Dire Straits: Love Over Gold (Limited Edition) (SHM-CD)

By the time Dire Straits released their first No. 1 album in the UK, they had already built up a large fan base in the UK and around the world over the course of several years. This happened in early fall 1982 with their fourth studio album, *Love Over Gold*. Within two weeks, on October 16 of that same year, they were back on the U.S. charts, entering directly into the Top 40. The LP’s debut at No. 38 was the second-highest of the week, behind Billy Joel’s debut at No. 29 with *The Nylon Curtain*. The LP was recorded at the Power Station in New York and demonstrated that Mark Knopfler’s songwriting skills had reached a new level of sophistication. He became increasingly confident in expressing himself in ways that went beyond the three-minute single format, a fact made clear right from the album’s opening track, the 14-minute “Telegraph Road.” In fact, *Love Over Gold* contained only five tracks, the shortest of which, “Industrial Disease,” lasted just under six minutes. The latter song became a major rock radio hit in the U.S. and helped the album reach No. 19 on the charts there. Dire Straits’ fourth studio album, released in 1982, issued as a limited-edition Japanese SHM-CD with a paper sleeve: Replica of the original LP sleeve with original artwork, miniature version of the Japanese obi strip, inner sleeve, and a white booklet with Japanese translations of the lyrics.