Dire Straits Rockpalast 1979

[knopflertom]

Hi,

I've listened several times to the Rockpalast bootleg and I don't get it what was wrong with the first Sultans of Swing version. Mark said "We've messed up Sultans so we have to do it again".

Does anybody know what was exactly messed up?

Best regards,

Thomas

[dmg]

If he were to replay this tours versions to that level of perfection he'd need to pay the band overtime!

I seem to recall it was something to do with Davids playing.  Perhaps someone else can elaborate.

[mschaap]

From memory I recall Mark or the band starting what was supposed to be played at the second guitar solo where they had only just arrived at the first solo.

[shangri la 1]

We had a guy on AMIT TV come up with this response:-
Joe Fossett 1 year ago
56:28 sounds like David played chorus chords when he should have played verse chords. Interesting small glitch from a phenomenal band. Hence the Mulligan later on. Watch Mark smile at David at that point in second version.
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[JF]

like I said before, it's the over way around : it's Mark's fault, not David's one

see here :

http://amarkintime.org/forum/index.php?topic=2351.msg80865;topicseen#msg80865

[Ingo]

Right, no question, Mark started to play the last solo in place of the first solo. As both go over completely different chord progressions, it sounded awful, big mistake.

So they played it again as the last song of that gig, instead of Southbound Again. It would have been the only filmed version of Southbound ever, too bad

[MK-47]

So they played it again as the last song of that gig, instead of Southbound Again. It would have been the only filmed version of Southbound ever, too bad

If it's true I wish you hadn't said that  , I was quite happy in my blissful ignorance. Southbound is one of my top DS songs and considering the quality of the entire concert, that would have surely been a great live version. Btw how do you know this if I may ask?

[JF]

So they played it again as the last song of that gig, instead of Southbound Again. It would have been the only filmed version of Southbound ever, too bad

If it's true I wish you hadn't said that  , I was quite happy in my blissful ignorance. Southbound is one of my top DS songs and considering the quality of the entire concert, that would have surely been a great live version. Btw how do you know this if I may ask?

Because Southbound was the usual tune played on the last encore at the time

e.g. the day after : http://www.oneverybootleg.nl/cologne79.htm

or few days after, in USA : http://www.oneverybootleg.nl/provid.htm

[MK-47]

Because Southbound was the usual tune played on the last encore at the time

e.g. the day after : http://www.oneverybootleg.nl/cologne79.htm

or few days after, in USA : http://www.oneverybootleg.nl/provid.htm

Thank you I didn't know that.

[Ingo]

If I think about it, I realize that I can name many recordings where Mark made mistakes on stage in those days, and also many mistakes by John, but NOT ONE SINGLE mistake by David!!
His rhythm seemed always tight in time to me, never a wrong chord, or such.

I am not saying that Mark and John made too many mistakes, just the 'normal error rate'  that simply happens on a gig, and maybe David was just lucky that his mistakes were not recorded on one of the  bootlegs.

I rather want to say that David seemed very concentrated and reliable as a rhythm guitarist. I always liked his rhythm guitar very much!

[Dave]

This made me think of a wrong chord of a complete measure during What's the matter with you baby sometime. Just found it: Live in Rotterdam 1978 at 2:53. In my memory it was David, but you're right, it was Mark

[vgonis]

And we just love these mistakes! So good they played live and not one of those stupid playbacks.
Southbound again was quite different in their early lives than in their first record. But by Rockplast the version was similar to the LP. And for me it has always been the music, not the images. So not a big thing to lose it.

[dmg]

And we just love these mistakes! So good they played live and not one of those stupid playbacks.
Southbound again was quite different in their early lives than in their first record. But by Rockplast the version was similar to the LP. And for me it has always been the music, not the images. So not a big thing to lose it.

You've hit on something that I've thought for a while now and that's that I've always preferred the performances from 1978 to the 1979 ones.  Just that little bit less polished in them and some evidence of over-confidence with the '79 ones that I don't like.  The '78 recordings are so good it's just a pity we have so few of them.

[Ingo]

And we just love these mistakes! So good they played live and not one of those stupid playbacks.
Southbound again was quite different in their early lives than in their first record. But by Rockplast the version was similar to the LP. And for me it has always been the music, not the images. So not a big thing to lose it.

No, this is not true. They always played SA pretty much the same from the first demo to the time it was played for the last time on stage, at the end of 1979. Only for the first album they arranged it to a different version (which was never played live).

[vgonis]

well, it is what each of us define by different. I even find this version  ( http://www.graphikus.com/boots/#dire-straits-1979 ) from 1979 very different. Maybe it is the rawness of the live recording, but I find it quite different from the LP. Much faster too. And with more guitar work.