Brothers in Arms

What is the Brothers in Arms guitar tone?

The Brothers in Arms guitar tone is a slow, singing Les Paul lead built from a few long, sustained notes, heard on Dire Straits' 1980s rock ballad recording. It is a distorted solo tone, and Dire Straits reportedly tracked it with a 1983 Gibson Les Paul '59 Reissue, bought at Rudy's Music in New York, which Guitar World says drove both this song and Money for Nothing; Mark Knopfler's guitar tech Ron Eve says he pushed him towards the Les Paul against some early resistance and remembers him, if he recalls it rightly, on the neck pickup with the tone rolled off, winding up the sustain and holding the notes, and Eve does not think the part could have been played on any other guitar; the amp of the sessions was Eve's own Marshall JTM45 into the studio's Laney 4x12 cabinet, an idea Knopfler thinks he took from the Bluesbreakers album, and the Cry Baby wah on Money for Nothing was the only significant pedal on the record; Knopfler thinks he may have picked up the Les Paul after listening to Peter Green's Need Your Love So Bad, a sound that was not distorted but was very powerful; he says the song has to open with the same four notes, because audiences do not accept another intro, and that he improvises from there, and bassist John Illsley calls the playing economical, two or three notes in a bar where it did not need fifteen; Knopfler wrote the song in 1982, the year of the Falklands War, and the band recorded the album with Neil Dorfsman at AIR Studios in Montserrat in the winter of 1984; it closes Brothers in Arms, released in May 1985, and came out as a single on 18 October 1985. A ballad lead has to sing over a slow band, so it needs sustain from a drive pedal or a pushed amp and room around the notes, with the mids kept in so it cuts without getting louder.

You do not need that exact gear to land in the same place. What carries this sound is the gain structure, the EQ curve, the pickup choice and the order of the effects, and all four can be rebuilt on equipment that costs a fraction of the original. The numbers change from amp to amp, because a high-gain head and a small practice amp reach the same voicing from different knob positions. That translation is what Tonelify works out for the rig you actually own.

What gear did Dire Straits use on Brothers in Arms?

A 1983 Gibson Les Paul '59 Reissue, bought at Rudy's Music in New York, which Guitar World says drove both this song and Money for Nothing; Mark Knopfler's guitar tech Ron Eve says he pushed him towards the Les Paul against some early resistance and remembers him, if he recalls it rightly, on the neck pickup with the tone rolled off, winding up the sustain and holding the notes, and Eve does not think the part could have been played on any other guitar; the amp of the sessions was Eve's own Marshall JTM45 into the studio's Laney 4x12 cabinet, an idea Knopfler thinks he took from the Bluesbreakers album, and the Cry Baby wah on Money for Nothing was the only significant pedal on the record; Knopfler thinks he may have picked up the Les Paul after listening to Peter Green's Need Your Love So Bad, a sound that was not distorted but was very powerful; he says the song has to open with the same four notes, because audiences do not accept another intro, and that he improvises from there, and bassist John Illsley calls the playing economical, two or three notes in a bar where it did not need fifteen; Knopfler wrote the song in 1982, the year of the Falklands War, and the band recorded the album with Neil Dorfsman at AIR Studios in Montserrat in the winter of 1984; it closes Brothers in Arms, released in May 1985, and came out as a single on 18 October 1985.

Sources: Guitar World: Brothers in Arms, Knopfler and his inner circle on its creation, Wikipedia: Brothers in Arms (song)

Tonelify reads that chain and translates it to the amp and guitar you already own, returning gain, bass, mids, treble and presence values along with a pickup position.