Story of the song: Money for Nothing by Dire Straits

From The Independent archive: Robert Webb on how a blue-collar rant inspired the band’s biggest hit

Dire Straits performing with Sting at Live Aid in 1985 (Shutterstock)

Mark Knopfler had been listening to Randy Newman, and in particular liked the singer’s literary technique of employing what he called an “untrustworthy narrator” to tell his stories. “I’m sure the seeds of [“Money for Nothing”] were put there in my mind from listening to [his] songs,” said Knopfler.

The narrator of this Dire Straits hit was one such character, whom Knopfler encountered in a New York appliance store. The guitarist was browsing the kitchen displays in the front window when he overheard a customer berating a sales assistant. “I had to back up and actually spy through a little hole in the row of microwaves,” Knopfler told the author Paul Zollo. “I didn't want to put him off and interrupt his flow.”

Borrowing some paper and a pencil, Knopfler scribbled down the soundbites – “that ain’t working...”, “maybe get a blister on your little finger...” “They were written down two minutes after he said them,” recalled Knopfler and, back home, he began a song on his guitar around the lyrics. Knopfler adopted the casually spoken voice of a blue-collar worker, commenting on the music videos and adverts he watches on television.

“Lyrically it was pretty easy because he had said a lot of it,” explained Knopfler, recalling his shopping trip. “The store gave me the microwave ovens and the TVs ... all the things that were in the chorus were there.” In-character references to “f*****s” and a musician “bangin’ on the bongos like a chimpanzee” led some to mistakenly dismiss the song – and therefore Knopfler – as sexist and racist.

With the composition almost complete, Knopfler switched on his own television. “I had seen the Police doing this [MTV] advert,” he said. The channel’s slogan, “I want my MTV”, seemed to fit both the cadence and mood of Knopfler’s song. “Those five [sic] notes happened to come out like ‘Don’t Stand So Close to Me’.” It gave Knopfler an idea.

In late 1984, Sting rolled up at Dire Straits’ Montserrat studio to add his falsetto background vocals, aping the melody of his band’s old hit. Although the line was his only contribution, Sting’s publishers insisted on a co-writing credit. The song appeared on the 1985 album Brothers in Arms and was edited down for single release, earning its writers a Grammy. Knopfler, on MTV’s insistence, reluctantly agreed to make a video to accompany the hit.