Tunnel of Love (Dire Straits song)

"Tunnel of Love"
Single by Dire Straits
from the album Making Movies
B-side "Tunnel of Love, Part 2"
Released 2 October 1981
Format 7"
Recorded 20 June - 25 August 1980
Genre Rock
Length 8:08
Label Vertigo Records/Warner Bros. Records
Songwriter(s) Mark Knopfler
Richard Rodgers/Oscar Hammerstein II (Intro)
Producer(s) Jimmy Iovine, Mark Knopfler
Dire Straits singles chronology
"Skateaway"
(1981)		 "Tunnel of Love"
(1981)		 "Private Investigations"
(1982)

"Skateaway"
(1981)		 "Tunnel of Love"
(1981)		 "Private Investigations"
(1982)

"Tunnel of Love" is a 1980s rock song by Dire Straits. It appears on the album Making Movies, and subsequently on the live albums Alchemy and Live at the BBC and the greatest hits albums Money for Nothing, Sultans of Swing: The Very Best of Dire Straits, and The Best of Dire Straits & Mark Knopfler: Private Investigations.

"Tunnel of Love" is one of only three Dire Straits songs not credited to Mark Knopfler alone (the other two are "Money for Nothing" and "What's The Matter Baby?"). The song itself is entirely by Knopfler, but the opening instrumental is an arrangement of the "Carousel Waltz" from the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical Carousel.

Background

The Spanish City in the song was a fairground located in Whitley Bay, part of the North Sea coast to the north-east of Newcastle upon Tyne, one train stop along from Cullercoats as mentioned in the song. The term "Rockaway" references Rockaway Beach in New York City, the location of the Rockaways' Playland amusement park.

Chart performance

It reached the position of only #54 in the UK Singles Chart upon its single release in October 1981, despite being one of the band's most famous and popular songs.

Music videos

Two music videos exist for the song, one depicting Mark Knopfler, John Illsley and Pick Withers performing on a blank set, intercut with imagery and actors relevant to the lyrics, the other featuring a larger band arrangement and telling the story of a couple escaping a group of soldiers who chase them from a funfair.

Live performances

In 1980s concerts, Dire Straits played the central theme of The Animals' "Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood" during an extended instrumental introduction to the song, as Knopfler talked about that group's hometown of Newcastle. Knopfler's outro solo has received numerous plaudits over the years:

"Throughout "Tunnel of Love," Mark Knopfler dramatizes this close encounter by using his guitar as a Greek chorus. [...] Later, as Knopfler walks alone through the "carousel and the carnival arcades," waiting for another night and another girl, he wraps his voice like a ratty old raincoat around Bittan's gently tinkling piano and the long guitar solo that ends the track. Somehow, the evocative moan of the artist's guitar suggests a truth much deeper than the carnival-as-life metaphor has revealed."[1]

Mark Knopfler also sometimes played melody from chorus of Stop! In the Name of Love by The Supremes as an additional intro prior to the "Carousel Waltz" while performing this song live.

Cultural references

It was used in the 1982 film An Officer and a Gentleman. The song is sampled in John Legend's "I Love, You Love" on his 2008 Evolver album. The English folk duo Show of Hands recorded a cover version of this song on their 2011 album Covers 2.

The song is referred to in Douglas Adams's 1984 novel So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish :[2] "Mark Knopfler has an extraordinary ability to make a Schecter Custom Stratocaster hoot and sing like angels on a Saturday night, exhausted from being good all week and needing a stiff drink."

References

  1. ↑ Fricke, David (5 February 1981). "Dire Straits: Making Movies" (review). Rolling Stone. Retrieved 2011-08-14.
  2. ↑ "The alt.fan.douglas-adams FAQ". Retrieved 2007-02-07.
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