The first (today: nine) pages with Mark Knopfler guitars are online. I started with some Strats (mainly the most important ones) and also finished the ones about his 1958 and 1959 Les Pauls.

I also included the option to upload your own pictures for each guitar at the bottom of the pages. If many will do, we might soon have a nice picture gallery for each guitar. After approval (to avoid spam pictures or mistakes) they will appear in the user gallery there. You can also leave a description for each picture, which might include the date and venue, or the name of who submitted it. You don’t have to register to upload pictures.

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While working on the new gear database – especially on the pages about the different MK Signature Strats – I felt it difficult to tell from a picture which of his different signature Strats it is  (Mark used alone three of these on the 2008 tour, and generally seems to use even more here and there). So I had to dig a bit deeper into the numerous pictures and viceo clips to find any hints how to distinguish between these. What was finally most helpful was Guy Fletcher’s video interview with Glenn Saggers, Mark’s guitar technician, in which we see the three MK sig Strats one next to the other.

Generally, they almost look the same, although e.g. one of them – which was borrowed from Mark’s bass player Glen Worf – has a different, lighter colour – but even this is almost impossible to see with all the lights on  stage pictures. One thing that is abit different on all Strats is the exact position of the Fender decal as this water slide decal is placed by hand on the headstock, and the position might vary up to half an inch or so. Similarly, the position of the string butterfly that holds down the e and b strings, and the position of the Mark Knopfler signature decal vary to some extent. With the help of these positions you can clearly tell from a (good!) picture which guitar you see. Take a look at the following pictures demonstrate  what I mean.

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I finally decided to start  a new database for all the Mark Knopfler gear that was used over the years. This will take surely several weeks (or even months), and finally will be a never-ending progress.

The idea is to have one dedicated page for each guitar/amp/effect that holds all info we have on that guitar/amp/effect. As each page has the possibility to add reader  comments (at the bottom of the page), everyone – even without being registered – can add relevant info that is not included yet. I will then regularly add these pieces of information into the page itself but will leave all comments so that the author and the origin of all information will be documented and remains visible. So please all help with your input to create something that one single person alone would not be able to.

You can access the database from the navigation bar on top of the page (“Mark Knopfler gear database”) or from the sidebar (under “Pages”), or for now here (at this very moment only a handful of  Strats have been finished. So, if you have good ideas for improvements, now would be the right time as it should be possibly to add these easily at this early stage.

Me and (mainly) Jean-Francois already started a “which guitar/amp/effect on which song” database some time ago (find it here). I always felt the problem that this alone did not make too much sense since we could not link from the piece of gear like e.g. the guitar mentioned there to a page with info on that guitar, but now things start to go together.

By the way, I recently moved the whole site from mk-guitar.com/blog/ to mk-guitar.com (your links and bookmarks that point to /blog/ should be redirected to the new address automatically) – just to let you know.

 

"Buy me a beer" - donate for the site via PayPal. Or buy a backing track in my online shop :)

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Those beautiful 1958/59 Les Paul Standards are probably the holy grail not only for Mark Knopfler fans – Mark owns a 1958 and a 1959 and plays them on all his tours – but for all guitar players. Unfortunately the prices for these are in the region you’d normally pay for a house, so most of us will hardly ever get the chance to touch one of these. They came with those legendary original PAF humbucker pickups. Germany’s top pickup winder Harry Häussel has tried to replicate all tonal nuances of these with his 1959 model. Here is what the manufacturer himself says about his pickup:

The “Häussel-1959″ model gives you that legendary old PAF sound, still sought-after by professionals the world over. Manufactured with original wire, original-sized magnets and our optimally-matched winding, this pickup will captivate you with its silky, ‘woody-warm’ sound – on chord work, the sound of each string is clearly defined, while the overall sound is breezy and slightly nasal, but never muddy. The extremely agreeable, sweet highs make each tone a desirable delicacy for sound gourmets, while solos become a symphony of soaring sonic satisfaction. The 1959 model ‘smacks’ beautifully each time you strike the strings, gliding effortlessly into harmonic overtones and feedback. This is a pickup with a powerful ‘hook’ -and perfect if you want to get that truly authentic PAF sound.

Of course I don’t own a 1958 or 59 Les Paul, just an ‘ordinary’ 1974 Les Paul Custom . With its cherry sunburst finish it looks nice, especially after I replaced the black plastic parts to cream ones, and I also like the sound.  I was really satisfied with the original pickups – and many commentators on my youtube clips on which I played this guitar agreed with me. Nevertheless, I recently installed the Häussel pickups to hear for myself what all the talk about the silky, woody tone of the Häussel 1959 is about.

I recorded a youtube video when I plugged in the guitar directly after putting in the pickups, so you will really witness my first impression of these pickups. Check out why I will leave them in my guitar and why I cannot go on with the original Gibson pickups anymore.

The Häussels are not cheap but if you like me become addictive of this warm but transparent sound, you can get them for a top price here in my online shop.

 

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What can be nicer than one of those wonderful old National resophonic guitars like the Style-0? The answer is, of course, two of these! My friend Thomas brought his 1932 Style-O along for a photo session. And what a wonderful guitar this is – shiny and sparkling like one of the new reissues but real vintage, almost 80 years old. The pictures from the photo session show the guitar from all sides, and some in contrast to my battered-looking 1936 Style-O.

Differences

The National Style-0 from the early 30ies have a different, longer body shape. The body joins the neck at the 12th fret, while from the mid-30ies on the joint was near the 14th fret. For this reason the body was slightly larger, and thus has more volume. In fact Thomas’ National sounds deeper and has more low end than the 1936, however, you never know in how far the sound difference is caused by other aspects. One is that on his 1932 the resonator rests on a ring of thin rubber foil. This was done by a luthier some time ago to remedy buzz from the resonator.

Both guitars differ a lot in detail, e.g. different resonator covers, different logos, different headstocks, etc. The pictures might tell more than many words here.

The 1932 has a flat fingerboard while the 1936 is curved. Both have the original frets, but in case of the 1932 these are heavily worn, especially in the middle of the frets so that the frets appear almost concave which makes it unpleasant to fret certain chords. The 1936 has an extremely fat neck, the Shubb capo can be used only up to to the 5th fret and does not fit anymore beyond this point.

 

Both have the Hawaiian scene with a volcano, a canoe and the palm trees on the back, but both are different. National used many different variations over the years.

 

Video

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