How to Use brass tacks in a Sentence

brass tacks

plural noun

• Yet even as leaders get down to brass tacks, there’s plenty that can change.
  — Tory Newmyer, Washington Post, 25 Sep. 2017
• Sometimes the most creative thing a person can do is strip things down to brass tacks.
  — Janelle Okwodu, Vogue, 19 Apr. 2022
• The Center and the Square have dozens of shops selling a variety of wares from books and brass tacks to boots and bangles.
  — Joan Walden, courant.com, 19 Jan. 2018
• Getting down to brass tacks: These kids need to be singing like their livelihood depends on it.
  — Robbie Daw, Billboard, 23 Apr. 2018
• The brass tacks of this proposal are to be unveiled Tuesday.
  — Michael Tomasky, The New Republic, 25 Oct. 2021
• One of the roles of journalists is to separate brass tacks from bullshine.
  — Dahlia Lithwick, Slate Magazine, 26 Sep. 2017
• Shoppers can browse Fair casually or get right to the brass tacks of what the company will agree to sell, er, lease them.
  — David Muller, Car and Driver, 10 Oct. 2017
• But with both sides trying to keep options open, there has been little candid talk about brass tacks.
  — Alexander Coolidge, USA TODAY, 8 Oct. 2017
• The goal of the course was to infuse problem sets on policy dilemmas and philosophical debates with the brass tacks of coding.
  — Andrew Marantz, The New Yorker, 18 Oct. 2021
• The former first lady’s version was pink chiffon with porcelain beading, but Ford stripped the idea down to brass tacks outfitting Moore in white crème silk and ivory kid gloves.
  — Janelle Okwodu, Vogue, 6 May 2022
• But the point of this article is to get down to brass tacks and simply show the relationship between housing costs and worker shortages.
  — Atticus Leblanc, Forbes, 18 Jan. 2022
• Its stark wood paneled set, onstage band, and modern take on the dream ballet all work toward a notion stripping the musical down to brass tacks.
  — Maureen Lee Lenker, EW.com, 16 Sep. 2022
• Rae reveals that key elements of the finale were up in the air until very late in the game, from the final decision on the show’s enduring love triangle to the brass tacks of the script itself.
  — Angelique Jackson, Variety, 26 Dec. 2021
• And with the final month of college football’s regular season comes the brass tacks: November is when the best of the best of the Bowl Subdivision separate themselves from the pack.
  — Paul Myerberg, USA TODAY, 1 Nov. 2019
• Chapek, by contrast, has a reputation for transactional brass tacks and a bottom-line–first ethos.
  — Nicole Gull McElroy, Fortune, 16 June 2022
• The conversations can be searching, get philosophical, then quickly veer back to brass tacks.
  — Tina Nguyen, The Hive, 11 June 2018
• As these groups grapple with existential questions, others are focused on brass tacks.
  — Lee Seymour, Forbes, 28 Apr. 2021
• The following two days, after a panel discussion about the development of opera in the 21st century, Cleveland Opera Theater will get down to brass tacks with a scenes workshop.
  — Patrick Cooley, cleveland.com, 18 Jan. 2018
• After a quick discussion about why grown men continue to insist on wearing baseball caps and jerseys, the trio gets down to brass tacks solving listener problems.
  — Leigh Cesiro, Vulture, 14 Jan. 2021
• The sensitivity of Newkirk’s reporting and the gravity of his voice allow for a kind of grieving in addition to a revisiting of the brass tacks of what actually happened.
  — Nicholas Quah, Vulture, 7 June 2021
• The Weekly Standard’s version of conservatism was one that was supposed to be untethered — to candidates or specific matters of policy or even to the brass tacks of politics itself.
  — Jane Coaston, Vox, 14 Dec. 2018
• Teachers and administrators, particularly those who work with at-risk student groups like English learners and those experiencing poverty, can more easily talk brass tacks with kids.
  — oregonlive, 10 May 2020

Last Updated: 24 Jul 2024