Old Enough to Forget

1985 was a hell of a year for cool music. Dire Straits was right there in the mix with some of the best songs of the year. Dire Straits was still Dire Straits flitting on the periphery of what was in vogue while somehow managing to be at the centre of things. A year that saw albums by The Cult, Talking Heads, Tears for Fears, John Cougar Mellencamp along with a host of others that are too numerous to mention without taking up most of this post. This album was huge - it would move over a million copies in Canada, nine in the States topping out at over thirty worldwide. Of course to twenty two year old me, it was "Money for Nothing" that floated my boat. Much like "Industrial Disease" did from Love Over Gold . I was at best "a sort of fan" but didn't have their records. My roommate had the band's live album Alchemy (which I heard after Brothers in Arms ) and "Telegraph Road" remains to this day one of my favourite songs by Dire Straits. I...

This was mostly written and in my queue to post when I found out that Tina Turner passed away May 24, 2023. She was 83. Hard to imagine that almost forty years had passed since Private Dancer was released. It's always fun to revisit albums that you thought you disliked. I suppose the backlash was inevitable as "What's Love Got to Do With It" was pretty ubiquitous on MuchMusic and the radio for what seemed to be forever. I managed to keep up my dismissive airs for a long time, and even though I really liked "Better Be Good to Me" featuring the stellar guitar work of The Fixx's Jamie West-Orem and backing vocals of Cy Curnin. I stubbornly held my ground.  It didn't help that everyone was trying to make a then ancient in pop years Tina Turner who was all of forty five or six when this came out a sex symbol. "Look at those legs!"  This was right up there with trying to ogle the church organist. I'm looking through the album jacket and lin...