Tag: Dire Straits

Guitars, Mark Knopfler gear, MK guitar style and licks

Scarborough Fair – Three different lead guitars for Mark Knopfler sounds

Just like in my previous Youtube video, I am again playing different Knopfler-related guitars in my latest video. The tune is the traditional English ballad Scarborough Fair, made famous by Simon & Garfunkel.  There are four sections, each arranged differently and featuring a different guitar sound. Fender Stratocaster In the first and last section you can see my red ‘Part-o-caster’. While I am playing the bridge & middle pickup in […]

Guitars, Mark Knopfler gear, MK guitar style and licks

Dire Straits Guitar Sounds on Four Different Guitars

In my latest Youtube video I am playing four different guitars to a self-produced backing track. This backing track combines some Dire Straits flavours, a little inspired by songs like News, Single Handed Sailor or Once Upon a Time in the West (meter changes!), Tunnel of Love, plus some more. I am playing these guitars: Red Fender Stratocaster I used this guitar on many previous videos, however it has a […]

MK guitar style and licks

Guitar solo inspired by ‘Lady Writer’ – including backing track

This instrumental guitar performance was inspired by the Dire Straits song Lady Writer (from the Communiqué album). However, it is not a cover, nor is it a different solo over the same backing track. Instead I followed the chord progression of Lady Writer but created a backing track with a different tempo and a different rhythm, something more like Single Handed Sailor (from the same album). I played the solo […]

Guitars, MK guitar style and licks

Dire Straits Tunnel of Love licks and sounds played on two Schecter Dream Machine replicas

Check out my latest Youtube video where I am playing guitar over a backing track inspired by Tunnel of Love from the third Dire Straits album. I built both of these guitars myself, the one with the birch body is actually the very first guitar I built ever in my life. The specs of this guitar are like the stolen sunburst Schecter that Mark played on the Making Movies album. […]

Guitars

Bridge on the Dire Straits Stratocaster: Japanese or Original?

You probably know the discussion started by John Suhr about the originality of Mark Knopfler red Dire Straits Stratocaster (the one with the maple neck, not the 1961 Strat with the rosewood fingerboard). John Suhr worked on Mark’s guitars in the early 80ies and stated that this guitar was not an original vintage Fender but a ‘fake’, probably a Japanese copy. I always used to be a bit uncertain what […]

MK guitar style and licks

Playing some riffs, licks & solo from Dire Straits – Setting me up

Today I was just sitting around and playing bits and pieces of Setting me up from the first Dire Straits album. As the camera and recording gear was still in place from the last video, I spontanously decided to film a short sequence. It is not really a performance of the song in the sense of playing the right pieces in the proper order but rather some jamming with myself […]

Dire Straits/ Mark Knopfler live pictures and videos, Guitars, Mark Knopfler gear

Dire Straits pictures by Adrian Boot

Adrian Boot is one of Britain’s best-known music photographers. You might know his name  from  pictures in magazines  (e.g. in NME or Melody Maker) or books – e.g. from the Dire Straits book by Michael Oldfield  which features a lot of his pictures. While searching the web for unknown Dire Straits pictures, I recently found a website – urbanimage.tv – which has about 65 pictures of Dire Straits / Mark […]

Dire Straits/ Mark Knopfler live pictures and videos, Mark Knopfler gear

Dire Straits at the Paradiso, Amsterdam, October 23, 1978

Recently another diamond was dug out: an uncirculated early Dire Straits recording appeared out of nothing, from the Paradiso, Amsterdam, October 23, 1978. Unfortunately it is “only” an audience recording, nevertheless the sound quality is really nice. And it is the complete show. This gig was only a few month after the release of Dire Straits’ first album. They had played some gigs in the UK in summer 1978 (e.g. […]

Dire Straits/ Mark Knopfler live pictures and videos

Mark Knopfler surprise performance at the Range Rover event

In the evening of  September 6/7, Mark Knopfler and his band played a surprise performance at the Range Rover event at the Royal Ballet School in Richmond Park, where Land Rover revealed the All-New Range Rover, the fourth generation of the world’s most capable and luxurious SUV. The audience consisted of  leaders from business, film, television and sport. Many of these were long-standing Range Rover owners and enthusiasts keen to […]