Forbes contributors publish independent expert analyses and insights. Hugh McIntyre covers music, with a focus on the global charts. “Sultans of Swing” gives Dire Straits its first streaming hit in ...

Released as the first single from Dire Straits‘ eponymous 1978 debut, “Sultans of Swing” hit No. 4 on the Billboard Hot 100 and has remained a staple song within the British rockers’ classic catalog.

It was a rainy night in Ipswich, Suffolk, England, when Mark Knopfler found himself in a small pub watching a Dixieland jazz band playing to an audience of less than a handful of drunken patrons. The ...