Help me find an early Dire Straits song with the 'really good guitar riff'

[hedgehog90]

This guy I know, Pete - well, he's sort of my granddad but not biologically, he hooked up with my nan in the 70s, so we just call him Pete (I assumed everyone had a Pete when I was little*) - this Pete fella asked me to illegally download and burn a CD of the first Dire Straits album for him because - according to someone who played him a particular track from it during a recent trip to Connecticut (I don't know his name, sorry) - it had a dead good song on it with a killer guitar riff.
I got the impression it was more like a long guitar solo than a riff though.
Anyway, I burnt him their s/t debut record, but he came back to me a few weeks later and told me it didn't have the riff on it. In fact, it was some of the worst music he'd ever listened to (he didn't say this but I could tell he was very disappointed with it)
This was like 6 months ago and I didn't continue looking for Knopfler's riff because I'm really not a fan of Dire Straits. I really like Pete but I won't put myself through such an ordeal.
I haven't thought about it since, but this morning I got a text from Pete and he's still yearning for this riff.
Help me find this song with the riff because I can't be bothered.



* In my second year of primary school my favourite teacher, Mrs Bush, was going through all the names we have for family and relatives, she went through them all and wrote them on the whiteboard - mum, dad, brother, sister, cousin, grandmother, grandfather - and I must have been like 'yo, what about Pete?' and I explained to her I had a Pete, so on the board she added 'Pete', which affirmed my belief at the time that most people had a Pete.

[Ferris]

If it isn't Sultans of Swing or Brothers in Arms then I can't help you.

You could try those two though. They both have riffs and solos and that.

[Captain Z]

If it isn't Sultans of Swing or Brothers in Arms or Money For Nothing then I can't help you.

[DrGreggles]

Mrs Bush

I'm 44 years old...

[Delete Delete Delete]

Its not Money For Nothing is it. That would match up with the word riff.

[Norton Canes]

Knopfler's riff

Day Today racehorse names

[daf]

Long shot here, but could it be Knopfler's "Going Home" theme to Local Hero?

skip to the good bit  (. . . which is actually mainly played on saxophone - I said it was a long shot!)

[daf]

Some more wild stabs in the dark :

(Communique - 1979)
Lady Writer

(Making Movies - 1980)
Expresso Love
Solid Rock

[The Culture Bunker]

The only Dire Straits song I can abide is "Romeo and Juliet", so I'll add that.

[idunnosomename]

let's all just fucking watch this anyway.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wTP2RUD_cL0
fuckin ace

[Shit Good Nose]

let's all just fucking watch this anyway.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wTP2RUD_cL0
fuckin ace

True story - I was 5/6 when this came out and for years I wondered why BA and Murdock from the A-Team were working as removal men, but then reasoned (logically, I think you'll have to agree) that it was their only source of proper income given that they typically didn't bother collecting what they were owed when rescuing an attractive woman, cute child or poor latino type from the bad men.

[hedgehog90]

Some more wild stabs in the dark :

(Communique - 1979)
Lady Writer

I reckon this is probably it, thanks.
Makes sense it would be on the second album.

btw the lyrics to this are great:

Lady writer on the TV
Talking about the Virgin Mary
Yeah you know I'm talking about you and me
And the lady writer on the TV
Lady writer on the TV
Talking about the Virgin Mary
Yeah you know I'm talking about you and me
And the lady writer on the TV

Are most of Knopfler's songs based on whatever random bollocks he saw on telly the night before?

[Shit Good Nose]

Are most of Knopfler's songs based on whatever random bollocks he saw on telly the night before?

My favourite song of his is Cassandra's Miscarriage Made Delboy Fall Through the Bar.

[Glebe]

If it isn't Sultans of Swing or Brothers in Arms then I can't help you.

Those (and, let's be honest 'Money for Nothing') are crackers (I have a particular nostalgia for 'Sultuns')... Knopfler's beautiful 'The Long Road', from his soundtrack to the film Cal, is worth a mention.

[MidnightShambler]

I've never owned a Dire Straits album and never really taken any notice of them but I must have heard that song, and seen that video, thousands of times and that's the very first time I've ever noticed the verse about 'faggots with earrings'.

I'm old enough to remember the days when that wouldn't have been bleeped or muted out on the radio or telly either, why have I never heard that before???

[The Culture Bunker]

I've never owned a Dire Straits album and never really taken any notice of them but I must have heard that song, and seen that video, thousands of times and that's the very first time I've ever noticed the verse about 'faggots with earrings'.

I'm old enough to remember the days when that wouldn't have been bleeped or muted out on the radio or telly either, why have I never heard that before???

I think in recent times, they play an edited version missing that line.

[Darles Chickens]

That verse isn't in the 7" single version.

[daf]

why have I never heard that before???

It's likely they never played that version on the radio or TV.

As Darles mentioned, it was edited for the 7" version (which the radio would have used), and it's also cut from the video when it was played on Top of the Pops (8 august 1985).

So, unless you had the album, you wouldn't have heard it. #

Not a bad thing - as it takes ages to get to the best bit * as it is!

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
# (Was that bit edited from the LP version? The CD and cassette lists it as being 8:26, while the LP is 7:04)
* Sting's 'Dont Stand so Close to Me' harmony line

[PaulTMA]

If Knopfler wanted to snub the Hall Of Fame in style, he should have just got up to play just Les Boys and then fucked immediately after

[TheMonk]

If Knopfler wanted to snub the Hall Of Fame in style, he should have just got up to play just Les Boys and then fucked immediately after

Fucked John Illsley?

[bgmnts]

Sultans of Swing, Six Blade Knife or Money for Nothing I guess would be the three?