STRAIT TALK
One hundred and twenty million albums on this planet bear the bass parts of John Illsley, who recently released his memoir, My Life In Dire Straits. The autobiography traces his journey from the earliest days through the Eighties, when the Straits were an unstoppable, ubiquitous force—and beyond them, too. From the outset of the project, he tells us, he wanted to ensure his memories were contexted accurately.
“This is not about me scoring points,” says the bassist. “It is a celebration of the time we had and how we survived it. We stayed intact, and stayed friends—and a lot of people don’t. I decided right from the word go that I didn’t want people coming at me saying, ‘No, I didn’t say that—how dare you!’”
He adds: “I know some people will find glaring problems with my book, because their version of events is different from mine. This is my version of events. A lot of people did get hurt on the way, for various reasons, and you don’t want to get them to revisit that.
