It begins with a syrupy carnival organ and a left hand absent-mindedly dropping a note on the piano keys, from there unearthing a familiar earworm that makes you think you might have mistakenly dropped needle on Bruce Springsteen’s The River. But quicker than you can say Clarence Clemons comes an urgent tug on the guitar strings, that sounds every bit like the musical incarnation of a wave of the hand beckoning “come here” and you realize it’s Mark Knopfler with his foot on the gas and not The Boss. So it is Roy Bittan, keyboard master on loan from The E Street band, who opens the spindly guitar hero’s fierce third album. Immediately thereafter it’s that chattering, choogling, kicking the pebble down the road style of guitar playing, which Knopfler can safely call his own, that takes over and drives you hurriedly through the opening song, Tunnel Of Love.

Of course Knopfler’s voice begs comparison to Dylan’s, only maybe less obtuse and with fewer affectations. He sounds quite a bit like I imagine Al Pacino might sound had he been a rock and roll singer instead of an actor. He is Pacino to Dylan’s Brando, sometimes grumbling, sometimes mumbling, alternating between a reflective whisper and a pleading growl.

Tunnel Of Love is a story of carnival lights and sights, summer testosterone and youthful faces eyeing youthful bodies.

“and the big wheel keep on turning, neon burning up above

and I’m just high on the world

come on and take a low ride with me girl

on the tunnel of love”

The lyrics are classic boy meets girl only dramatically more nuanced and intimate, “in the screaming ring of faces I seen her standing in the light” the interlude begins. Boy gets girl; “and girl it looks so pretty to me just like it always did” followed by Knopfler’s command to “Check it out”, as he lets loose a burst of a guitar solo, shuddering and brief, reminiscent of that moment of release which any teenage tryst might muster. And in the end boy loses girl, “She took off a silver locket she said remember me by this, she put her hand in my pocket I got a keepsake and a kiss”.

The protagonist spends the remainder of the song unsuccessfully searching the carnival arcades and ultimately, softly pining for his fleeting partner. Tunnel Of Love culminates with what you might call a second and longer guitar solo but calling it that wouldn’t do justice to Knopfler’s emotive and expressive playing that is every bit as conversational as his vocals. One of the most beautifully natural and unforced performances you’ll hear on record gives way in the end to the return of Bittan’s piano, closing out the first track.

The next song, Romeo and Juliet quietly opens with a lovely acoustic guitar that would not be out of place on an early Simon and Garfunkel record. It’s a street-wise retelling of the classic tale of young love gone awry that anybody who has ever had their teenage heart broken can relate to. This Romeo is a doo-wop kid singing under the lamppost while Juliet responds in kind with a refrain from a 1963 classic by The Angels, “hey la, my boyfriend’s back.” In this incarnation it’s not death that disrupts the romance so much as fickle hearts, the promise of the new and the utter frenetic difficulty of navigating raging teenage emotions. Together, apart, together, apart and so on, but when it’s on it is a rare and captivating rapturous sort of torture and delight. When was the last time the intensity of love hurt so good that you cried?

Together,

“Juliet when we made love you used to cry

you said I love you like the stars above, I’ll love you till I die

there’s a place for us, you know the movie song

when you gonna realize it was just that the time was wrong, Juliet?”

Apart,

“and all I do is miss you and the way we used to be

all I do is keep the beat and bad company

all I do is kiss you through the bars of a rhyme

Julie I’d do the stars with you any time”

The closing verse is a repeat of the opening verse only this time around it is sung devoid of the original hubris. Romeo is knocked down and defeated wanting things as they were, all the while knowing it can never be the same. It’s simply not in the stars. Knopfler’s plaintive guitar ends the song with haunting notes of longing and regret.

Skateaway closes out side one and is the song that first drew me to the album, largely on the strength of the captivating music video that was in heavy rotation back in the very earliest days of MTV.

The track starts like a marching band coming up the street, the sound of the drums faint at first and then building. The organ breaks the surface followed closely by Knopfler’s infectious Telecaster chicken picking that would make the great Don Rich smile in heaven. (Google him)

“I seen a girl on a one way corridor

stealing down a one way street

for all the world like an urban toreador

she had wheels on, on her feet”

Unlike the two preceding songs Skateaway (have a listen, audio player found on main page) is not about lust or love. The subject of the song is not an object of desire rather a celebration, with giddy admiration, of a woman in complete control. Music in the early 1980’s and specifically music videos were full of great examples of cool girls in command like the rollergirl in Skateaway. Chrissie Hynde, Debbie Harry, Annie Lennox, Annabella Lwin, Joan Jett, The Go-Go’s and even those two intriguing ladies in The Human League were far more interesting and appealing than the scantily clad window dressing that women in music videos would soon degenerate into, thanks to the dreadful dreck of homoerotic faux metal hair bands like Poison and Ratt.

Speaking of the music video for Skateaway, I was saddened to discover that the rollergirl Jayzik Azikiwe, who was so charmingly effective in portraying cool indifference (“I swear she let a big truck graze her hip”) as she cruised through traffic, passed away from cancer back in 2008 at the age of 49. Another crush done gone, another teenage dream dissolved in the mist.

On top of everything else it has going for it Skateaway features one of the most delightfully convoluted lines ever constructed, “but the music make her wanna be the story and the story was whatever was the song what it was” That’s a fun one to sing.

God Bless the Rollergirl, “skateaway that’s all”.

If the three songs comprising side one were all the album had to offer we would be getting our money’s worth and then some but there’s more.

Expresso Love starts off side two and now Knopfler’s guitar is no longer a pebble being kicked down the road but a can, loud and tumbling, pivoting and popping. What might have been a pedestrian rocker constructed for filler on any other album comes across here as a bright and churning caffeinated energy boost. After the departure of little brother David, Knofpler’s Dire Straits is now a power trio and the crystal clear rhythms provided by John Illsley’s bass and Pick Withers forceful concise drumming were made to go with Mark’s guitar “like a saxophone was made to go with the night.” Bittan’s piano adds sugar to the brew and really comes again to the forefront on the next track.

Hand in Hand delivers what was suggested and abruptly dismissed on the album’s opening track. A composition that would fit comfortably on the aforementioned The River as Bittan’s piano and Knopfler’s guitar interplay effortlessly in a mournful little tune that could easily have been penned and sung by Springsteen. Another study of love lost, stirringly summed up in the forlorn admission that has haunted every jilted lover since time began,

“now it’s another dirty river and another dirty scar

and I don’t know who’s kissing you and I don’t know where you are

so far from home, don’t you think of me sometime”

On Solid Rock the can has been kicked into the ditch as the band focuses instead on kicking the listener in the seat of the pants with reckless abandon. It takes about thirteen seconds to acquire ignition but once the engine fires the throttle is left wide open for the remainder of the ride. Knopfler sounds as if he’s hyperventilating trying to catch his vocals up with his careening guitar. A perfect length rock and roll song that somehow manages to find time to offer up some very non rebellious advice on how to live life responsibly with your head on straight and a solid foundation.

“because the heart that you break

that’s the one that you rely on

the bed that you make

that’s the one you gotta lie on

when you point your finger cos your plan fell through

you got three more fingers pointing back at you”

It’s like a scorching three and a half minute advice manual for raising teenagers! I was 15 when Making Movies was released; I wish I had paid closer attention to the lyrics at the time, might have saved me a bunch of headaches down the road.

Les Boys is the last song on the album. I suppose as a cabaret romp it’s a pleasant enough little ditty. I still haven’t figured out if it’s an early daring celebration of a particular gay lifestyle or a snide mockery. At any rate it stands as the least of the albums offerings and doesn’t do much other than to serve as a distraction and an aside to an otherwise perfect disc. Leave it off and you have a perfectly balanced set of sides, three classics on each.

Much of my favorite music of the early eighties has the magical power to transport me immediately back to one of the most exciting and carefree times in my life. Bands like The Police, The Clash and Squeeze along with all those glorious one or two hit wonders of the new wave so perfectly populate their era and are forever fused with the time.The difference is what elevates Making Movies to such lofty status. It is timeless and therefore a triumph. Nothing about the music within screams 1980 and every time I drop the needle it sounds as fresh and interesting as that very first time I turned on the Zenith and saw that captivating, long legged rollergirl zigzagging through traffic to that glorious beat.

Lyrics By Mark Knopfler