Dire Straits - When It Comes To You (Live in Nîmes, France / 1992 / Visualiser)

[hunter v2.0]

Hand over raw footage to fans for them to work on ... Get real, folks.

As for 'When it comes to you', such a depressing song. I used to love it 30 years ago, but now don't even think it's a good song. The live version is very dead, Mark's singing terrible and his guitar playing really nothing special.

[quizzaciously]

Jokes aside, fans often do a far better job than official parties.

I guess it depends how you quantify 'a better job'.
If you look at fans 'cover song' videos on Youtube both the audio and video quality are often terrible.

Hand over raw footage to fans for them to work on ... Get real, folks.

Musical quality also usually suck. But cover versions have nothing to do with editing a video. I'd say it's easier to combine a few professionally recorded and graded video tracks into a somewhat watchable material than spend 20 years mastering both your playing and recording skills. It's like semi-finished already, you only need to decide on angles and cuts, which could be done by a fan, believe me. Even in iMovie!

I just wanted to say, many fans are professionals in their respective fields. You can have professional video editors, sound engineers, DPs, musicians, lawyers or whoever else as your fans, and yes, sometimes they can do a better job, without getting paid and time constraints. I don't understand what's so controversial about this simple statement and why everybody gangs up on me again. Are all fans unemployed?

Indeed, nobody will ever "hand over" anything to fans or anyone else, we're discussing thin air here. Fans can't do anything because we don't have anything, and the artist can't do anything because they don't care, and all we get is this animation. And nothing goes south again, just a natural off-topic. I'll just drop here a masterpiece of an official video, and curious to see if the officialness of it makes it better:

[quizzaciously]

One of my favourite examples of fans vs. professionals is this video right there (coincidentally, it's about Queen, hehe):



P.S. I'm sorry for going off-topic, but it's an interesting topic, and as usual, you either have fun "discussing" things on a discussion forum or force people like me into an argument... Then just shut down all the topics, open a new topic after the slightest movement towards another topic, or better yet — execute me because I'm talking too much and you don't agree with my opinion!

[Rolleyway Man]

As for 'When it comes to you', such a depressing song. I used to love it 30 years ago, but now don't even think it's a good song. The live version is very dead, Mark's singing terrible and his guitar playing really nothing special.

I disagree. Songs aren’t always going to be about happy subjects! The Dire Straits version is very atmospheric. I love the synth pad, Mark’s tone on the Pensa-Suhr and the way he delivers his vocal. It’s one of my favourites from On Every Street. I love the live versions too, both by NHB and DS.

[Robson]

As for 'When it comes to you', such a depressing song. I used to love it 30 years ago, but now don't even think it's a good song. The live version is very dead, Mark's singing terrible and his guitar playing really nothing special.

I disagree. Songs aren’t always going to be about happy subjects! The Dire Straits version is very atmospheric. I love the synth pad, Mark’s tone on the Pensa-Suhr and the way he delivers his vocal. It’s one of my favourites from On Every Street. I love the live versions too, both by NHB and DS.

Exactly! When It Comes To You is a great song. The studio and live version are great. Possibly the best from the TNH era

[Brunno Nunes]

And what would be the problem with releasing the raw version so that fans, for example, could edit it at an amateur/pro level?

What is the advantage of keeping them locked away instead of releasing them in their current version, technically speaking?

The first line is madness. No credible artists release raw, unedited art for 'fans' to do their own thing with.
The advantage of 'locking them away' is that the artist is in control of their legacy. They recorded 6 to 8 shows and edited, finishing the best performances for the fans. Why would anyone give you the least good stuff....seriously?

You are entering a territory of pure subjectivity at this point, what is good, what is bad for the fans is decided by the artist, ok, but, this is not always a guarantee that they are getting it right, OTN is an example, from the point of view of a release that intended to show a show from the band's last tour, in my opinion and that of many fans I know, it left a lot to be desired, in several aspects, I will only highlight one aspect here: the repertoire, there is not a show in the history of Dire Straits that has not played SOS, but, OTN was released like this, without SOS, (not to mention other classics like TOL and TR, both with new arrangements and format, different from how they were played in the 80s.) This is an example of a mistaken perspective on the part of whoever made this choice, more than 30 years later, they corrected this mistake with Box Live 78/92 and made the dream of many come true, especially the band's most assiduous fans, releasing OTN and Alchemy with all the songs that had been played, regardless of whether the production was criticized or not, we have the songs and that is the most important thing. Understand that the people who want this type of material from the band the most are people who are used to Bootlegs that are not always of good quality, but that is just one aspect of the product, generally the recording itself is worth it for the fan collector, imagine something like this Live 78/92 box, professionally produced?

Finally, Dire Straits' legacy is far from having received the due care it deserves, judging by the releases since the beginning, especially live ones, there are several gaps, (the Live 78/92 box is one of the few exceptions), we easily find anachronistic information on official channels, photos of the BIA tour 85/86 being released as from the OES tour 91/92, even John's book is full of errors and to make matters worse, MK doesn't care at all about DS's legacy, he put a damper on it when he was absent from the RRHF ceremony in 2018. None of this was by chance.

[Brunno Nunes]

And what would be the problem with releasing the raw version so that fans, for example, could edit it at an amateur/pro level?

What is the advantage of keeping them locked away instead of releasing them in their current version, technically speaking?

The first line is madness. No credible artists releases raw, unedited art for 'fans' to do their own thing with.
The advantage of 'locking them away' is that the artist is in control of their legacy. They recorded 6 to 8 shows and edited, finished the best performances for the fans. Why would anyone give you the less good stuff....seriously?

And why do you think there are no qualified people here on the forum who can take the raw material and transform it into a commercial product? Especially with all the technology available today, unlike in the 90s... Even if there were no qualified people for this here on the forum, in the utopia I conjectured (utopia, because of course they wouldn't do that) they would ask for a qualified producer to produce the recording in a professional manner, all financed by fans interested in covering the costs, if that were the case, since no one who owns these recordings has ever been interested in releasing them.

I've noticed that you sometimes underestimate many of us here on the forum. I respect you a lot as a musician, your resume, especially for having participated in Dire Straits' last tour and having played with the Beatles. However, unlike everyone else here, you are not a fan of the band. Your perspective is different, very valid for contextualizing the historical period of 91/92. However, the perspective of a loyal fan of the band is a totally different universe from yours as a former member, and I understand that perfectly. I asked you a question on page 1 of this thread: did you believe that this song was filmed, like the others in the On The Night video? The idea here is to understand the reason why they didn't give us the complete product. There is nothing that justifies the absence of footage of these songs to this day (the same goes for Alchemy), unless it simply doesn't exist, someone deleted it, erased it, destroyed it, which would be a shame. Again, in the end, what is good, what is bad will always be subjective, we want the opportunity to see it so we can make our own judgment, just like those who were there in the audience, especially if this footage exists, we already have the audio, and it wasn't bad at all, on the contrary, it would have been very well received by fans upon its first release in 1993.

[Brunno Nunes]

What the record company will try to cash in for BIA 40th aniversary release?

I think the only correct approach is about market and money.

Is there a way that releasing the full Live in Wembley Arena being worthly profitable for Universal ?

I imagine Mark has final say on any such projects. What is HIS motivation to add to the On Every Street, On The Night film and audio.
I imagine it's not a particularly happy memory for him, not one of his proudest moments.
I think the recent box set is probably his last word on remixes, extra songs and re-releases.

Personal problems are something that should never be above art. What you did was art and entertainment during the tour, you brought great joy to fans around the world during the OES tour 91/92. More than three decades have passed since this adventure. Both those who had the chance to see you back then and those who didn't would love to see Dire Straits' legacy receive less modest, fairer and more caring treatment. This idea that it's not a good memory for him is something that should be absent from the equation. All we want is to consume art, nothing more. It's the art that matters, it's the art that gives us good emotions. We want the recordings, the songs. This is the most basic thing any band leader should know. I've always thought of it as a two-way street. The artist produces art to be consumed by his audience, which supports his career. It's a shame that things aren't always like this, but they should be. Thank goodness we have great examples of preserving their legacy, the Beatles, Dylan, Hendrix, Pink Floyd... not all is lost in this sense, but Dire Straits still needs to improve a lot, who knows one day...

[Brunno Nunes]

Exactly.
That was the best question, the most appropriate one could ask when faced with this! If there are recordings, what's the point in keeping them out of reach of fans? If this material were given to some people here on this forum (I include myself in this list), I guarantee that with a small investment, we would be able to do a good job of producing this recording and giving it the treatment it has always deserved, even if the cost were paid for by everyone involved.

And you could finish an unfinished Picasso at the same time. Really, I've seen some crazy stuff on this forum and this line of argument takes the biscuit.
The people who work on video and audio production have decades of experience. Anyone who gets to work on a product by a major artist like Dire Straits has years of experience at the highest level and a track record of delivering outstanding work. And you think Mark and John are going to release raw content for you to finish?
For the record - I wouldn't put MYSELF in that frame, let alone an amateur fan.

Jokes aside, fans often do a far better job than official parties. Take a look at the gaming industry, where releases by big corporations are often complete trash that then gets improved by fans, sometimes single-handedly. A good example from recent history: Grand Theft Auto: The Trilogy – The Definitive Edition. From 1998 Trespasser to this day, the gaming industry is constantly being improved by fans and their mods. Heck, even "Counter-Strike" originally was a mod. Don't underestimate the power of fans.

Personally, I lost any confidence in anything "official" as the quality of the product is often mediocre, so if it's official it doesn't automatically mean quality. Not to say live videos are bad though as USUALLY they are done great. What Brunno meant was, I think, is should these "raw" tracks be available somehow, official or not, fans could (and they would) combine raw tracks and audio into something pretty good. As an editor myself, I can say editing is not rocket science, and it would be fun to mess with OES tracks.

Exactly that, quizzaciously, that's my perspective, it's blatant that many official releases are mediocre, especially from Dire Straits. (Starting in 1978, the video for Sultans of Swing has a cut when the climax of the song begins, its final solo. Do you want something more mediocre than that, because it doesn't stop there.)

The treatment given to Dire Straits releases is historically modest, often bordering on mediocrity, and lately with the presence of "nickel hunting", the tenth edition of the album BIA, look at the way MK's solo albums have been released since 2009, you have to be willing to spend a lot of money to get what the record company imposes, this latest release is... discouraging, the marketing team is a disaster, oddly enough, it shows amateurism, look at the photos and information recently posted on the official channels, even the date of the videos...

[Brunno Nunes]

As for 'When it comes to you', such a depressing song. I used to love it 30 years ago, but now don't even think it's a good song. The live version is very dead, Mark's singing terrible and his guitar playing really nothing special.

I disagree. Songs aren’t always going to be about happy subjects! The Dire Straits version is very atmospheric. I love the synth pad, Mark’s tone on the Pensa-Suhr and the way he delivers his vocal. It’s one of my favourites from On Every Street. I love the live versions too, both by NHB and DS.

I agree with you 100%. Dire Straits' live version has unique elements, and I love the whole atmosphere the band manages to create, there's nothing like it. I would love to see the audiovisual experience of this song on OTN.

[Chris W]

You are entering a territory of pure subjectivity at this point, what is good, what is bad for the fans is decided by the artist, ok, but,

But nothing.... Like it or not, artists in ALL disciplines have been the final word on what is published.
You don't get to re-edit Citizen Kane, remix Rumours, or touch up the Mona Lisa.

[Chris W]

This idea that it's not a good memory for him is something that should be absent from the equation.

I wasn't really talking about personal issues, but anyway you can't ask people NOT to be human with their decision making. The OES album was a disappointment after BIA. No real hits, the album itself didn't sell as well. Critics said it wasn't as good an album as previous releases. The tour didn't match BIA in terms of records broken, Live Aid in the afternoon, sold out show at Wembley in the evening etc...
So as an artist what is the motivation to revisit one of your less successful periods?

[Chris W]

The treatment given to Dire Straits releases is historically modest, often bordering on mediocrity, and lately with the presence of "nickel hunting", the tenth edition of the album BIA, look at the way MK's solo albums have been released since 2009, you have to be willing to spend a lot of money to get what the record company imposes, this latest release is... discouraging, the marketing team is a disaster, oddly enough, it shows amateurism, look at the photos and information recently posted on the official channels, even the date of the videos...

And yet you are a hardcore fan?? ??
Being a smash hit artist, multi-millionaire and powerful entity almost as the sole controller of Dire Straits and his solo career, you can't blame a record company for the last 20 years of releases. mark has signed off on everything, from solo albums, to re-issues to photo sessions.

[ds1984]

Disposable art said Ed.

Live video editing or event audio editing is not painting. One is mostly technicall skill, the other one is Art.

And fans can only control what Mark and the record company are ready to allow them (almost nothing).

[ds1984]

But nothing.... Like it or not, artists in ALL disciplines have been the final word on what is published.

Chris I am sorry to say you that you are wrong.

The producer, the one who is putting the money on the table has the final word in many cases unlike the painter.

The artist is not always the king.

I don't remember which big star just said "I recorded this album only for the money..."