I don’t know what happened in the translation from the stage to
the tape. I mean, I saw Dire Straits perform in Chicago on their
tour for
On Every Street, and the show was anything but boring. But
the ten songs on this set don’t always light up the speakers the
way that Knopfler and crew do in the flesh.
Ah, maybe I’ve already hit upon the problem early on in the
review! Often, I’ve heard bands live who just plain kicked ass, and
I’ve gone back to their studio efforts and have been incredibly
disappointed. Maybe this is the case with Dire Straits; nothing
takes the place of seeing them live.
And it’s not that everything on this album will put you to
sleep. When the band relies on selections from
Brothers In Arms and
On Every Street, things do take off. Renditions of “Walk Of
Life” and “Heavy Fuel” are very interesting, and the live version
of “Money For Nothing” has a livelier tempo, even if the vocals
sound a bit jaded. What I don’t understand is that “On Every
Street” gets one of the loudest ovations from the crowd (these
shows were recorded in France and The Netherlands); I never thought
this was a song to go ape over (though the version here is not bad
at all).
But not all the material from the blockbuster albums lights the
speakers up the same way. “Calling Elvis” sounds rather uninspired,
and the jams at the end of the song almost prolong the torture. (In
the band’s defense, they did the same thing when I saw them in
concert; again, this might be something that translates better when
you can see it.) The closer, “Brothers In Arms,” is another track
that just plods along.
For that matter, maybe this is the problem I have with
On The Night. Many of the “for the fans” tracks tend to
crawl. “Romeo And Juliet” (I liked the Indigo Girls’ rendition
better), “Private Investigations” and “You And Your Friend” all
seem to stall in first gear – not the best thing to happen on a
live album. However, there is a hidden gem in “Your Latest Trick,”
which features Dire Straits sounding like they’ve finally tapped a
vein of musical energy that they had been searching for. More songs
in this style would have helped this album immensely.
And I can hear the obvious criticism: Where is “Sultans Of
Swing”? Hey, you want that one, go buy
Alchemy. (Now that I think about it, I think there are some
repeats from the earlier live album on this one.)
Of course, the diehard Dire Straits fan will find every note of
this disc to be pure ambrosia. For the rest of us,
On The Night has some moments of glory, but it’s not the
pinnacle of what Dire Straits is all about — and that’s the
greatest disappointment of all.