Was Dire Straits' 1980s hit song - 'Money for nothing and your chicks for free' - an inappropriate lifestyle promotion statement/song? A conversation on it

Last updated on 31st March 2018

Note: Readers who prefer not to read about rock song lyrics which refer to ladies as 'chicks', may please skip reading rest of this post.

Extracts from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Money_for_Nothing_(song) :

"Money for Nothing" is a single by British rock band Dire Straits, taken from their 1985 studio album Brothers in Arms. The song's lyrics are written from the point of view of two working-class men watching music videos and commenting on what they see. The song features a guest appearance by Sting singing background vocals, providing both the signature falsetto introduction and backing chorus of "I want my MTV." The groundbreaking video was the first to be aired on MTV Europe when the network launched on 1 August 1987.

It was Dire Straits' most commercially successful single, peaking at number 1 for three weeks in the United States, number 1 for three weeks on the US Top Rock Tracks chart and number 4 in the band's native UK. "Money for Nothing" won the Grammy Award for Best Rock Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal in 1986 at the 28th Annual Grammy Awards and the video won Video of the Year at the 3rd MTV Video Music Awards.

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Mark Knopfler described the writing of the song in a 1984 interview with critic Bill Flanagan:

"The lead character in "Money for Nothing" is a guy who works in the hardware department in a television/​custom kitchen/​refrigerator/​microwave appliance store. He's singing the song. I wrote the song when I was actually in the store. I borrowed a bit of paper and started to write the song down in the store. I wanted to use a lot of the language that the real guy actually used when I heard him, because it was more real...."

In 2000, Knopfler appeared on Parkinson on BBC One and explained again where the lyrics originated. According to Knopfler, he was in New York and stopped by an appliance store. At the back of the store, they had a wall of TVs which were all tuned to MTV. Knopfler said there was a man working there dressed in a baseball cap, work boots, and a checkered shirt delivering boxes who was standing next to him watching. As they were standing there watching MTV, Knopfler remembers the man coming up with lines such as "what are those, Hawaiian noises?...that ain't workin'," etc. Knopfler asked for a pen to write some of these lines down and then eventually put those words to music.[citation needed] The first-person narrating character in the lyrics refers to a musician "banging on the bongos like a chimpanzee" and a woman "stickin' in the camera, man we could have some fun". He describes a singer as "that little faggot with the earring and the make-up", and bemoans that these artists get "money for nothing and chicks for free".

Mötley Crüe bassist Nikki Sixx claimed that the song was about his band’s outrageous lifestyle. In an interview, he related an apocryphal story that the members of Dire Straits were in a store that sold televisions, and a row of TVs were all playing Mötley Crüe videos.

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Here are the lyrics of the song: https://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/direstraits/moneyfornothing.html.

The key line in the song in the context of this post is "Money for nothin' and your chicks for free".

Given below is a recent conversation I had with Himy Misra on Facebook (Himy was OK with public sharing):

Himy put up a post with these contents:
thats the
way you do it.
[Post had the following link:
Dire Straits - Money For Nothing, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wTP2RUD_cL0, around 5 mins. published by DireStraitsVEVO on 23rd Feb. 2010, over 62 million views.]
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Ravi S. Iyer wrote: This was a big, big hit among my software techies group in the second half of the 1980s, with most of us having spent significant time in the USA then.

"Money for nothing and your chicks for free" - the title line was a big lifestyle statement/philosophy in itself!
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Ravi S. Iyer wrote: Of course, it was a misleading statement and an inappropriate lifestyle promotion.
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Ravi S. Iyer wrote: The song was an in-demand one for any booze and/or shake-a-leg (I wouldn't call it dance) parties we had (mostly only the guys shaking-a-leg) then, both in the USA and in Mumbai.
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Himy Misra wrote: baba said not to eat meat, not to booze and not to smoke cigis. so i gave up all three in 1994 i think. baba is a tough taskmaster.
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Ravi S. Iyer wrote: I too quit meat and booze maybe around 1991-1992 as my digestive system health had nosedived impacting my life quite significantly. Took me longer to get rid of cigarettes. I was able to do that fully only around 1992-93, if I recall correctly. I think I had got rid of these habits almost fully, if not fully, before I came/was brought to Baba's fold perhaps around 1993-94.
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Himy Misra wrote: yes yes same for me ravi. i was at dharmakshetra and His message came to give up all three on one birthday.
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Ravi S. Iyer wrote: Interesting!
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Ravi S. Iyer wrote: Himy Misra, I think our exchange being put up on my FB and blog posts may help some youngsters. May I share your post and comments on a public FB post and blog post on this?
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Himy Misra wrote: please feel free to share anything you want to Ravi.
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Ravi S. Iyer wrote: Will do. Thanks.
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Himy Misra wrote: you know Ravi maybe the youngsters ought to take me as an example of how NOT to be.
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Ravi S. Iyer Himy, yes, that's what I meant - from the examples of both of us. How we went astray in our youth and got caught up in habits of smoking and drinking (occasionally). And how I (and perhaps you too) who did not eat meat (and had not smoked tobacco or drank alcohol) till I first went to Belgium when I was around 23 years of age, got into meat-eating.

And then how we got out of our habits some years later (in my case in the early 30s).

Stories of people giving up their earlier habits and changing are positive, and give hope to youngsters who may be currently caught up in the habits that you and I were caught up in. It is in that context that I am thinking of sharing our experiences.

And the Dire Straits 'Money for nothing and your chicks for free' lifestyle statement, in my case at least, played a small contributory role along with other things that I saw in the West in my twenties, that egged me to hold a view that such lifestyle statements are not wrong and that's what some in the West do. I think these did play a role in me holding on to those habits of smoking and drinking (occasionally) as not a bad thing to do (and helped me ignore the health warnings on cigarette packs).

Eventually I paid a price in terms of physical health due to these habits. Reality kicked in and forced me to come to the realization that the medical fraternity's health warnings on the cigarette packs were the truthful and wise words, and not lifestyle statements on the lines of 'Money for nothing and your chicks for free'!
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Himy Misra wrote (slightly edited): yes Baba is very kind and picks up folks gone astray. actually let me just clarify 'money for nothing and chiks for free' is just an observation by Mark Knofler of how the working class people, such as the type who shift furniture, tend to view rock stars. they think that playing a guitar amounts to nothing and they wish they had also learnt to play the guitar so they too could be rich and attract beautiful women. its Knofler being humble. He isnt really wanting us to adopt that lifestyle. just to be fair to Knofler who is an amazing artist. see his interview. he is a very beautiful, sensitive person and i think Andrew made me aware of this youtube. so appreciation to him. academic pressure pushed me into this stuff as a kind of coping strategy and not Knofler at least in my case:

[Mark Knopfler - Tracker – A Track by Track], https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gpNV5ECePg8
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Ravi S. Iyer wrote: Will see the youtube video later. Thanks for sharing.

I would not be surprised at all to know that the songwriter is a nice guy and does not really endorse the message in the song as a lifestyle promotion statement.

However, some foolish people (including me then in my twenties), did get that sort of view on listening to the song. I mean, I did not know the background of the song but went by the words in the song! And they were simple to understand :-). Money for nothing and the chicks for free :-). Not Alice in Wonderland but Desi guy in Wonderland perhaps :-).

And other songs in MTV during those days - 2nd half of the 80s - were as challenging to digest as this one, for a Desi guy like me (which perhaps was the case for many other Desis too). I mean, the hit Indian language film songs at that time had much more healthier lifestyle statements, even the romantic and the flashy ones.

The other big hit songs on MTV in those days, of this type were Material Girl by Madonna (release in 1985) and Bad by Michael Jackson (released in 1987). Their 'messages' were as challenging as the 'Money for nothing and the chicks for free' message, though I now understand Bad to be a mixed message one, where MJ is attempting to reform the bad gang types. But in those days when I heard it, the key line was, "I am bad"! :-). And the video was gangster stuff.

Fortunately we also had car radio with lovely FM stations like Boston/Massachusetts Easy Listening which gave guys like me exposure to Simon & Garfunkel, Joan Baez, Stevie Wonder, Bob Marley (Buffalo Soldier), Otis Redding (Sitting on the dock of the bay), and other much more meaningful lyrics contemporary singers. Note that in Bombay itself I had had some exposure to oldies like Beatles, Abba and through my elder sister, Cliff Richard etc.

But that's not what you got on MTV in the second half of the 1980s! At home on the telly it was MTV for songs (which I would get even in my 15 month stint in Belgium in 1985-86) and that was dominated by Michael Jackson, Madonna, Dire Straits etc. as they were hitting the top of the charts!
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Ravi S. Iyer wrote: And I do think that I got a wrong impression about USA through MTV. It was too freaky. But I thought that to be a reflection of some reality in the USA.

Today, I think MTV represents only a portion of the listening and video watching public in the USA, even if that portion may be a significant amount.

And I also think that perhaps most of this listening public is able to not take the words of some of these freaky songs as any kind of message at all. But I am not sure about that.

In the past few years, I saw some USA rap stuff (if I got the name correctly) of the real freaky kind on youtube (sitting in Puttaparthi, India). I do hope that such stuff is not viewed as a lifestyle message by its listeners/viewers. Note that I am not saying that about all rap stuff as I believe there is fair amount of good message rap too. But there is some real freaky rap stuff out there!
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Himy Misra wrote: many IITians land up in the US thinking that chiks are waiting for them with garlands to welcome them. i think they had some wrong ideas. you heard some good music. its good to get out of the head and into the heart. these days i actually just hum bhajans. what i am posting here is my past coz am feeling a bit nostalgic these days for the good old days. i am just getting it out of my system.
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Ravi S. Iyer wrote: Oh! I liked the music. I lacked the maturity then to focus on the music and not pay much attention to the lyrics of songs like these.

I am considering sharing such info. as I wanted to capture a rather frank memoir through these posts.

This is the journey of life that many travel on. It is in one's youth that one is vulnerable to misunderstanding some things based on superficial understanding. For me, that was the case with some parts of the Western world, especially the USA, as seen through glasses like that of MTV.

Even today, I like the energy of the music in these songs including that of Madonna and Michael Jackson. But I am wise enough now to filter out the lyrics of some of these songs as unimportant.

I should also say that some of these songs have a powerful message which I appreciated then and appreciate today too. I think 'Papa don't preach' of Madonna is one of such songs. The song boldly captures the reality that some young girls get into, and the song and video shows a positive way of it being handled.
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Himy Misra wrote: Madonna and MJ havent heard much. when we are young there was no one to guide. anyway, all the sai aunties tell me it would have been better if i had had a less wild time but what to do. its all karma. me like stuff like Beatles, Pink Floyd, Eric Clapton, Dire Straits, Jethro Tull, Eagles, basically its now called classic rock. but now what really gives me peace are baba bhajans.
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Ravi S. Iyer wrote: Noted your response Himy Misra. Just finished watching the Mark Knopfler video. It was very interesting. Thanks for sharing it.
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Ravi S. Iyer wrote: Having walked down the Dire Straits memory path I revived my memories of two popular songs of it (from the same album as 'Money for nothing' - Brothers in Arms - if I am not mistaken) by listening to them again after at least a few years, I think. These songs had no issues of any misunderstanding of their lyrics :-), then and now. I enjoyed these songs then and now :-).

Walk of life - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kd9TlGDZGkI
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Ravi S. Iyer wrote: So far away - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YIHMPc6ZCuI
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C Andrew Barker wrote (and was OK with public sharing): Interesting thread between you guys. Cool to see the 80's US music scene through desi eyes. IMO pop music started going downhill (and continues to do so) in the 80's from the heights of the English bands of the 60's and 70's. Mark Knopfler was a bit of an outlier as he is infinitely more musically gifted than his 80's peers. It is hilarious to construe any connection between when happened on MTV and normal American life, though it is easy to see how a naive newcomer might make that mistake.
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Himy Misra wrote: hollywood and MTV make American life look very enticing to desis thats true Andrew.
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Himy Misra wrote: but i got lots of family living there so i know the strong work ethic that runs America. i got no illusions now which i might have had as a college going desi guy.
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Ravi S. Iyer wrote (slightly edited): For me as a young early twenties fellow, first Western European life in Brussels, Belgium - around 15 months in 1985-86 - followed, after some time, with a couple of USA stints perhaps in 1987-1989 (I turned 25 in 1987) for a total of around 19 months living mainly in Nashua, New Hampshire but also Chelmsford, Massachusetts for some time, and assignment-working (as a consultant/contractor from my Mumbai company) in Lowell, Massachusetts at Wang Labs Headquarters there, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wang_Laboratories, had a very great impact on me. These places in the West were extraordinary material successes as compared to my life in Dombivli (residence; working-class town close to Mumbai from where one could commute using jam-packed rush hour suburban trains to Mumbai) and Mumbai (work place) then. I mean, I was just floored by the comfortable lifestyle I and all my software industry (techie) colleagues from India had while I was in Brussels and more so while I was in the USA, in the above stints.

Yes, I could see some flaws of the West too. And I was into spiritual philosophy then itself (some rather immature understanding, but still some understanding, of Bhagavad Gita and Upanishads). And I did see the mechanical aspects of Western city/urban life. But all that melted into the background when I compared my life in Dombivli & Mumbai then with my comfy lifestyle in Brussels and North-East USA.

And so there was this great admiration in me for what I ***myself saw and experienced*** of the great material achievements of the Western world over a nearly 3 year period then in Belgium and the USA. I felt that India had a lot to learn from the West in this regard.

And so when I did see MTV and all those song-videos which were at or close to the top of the charts, I saw it as a feature of contemporary Western civilization. The energy of those songs were breath-taking as compared to what I had heard in Hindi film songs then. And so I think it was a little natural for me to get somewhat caught up in thinking that maybe these aspects of Western world as portrayed by song-videos played on MTV did reflect, I repeat reflect, some reality of the contemporary Western world which was way, way ahead of Indian world then, in material well being of its people.

Work hard, party hard (using MTV type songs) - that's the way to do it! Maybe that's the message I got then from these Western pop hit songs in my young and impressionable twenties. And in the international software techie world then, I think that was the lifestyle of quite a few. I wouldn't be surprised if that is the lifestyle of many young software techies in Bangalore, India today!
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Ravi S. Iyer wrote: The (former) Wang Labs three towers office in Lowell, Massachusetts where I was privileged to consult/work in the second half of the 1980s: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/62/Cross_Point_Towers%3B_northeast_side%3B_Lowell%2C_MA%3B_2011-09-11.JPG
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Ravi S. Iyer wrote: C Andrew Barker, May I share your above comment on my free FB post and blog post (mentioned in earlier comments above)?
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C Andrew Barker wrote: Sure Ravi, though it wasn't any deep thoughts, just some idle musings.
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--- end conversation exchange between Himy Misra and me on Facebook with some additional input from C. Andrew Barker ---

Note that Himy Misra lives in Mumbai/Bombay and had studied engineering in IIT Bombay, if I recall correctly. C. Andrew Barker is based in the USA (as per his public Facebook profile info.).

[I thank wikipedia and have presumed that they will not have any objections to me sharing the above extracts from their website on this post which is freely viewable by all, and does not have any financial profit motive whatsoever.]