A Mark In Time
Mark Knopfler Discussion => Mark Knopfler Discussion Forum => Topic started by: ds1984 on March 13, 2025, 09:35:40 PM
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Enjoy :wave
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rqt_VbXYMXY
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Magnifique!!! :clap :clap :clap :clap :clap :clap :clap :clap :clap
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I would have prefered a pro shot footage video than this visualizer clip
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I would have prefered a pro shot footage video than this visualizer clip
And I would prefer the audience clapping on 2 and 4 instead of 1 and 3 :lol
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Pretty good quality sound.
I would have liked to play WICTY more often.
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This song was one of those which made me fall deep in love with DS. This "video"...Just no. One still photo or nothing at all would be better.
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Pretty good quality sound.
I would have liked to play WICTY more often.
This song is a gem from the OES tour, I've never been able to understand why it wasn't played more often, in fact, it was probably played less than Fade to Black and the wonderful You and Your Friend.
Chris, by the way, can you believe this song was filmed, like the others in the On The Night video? It would be so nice to be able to watch the band perform on video.
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Was it filmed?
We played Nimes twice, several months apart.
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Was it filmed?
We played Nimes twice, several months apart.
may and september, i believe the september shows were the "better" ones.
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dear Chris, how many shows would you remember that were recorded on video from OES tour?
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The September shows in Nimes and Rotterdam. Not the first Nimes run.
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The September shows in Nimes and Rotterdam. Not the first Nimes run.
Dear Chris, as we know, the OTN is made up of shows in Nimes and Rotterdam, both in May 1992, with a difference of 10 days between one city and the other. In the OTN video, we can see scenes from both places. See below the tracks contained in the On the Night show and which shows were chosen for the release on video, VHS and DVD.
1-Calling Elvis
2-Walk of life
3-Heavy fuel
4-Romeo and Juliet
5-The bug
6-Private investigations
7-Your latest trick
8-On every street
9-You and your friend
10-Money for nothing
11-Brothers in arms
12-Solid rock
13-Wild theme
Les Arenes, Nimes FRA 20. 05.92 [3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8]
Les Arenes, Nimes FRA 21. 05.92 [1]
Feyenoord, Rotterdam HOL 30.05.92 [,2,13]
Feyenoord, Rotterdam HOL 31.05.92 [9, 10, 11,12]
As you can see, most of the songs were taken from the show in Les Arenes, Nimes FRA 20. 05. 92*, seven songs (which increases the possibility that this show was filmed in full), followed by the show in Feyenoord, Rotterdam HOL 31. 05. 92 with six songs.
For this reason, I wonder, if there were cameras filming both shows, did they film the full shows and then choose which ones they would use for the release at the time? Or did they only film what they were going to use, so that this had already been decided before the shows took place? I think the second option is unlikely, I believe that all the shows chosen for an official release were recorded in audio and filmed in full, only more than two decades later were the songs that were left out released in audio, such as WICTY, Fade to Black, ITILTM, SOS... But, until then, no one wanted to invest time and money in publishing the videos. Just a hypothesis.
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The 29th september gig in Nîmes was aired live on french Canal+ channel.
I wonder if the band did record that show on multitrack or not as it was not used at all for OTN.
As often with Mark, this leg was featuring shorter setlist.
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Oh yeah, May 1992. I got confused when writing my post.
I can't remember the actual details, but when you have a remote studio set up and have hired film crew etc, you are not going to just film and record certain songs or certain shows.
The idea is to film and record all the shows in one venue, then you can go through and pick out the best performances for each song.
The venues chosen were Nimes and Rotterdam.
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Oh yeah, May 1992. I got confused when writing my post.
I can't remember the actual details, but when you have a remote studio set up and have hired film crew etc, you are not going to just film and record certain songs or certain shows.
The idea is to film and record all the shows in one venue, then you can go through and pick out the best performances for each song.
The venues chosen were Nimes and Rotterdam.
Exactly, that's what I thought, all these shows were filmed in full too, a selection was made of what would be used for the official VHS release in 1993.
We always come back to the question of a few thousand euros... Where are the tapes (these videos)? The Live 78/92 box set was a precious gift, at least we have these wonderful new tracks to contemplate in audio, it's really incredible, a new experience to listen to OTN, as well as Alchemy and the completely unreleased Live at The Rainbow 79, ironically, both shows were filmed, but unfortunately we are not so lucky to have these recordings in full on video, that luck only for fans of other bands and artists. But, I am grateful for the aforementioned box set, better late than never.
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It would be a significant expense to go back to the film and edit new songs from the raw footage, also the audio has to match the video, so the audio would also have to be remixed. Cost versus benefit? How many people would want to buy a second (expanded) version of the On The Night DVD?
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And what would be the problem with releasing the raw version so that fans, for example, could edit it at an amateur/pro level?
What is the advantage of keeping them locked away instead of releasing them in their current version, technically speaking?
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It would be a significant expense to go back to the film and edit new songs from the raw footage, also the audio has to match the video, so the audio would also have to be remixed. Cost versus benefit? How many people would want to buy a second (expanded) version of the On The Night DVD?
I would defenitely buy an expanded version on dvd. I would love to have a completer version of this album. For example I am also a big fan of the remixed and edited version of Pink Floyds live album Delicate Sound of thunder of the boxset or 24 nights from Eric Clapton. Or how the Rolling Stones releases the vault concerts
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And what would be the problem with releasing the raw version so that fans, for example, could edit it at an amateur/pro level?
What is the advantage of keeping them locked away instead of releasing them in their current version, technically speaking?
Exactly.
That was the best question, the most appropriate one could ask when faced with this! If there are recordings, what's the point in keeping them out of reach of fans? If this material were given to some people here on this forum (I include myself in this list), I guarantee that with a small investment, we would be able to do a good job of producing this recording and giving it the treatment it has always deserved, even if the cost were paid for by everyone involved. I know that this won't happen, but if someone who has access to this band's material made it available for fans to finance the production, even if on a small scale, I have no doubt that the overwhelming majority of the fans most present here on this forum and on other social networks would participate in a crowdfunding campaign. There are ways, but initiative and willingness on the part of those who could provide this raw material is what is lacking, unfortunately. I would love to put this proposal out there for anyone who could lead me to someone who could verify this material (Guy, John?). A collective campaign could be started to finance the production, all that was needed was access to the existing material. Now, if nothing exists, forget everything I wrote, but, seeing a release like the content of the live box set 78-92, having a gem like Rainbow 79... I still have hope that there is more material that could receive the treatment it deserves for the sake of Dire Straits' historical memory.
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What the record company will try to cash in for BIA 40th aniversary release?
I think the only correct approach is about market and money.
Is there a way that releasing the full Live in Wembley Arena being worthly profitable for Universal ?
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And what would be the problem with releasing the raw version so that fans, for example, could edit it at an amateur/pro level?
What is the advantage of keeping them locked away instead of releasing them in their current version, technically speaking?
The first line is madness. No credible artists releases raw, unedited art for 'fans' to do their own thing with.
The advantage of 'locking them away' is that the artist is in control of their legacy. They recorded 6 to 8 shows and edited, finished the best performances for the fans. Why would anyone give you the less good stuff....seriously?
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Exactly.
That was the best question, the most appropriate one could ask when faced with this! If there are recordings, what's the point in keeping them out of reach of fans? If this material were given to some people here on this forum (I include myself in this list), I guarantee that with a small investment, we would be able to do a good job of producing this recording and giving it the treatment it has always deserved, even if the cost were paid for by everyone involved.
And you could finish an unfinished Picasso at the same time. Really, I've seen some crazy stuff on this forum and this line of argument takes the biscuit.
The people who work on video and audio production have decades of experience. Anyone who gets to work on a product by a major artist like Dire Straits has years of experience at the highest level and a track record of delivering outstanding work. And you think Mark and John are going to release raw content for you to finish?????????????
For the record - I wouldn't put MYSELF in that frame, let alone an amateur fan.
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Meanwhile, for other bands you can even find stuff like "Live At Wembley ‘86 - Bass Player's Camera Angle HD":
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bL8j3DC8M_g
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What the record company will try to cash in for BIA 40th aniversary release?
I think the only correct approach is about market and money.
Is there a way that releasing the full Live in Wembley Arena being worthly profitable for Universal ?
I imagine Mark has final say on any such projects. What is HIS motivation to add to the On Every Street, On The Night film and audio.
I imagine it's not a particularly happy memory for him, not one of his proudest moments.
I think the recent box set is probably his last word on remixes, extra songs and re-releases.
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Meanwhile, for other bands you can even find stuff like "Live At Wembley ‘86 - Bass Player's Camera Angle HD":
Where does that video come from?
Also, Queen are still en entity, playing shows, promoting their band and selling tickets. DS ended effectively in 1992. Where is the advantage for Mark and John going back to live video and editing a John Illsley camera angle?
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Meanwhile, for other bands you can even find stuff like "Live At Wembley ‘86 - Bass Player's Camera Angle HD":
Where does that video come from?
Also, Queen are still en entity, playing shows, promoting their band and selling tickets. DS ended effectively in 1992. Where is the advantage for Mark and John going back to live video and editing a John Illsley camera angle?
I believe it comes from the second disc of the 2003 (!) DVD release of the show, but ultimately yes, it depends on whether the people responsible care for this stuff at all. I bet nobody asked for a multi-angle feature of this show, but they still did it, 22 years ago.
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Exactly.
That was the best question, the most appropriate one could ask when faced with this! If there are recordings, what's the point in keeping them out of reach of fans? If this material were given to some people here on this forum (I include myself in this list), I guarantee that with a small investment, we would be able to do a good job of producing this recording and giving it the treatment it has always deserved, even if the cost were paid for by everyone involved.
And you could finish an unfinished Picasso at the same time. Really, I've seen some crazy stuff on this forum and this line of argument takes the biscuit.
The people who work on video and audio production have decades of experience. Anyone who gets to work on a product by a major artist like Dire Straits has years of experience at the highest level and a track record of delivering outstanding work. And you think Mark and John are going to release raw content for you to finish?????????????
For the record - I wouldn't put MYSELF in that frame, let alone an amateur fan.
Jokes aside, fans often do a far better job than official parties. Take a look at the gaming industry, where releases by big corporations are often complete trash that then gets improved by fans, sometimes single-handedly. A good example from recent history: Grand Theft Auto: The Trilogy – The Definitive Edition. From 1998 Trespasser to this day, the gaming industry is constantly being improved by fans and their mods. Heck, even "Counter-Strike" originally was a mod. Don't underestimate the power of fans.
Personally, I lost any confidence in anything "official" as the quality of the product is often mediocre, so if it's official it doesn't automatically mean quality. Not to say live videos are bad though as USUALLY they are done great. What Brunno meant was, I think, is should these "raw" tracks be available somehow, official or not, fans could (and they would) combine raw tracks and audio into something pretty good. As an editor myself, I can say editing is not rocket science, and it would be fun to mess with OES tracks.
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I believe it comes from the second disc of the 2003 (!) DVD release of the show
So it comes officially from the band. And that is my point. It wasn't released as raw footage a few months ago for fans tomplay around with.
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Jokes aside, fans often do a far better job than official parties.
I guess it depends how you quantify 'a better job'.
If you look at fans 'cover song' videos on Youtube both the audio and video quality are often terrible.
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It's a shame a nice thread about a great performance of a great song - has had to go Wild West again.
:'(
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Hand over raw footage to fans for them to work on ... Get real, folks.
As for 'When it comes to you', such a depressing song. I used to love it 30 years ago, but now don't even think it's a good song. The live version is very dead, Mark's singing terrible and his guitar playing really nothing special.
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Jokes aside, fans often do a far better job than official parties.
I guess it depends how you quantify 'a better job'.
If you look at fans 'cover song' videos on Youtube both the audio and video quality are often terrible.
Hand over raw footage to fans for them to work on ... Get real, folks.
Musical quality also usually suck. But cover versions have nothing to do with editing a video. I'd say it's easier to combine a few professionally recorded and graded video tracks into a somewhat watchable material than spend 20 years mastering both your playing and recording skills. It's like semi-finished already, you only need to decide on angles and cuts, which could be done by a fan, believe me. Even in iMovie!
I just wanted to say, many fans are professionals in their respective fields. You can have professional video editors, sound engineers, DPs, musicians, lawyers or whoever else as your fans, and yes, sometimes they can do a better job, without getting paid and time constraints. I don't understand what's so controversial about this simple statement and why everybody gangs up on me again. Are all fans unemployed?
Indeed, nobody will ever "hand over" anything to fans or anyone else, we're discussing thin air here. Fans can't do anything because we don't have anything, and the artist can't do anything because they don't care, and all we get is this animation. And nothing goes south again, just a natural off-topic. I'll just drop here a masterpiece of an official video, and curious to see if the officialness of it makes it better:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e1g9eTjpZXU
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One of my favourite examples of fans vs. professionals is this video right there (coincidentally, it's about Queen, hehe):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4dn8Fd0TYek
P.S. I'm sorry for going off-topic, but it's an interesting topic, and as usual, you either have fun "discussing" things on a discussion forum or force people like me into an argument... Then just shut down all the topics, open a new topic after the slightest movement towards another topic, or better yet — execute me because I'm talking too much and you don't agree with my opinion! :lol
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As for 'When it comes to you', such a depressing song. I used to love it 30 years ago, but now don't even think it's a good song. The live version is very dead, Mark's singing terrible and his guitar playing really nothing special.
I disagree. Songs aren’t always going to be about happy subjects! The Dire Straits version is very atmospheric. I love the synth pad, Mark’s tone on the Pensa-Suhr and the way he delivers his vocal. It’s one of my favourites from On Every Street. I love the live versions too, both by NHB and DS.
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As for 'When it comes to you', such a depressing song. I used to love it 30 years ago, but now don't even think it's a good song. The live version is very dead, Mark's singing terrible and his guitar playing really nothing special.
I disagree. Songs aren’t always going to be about happy subjects! The Dire Straits version is very atmospheric. I love the synth pad, Mark’s tone on the Pensa-Suhr and the way he delivers his vocal. It’s one of my favourites from On Every Street. I love the live versions too, both by NHB and DS.
Exactly! When It Comes To You is a great song. The studio and live version are great. Possibly the best from the TNH era :)
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And what would be the problem with releasing the raw version so that fans, for example, could edit it at an amateur/pro level?
What is the advantage of keeping them locked away instead of releasing them in their current version, technically speaking?
The first line is madness. No credible artists release raw, unedited art for 'fans' to do their own thing with.
The advantage of 'locking them away' is that the artist is in control of their legacy. They recorded 6 to 8 shows and edited, finishing the best performances for the fans. Why would anyone give you the least good stuff....seriously?
You are entering a territory of pure subjectivity at this point, what is good, what is bad for the fans is decided by the artist, ok, but, this is not always a guarantee that they are getting it right, OTN is an example, from the point of view of a release that intended to show a show from the band's last tour, in my opinion and that of many fans I know, it left a lot to be desired, in several aspects, I will only highlight one aspect here: the repertoire, there is not a show in the history of Dire Straits that has not played SOS, but, OTN was released like this, without SOS, (not to mention other classics like TOL and TR, both with new arrangements and format, different from how they were played in the 80s.) This is an example of a mistaken perspective on the part of whoever made this choice, more than 30 years later, they corrected this mistake with Box Live 78/92 and made the dream of many come true, especially the band's most assiduous fans, releasing OTN and Alchemy with all the songs that had been played, regardless of whether the production was criticized or not, we have the songs and that is the most important thing. Understand that the people who want this type of material from the band the most are people who are used to Bootlegs that are not always of good quality, but that is just one aspect of the product, generally the recording itself is worth it for the fan collector, imagine something like this Live 78/92 box, professionally produced?
Finally, Dire Straits' legacy is far from having received the due care it deserves, judging by the releases since the beginning, especially live ones, there are several gaps, (the Live 78/92 box is one of the few exceptions), we easily find anachronistic information on official channels, photos of the BIA tour 85/86 being released as from the OES tour 91/92, even John's book is full of errors and to make matters worse, MK doesn't care at all about DS's legacy, he put a damper on it when he was absent from the RRHF ceremony in 2018. None of this was by chance.
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And what would be the problem with releasing the raw version so that fans, for example, could edit it at an amateur/pro level?
What is the advantage of keeping them locked away instead of releasing them in their current version, technically speaking?
The first line is madness. No credible artists releases raw, unedited art for 'fans' to do their own thing with.
The advantage of 'locking them away' is that the artist is in control of their legacy. They recorded 6 to 8 shows and edited, finished the best performances for the fans. Why would anyone give you the less good stuff....seriously?
And why do you think there are no qualified people here on the forum who can take the raw material and transform it into a commercial product? Especially with all the technology available today, unlike in the 90s... Even if there were no qualified people for this here on the forum, in the utopia I conjectured (utopia, because of course they wouldn't do that) they would ask for a qualified producer to produce the recording in a professional manner, all financed by fans interested in covering the costs, if that were the case, since no one who owns these recordings has ever been interested in releasing them.
I've noticed that you sometimes underestimate many of us here on the forum. I respect you a lot as a musician, your resume, especially for having participated in Dire Straits' last tour and having played with the Beatles. However, unlike everyone else here, you are not a fan of the band. Your perspective is different, very valid for contextualizing the historical period of 91/92. However, the perspective of a loyal fan of the band is a totally different universe from yours as a former member, and I understand that perfectly. I asked you a question on page 1 of this thread: did you believe that this song was filmed, like the others in the On The Night video? The idea here is to understand the reason why they didn't give us the complete product. There is nothing that justifies the absence of footage of these songs to this day (the same goes for Alchemy), unless it simply doesn't exist, someone deleted it, erased it, destroyed it, which would be a shame. Again, in the end, what is good, what is bad will always be subjective, we want the opportunity to see it so we can make our own judgment, just like those who were there in the audience, especially if this footage exists, we already have the audio, and it wasn't bad at all, on the contrary, it would have been very well received by fans upon its first release in 1993.
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What the record company will try to cash in for BIA 40th aniversary release?
I think the only correct approach is about market and money.
Is there a way that releasing the full Live in Wembley Arena being worthly profitable for Universal ?
I imagine Mark has final say on any such projects. What is HIS motivation to add to the On Every Street, On The Night film and audio.
I imagine it's not a particularly happy memory for him, not one of his proudest moments.
I think the recent box set is probably his last word on remixes, extra songs and re-releases.
Personal problems are something that should never be above art. What you did was art and entertainment during the tour, you brought great joy to fans around the world during the OES tour 91/92. More than three decades have passed since this adventure. Both those who had the chance to see you back then and those who didn't would love to see Dire Straits' legacy receive less modest, fairer and more caring treatment. This idea that it's not a good memory for him is something that should be absent from the equation. All we want is to consume art, nothing more. It's the art that matters, it's the art that gives us good emotions. We want the recordings, the songs. This is the most basic thing any band leader should know. I've always thought of it as a two-way street. The artist produces art to be consumed by his audience, which supports his career. It's a shame that things aren't always like this, but they should be. Thank goodness we have great examples of preserving their legacy, the Beatles, Dylan, Hendrix, Pink Floyd... not all is lost in this sense, but Dire Straits still needs to improve a lot, who knows one day...
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Exactly.
That was the best question, the most appropriate one could ask when faced with this! If there are recordings, what's the point in keeping them out of reach of fans? If this material were given to some people here on this forum (I include myself in this list), I guarantee that with a small investment, we would be able to do a good job of producing this recording and giving it the treatment it has always deserved, even if the cost were paid for by everyone involved.
And you could finish an unfinished Picasso at the same time. Really, I've seen some crazy stuff on this forum and this line of argument takes the biscuit.
The people who work on video and audio production have decades of experience. Anyone who gets to work on a product by a major artist like Dire Straits has years of experience at the highest level and a track record of delivering outstanding work. And you think Mark and John are going to release raw content for you to finish?????????????
For the record - I wouldn't put MYSELF in that frame, let alone an amateur fan.
Jokes aside, fans often do a far better job than official parties. Take a look at the gaming industry, where releases by big corporations are often complete trash that then gets improved by fans, sometimes single-handedly. A good example from recent history: Grand Theft Auto: The Trilogy – The Definitive Edition. From 1998 Trespasser to this day, the gaming industry is constantly being improved by fans and their mods. Heck, even "Counter-Strike" originally was a mod. Don't underestimate the power of fans.
Personally, I lost any confidence in anything "official" as the quality of the product is often mediocre, so if it's official it doesn't automatically mean quality. Not to say live videos are bad though as USUALLY they are done great. What Brunno meant was, I think, is should these "raw" tracks be available somehow, official or not, fans could (and they would) combine raw tracks and audio into something pretty good. As an editor myself, I can say editing is not rocket science, and it would be fun to mess with OES tracks.
Exactly that, quizzaciously, that's my perspective, it's blatant that many official releases are mediocre, especially from Dire Straits. (Starting in 1978, the video for Sultans of Swing has a cut when the climax of the song begins, its final solo. Do you want something more mediocre than that, because it doesn't stop there.)
The treatment given to Dire Straits releases is historically modest, often bordering on mediocrity, and lately with the presence of "nickel hunting", the tenth edition of the album BIA, look at the way MK's solo albums have been released since 2009, you have to be willing to spend a lot of money to get what the record company imposes, this latest release is... discouraging, the marketing team is a disaster, oddly enough, it shows amateurism, look at the photos and information recently posted on the official channels, even the date of the videos...
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As for 'When it comes to you', such a depressing song. I used to love it 30 years ago, but now don't even think it's a good song. The live version is very dead, Mark's singing terrible and his guitar playing really nothing special.
I disagree. Songs aren’t always going to be about happy subjects! The Dire Straits version is very atmospheric. I love the synth pad, Mark’s tone on the Pensa-Suhr and the way he delivers his vocal. It’s one of my favourites from On Every Street. I love the live versions too, both by NHB and DS.
I agree with you 100%. Dire Straits' live version has unique elements, and I love the whole atmosphere the band manages to create, there's nothing like it. I would love to see the audiovisual experience of this song on OTN.
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You are entering a territory of pure subjectivity at this point, what is good, what is bad for the fans is decided by the artist, ok, but,
But nothing.... Like it or not, artists in ALL disciplines have been the final word on what is published.
You don't get to re-edit Citizen Kane, remix Rumours, or touch up the Mona Lisa.
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This idea that it's not a good memory for him is something that should be absent from the equation.
I wasn't really talking about personal issues, but anyway you can't ask people NOT to be human with their decision making. The OES album was a disappointment after BIA. No real hits, the album itself didn't sell as well. Critics said it wasn't as good an album as previous releases. The tour didn't match BIA in terms of records broken, Live Aid in the afternoon, sold out show at Wembley in the evening etc...
So as an artist what is the motivation to revisit one of your less successful periods?
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The treatment given to Dire Straits releases is historically modest, often bordering on mediocrity, and lately with the presence of "nickel hunting", the tenth edition of the album BIA, look at the way MK's solo albums have been released since 2009, you have to be willing to spend a lot of money to get what the record company imposes, this latest release is... discouraging, the marketing team is a disaster, oddly enough, it shows amateurism, look at the photos and information recently posted on the official channels, even the date of the videos...
And yet you are a hardcore fan?? ??
Being a smash hit artist, multi-millionaire and powerful entity almost as the sole controller of Dire Straits and his solo career, you can't blame a record company for the last 20 years of releases. mark has signed off on everything, from solo albums, to re-issues to photo sessions.
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Disposable art said Ed.
Live video editing or event audio editing is not painting. One is mostly technicall skill, the other one is Art.
And fans can only control what Mark and the record company are ready to allow them (almost nothing).
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But nothing.... Like it or not, artists in ALL disciplines have been the final word on what is published.
Chris I am sorry to say you that you are wrong.
The producer, the one who is putting the money on the table has the final word in many cases unlike the painter.
The artist is not always the king.
I don't remember which big star just said "I recorded this album only for the money..."
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Chris I am sorry to say you that you are wrong.
The producer, the one who is putting the money has also the final word in many case.
Don't you think that is Mark since the end of Dire Straits? I'm not sure even how much a record label was involved in 'On Every Street'. If you watch all the background videos online, it seems like Mark pretty much called the shots on what was recorded, where it was recorded and who was involved.
Since he went solo he's worked in his own, highly sophisticated recording studio. Most artists like him make the record they want to make, then license it to a label to release. Mark also puts out stuff on his own website.
That's what happens when you have hit after hit and become a multi-millionaire, you gain the ability to control everything yourself, you no longer need a label. mark doesn't even have a regular manager any more....likewise Paul McCartney.
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Chris I am sorry to say you that you are wrong.
The producer, the one who is putting the money has also the final word in many case.
Don't you think that is Mark since the end of Dire Straits? I'm not sure even how much a record label was involved in 'On Every Street'. If you watch all the background videos online, it seems like Mark pretty much called the shots on what was recorded, where it was recorded and who was involved.
Since he went solo he's worked in his own, highly sophisticated recording studio. Most artists like him make the record they want to make, then license it to a label to release. Mark also puts out stuff on his own website.
That's what happens when you have hit after hit and become a multi-millionaire, you gain the ability to control everything yourself, you no longer need a label. mark doesn't even have a regular manager any more....likewise Paul McCartney.
Read again to what I was anwering :
But nothing.... Like it or not, artists in ALL disciplines have been the final word on what is published.
That is exactly my point, Mark Knopfler in this case is the one who put the money, he is the producer.
And I stand on my point that it is inacurate to write sentence such as "artists in ALL disciplines have been the final word on what is published'".
How many film directors in the US would have liked you to be true !!!
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It was obviously a generalisation, but it is generally true.
The label isn't in the studio telling you what is a good take or not, making you keep a guitar solo you'd rather redo.
The label isn't writing the songs. 99% of the time the label isn't controlling which songs go on a live album and which get ignored.
After Brothers In Arms I think ~Mark pretty much controlled all decisions.
He shocked everyone around him by deciding to make another DS album. The label and management allowed the album to be released with no obvious hit song on it. The tour was all mark's ides, including the band members, the length of the tour. No one outside of Mark decided which songs we would play on the tour, even which songs we would play each show.
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It was obviously a generalisation, but it is generally true.
We won't agree about the "generally true" part.
The label isn't in the studio telling you what is a good take or not, making you keep a guitar solo you'd rather redo.
This is the job of the record producer. If as an artist you have signed a 360 deal artist contract with a label, the producer in working for the lablel and represent the label.
The label isn't writing the songs.
This is not the job of the label
99% of the time the label isn't controlling which songs go on a live album and which get ignored.
I don't see much difference between a studio and a live album apart that most of the time a live album used not to sell as well as a studio album.
Again if you have signed a 360 deal artist contract with the label...
After Brothers In Arms I think ~Mark pretty much controlled all decisions.
He shocked everyone around him by deciding to make another DS album. The label and management allowed the album to be released with no obvious hit song on it. The tour was all mark's ides, including the band members, the length of the tour. No one outside of Mark decided which songs we would play on the tour, even which songs we would play each show.
I agree with you on that, as Mark owned the money he got freedom and powership.
Regarding Calling Elvis, it was a hit as the band had before BIA.
The problem was not OES but BIA.
BIA was a lucky accident.
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As for 'When it comes to you', such a depressing song. I used to love it 30 years ago, but now don't even think it's a good song. The live version is very dead, Mark's singing terrible and his guitar playing really nothing special.
I disagree. Songs aren’t always going to be about happy subjects! The Dire Straits version is very atmospheric. I love the synth pad, Mark’s tone on the Pensa-Suhr and the way he delivers his vocal. It’s one of my favourites from On Every Street. I love the live versions too, both by NHB and DS.
Exactly! When It Comes To You is a great song. The studio and live version are great. Possibly the best from the TNH era :)
Of course you are both wrong ;D
When I wrote 'depressing' I wasn't referring to the subject matter, but more the mood. Also I find the live performance extremely lackluster. It feels like Mark is totally going through the motions, which is kind of ironic considering his high expectations of the band. But as the band leader, songwriter and frontman, I guess that's your prerogative ...
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"He shocked everyone around him by deciding to make another DS album"
Why was it shocking? It was a great event in the media. DS is back after 6 years! But I'm definitely wrong again. However, I will stick to my memories :)
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How many film directors in the US would have liked you to be true !!!
I read it the first time.
Hollywood is just about the only exception, where you have to raise millions of investment dollars just to cast a movie. And actually I think it's a minority of incidents where the4 director is unhappy with the Final Cut.
In art, photography, writing, the creative process is pretty much 100% controlled by the artist. People are always scrapping their work rather than release something they can't stand behind.
In music people mostly make their records in home studios, without the label meddling.
In the CONTEXT of this discussion, people were blaming 'labels' and 'producers' for the lack of Dire Straits and Mark Knopfler unreleased material.
So in this CONTEXT, the releases would be completely under the control of Mark and John, mostly Mark.
Try bringing up your film directors again - it's basically the exception to what we are actually discussing.
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I don't see much difference between a studio and a live album apart that most of the time a live album used not to sell as well as a studio album.
No idea what you are talking about.
In the studio you have a set number of songs, maybe 12. You work on each song until you are happy with it (multiple takes).
Live you have 25+ songs, they are all a single take where you really need a nine piece band to all play it well in order to choose it. Then you have multiple shows. So you have hours of material and dozens of songs to choose from. Completely unlike making a studio album.
Regarding Calling Elvis, it was a hit as the band had before BIA.
The problem was not OES but BIA.
BIA was a lucky accident.
[/quote]
Calling Elvis really wasn't a hit. There was nothing on OES to match Brothers In Arms and Money For Nothing (the songs).
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Why was it shocking?
because no one involved expected it. John was shocked, Ed Bicknell was shocked. Everyone felt mark had changed and moved on since the end of the BIA tour and several years had passed. NO ONE expected another DS album, let alone a lengthy world tour.
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Maybe it wasn't about the hits. Times had changed. Dire Straits in the early 90s were different too. But the level of the On Every Street album was high. For me:)
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Why was it shocking?
because no one involved expected it. John was shocked, Ed Bicknell was shocked. Everyone felt mark had changed and moved on since the end of the BIA tour and several years had passed. NO ONE expected another DS album, let alone a lengthy world tour.
Chris do you think the last album and tour should have happened sooner?
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I think it would have been logical to follow up the huge success of BIA with a new album and tour within two years, yes.
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Regarding unreleased classics - I'm sure Sultans Of Swing from the '92 tour sounded pretty terrible.
The drum sound isn't great on the Basel video. And yes it's a thrash fest. Something I regret but also a product of circumstances.
We had a B kit, which probably didn't sound as nice as my main kit. I was also set up right in front of Mark's very loud guitar speakers. I couldn't really hear anything but guitar, which made me thrash the kit and over play. Mark's guitar would have been loud in all the drum mics too.
With modern digital technology you could probably rescue it - which is I'm sure why Guy started to work on all those old recordings for the box set.
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The treatment given to Dire Straits releases is historically modest, often bordering on mediocrity, and lately with the presence of "nickel hunting", the tenth edition of the album BIA, look at the way MK's solo albums have been released since 2009, you have to be willing to spend a lot of money to get what the record company imposes, this latest release is... discouraging, the marketing team is a disaster, oddly enough, it shows amateurism, look at the photos and information recently posted on the official channels, even the date of the videos...
And yet you are a hardcore fan?? ??
Being a smash hit artist, multi-millionaire and powerful entity almost as the sole controller of Dire Straits and his solo career, you can't blame a record company for the last 20 years of releases. mark has signed off on everything, from solo albums, to re-issues to photo sessions.
Yes, like everything in life there are two sides, this is the side that for me leaves something to be desired, that fails when it comes to DS and MK and I'm not just blaming the record company, it's clear that for decades MK has had control over what he wants to do with his work, for me it's clear that all of this is the consequence of a set of decisions that go through the Marketing team, record company, producer and of course, the greatest weight of the decision is MK's. And yet, I am a hardcore fan, because when I weigh it up, the songs he made with Dire Straits are greater than these modest release choice policies that I highlighted, the albums are incredible, the songs are wonderful, I love every tour the band did during their time of activity and I am deeply connected to their entire work like nothing else in this world, simply like that, and yet, this does not make me a blind and alienated fan, incapable of self-criticism of the band and artists that I admire the most, far from it, the fact of knowing my research object naturally leads me to realize where the gaps are, at least from my point of view. If everyone involved in the production of the DS release had a bolder and less modest outlook, we would have at some point had videos of these songs that were left out of Alchemy and On The Night. The Live 78/92 box set was a very positive sign, hopefully it sold well to encourage them to produce more material like this instead of releasing yet another version of the BIA album that would be more of the same.
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I wonder how much UNinvolved Mark was in the live boxset release.
I do my own speculation on the matter.
Mark love his fans - he has a true attention for us even if we are always asking for more and better.
Who know who asked him to give his blessing on issuing a live boxset featuring unreleased material and he instantly agreed.
So no other than Guy was hired for the project, but as it is a budget release, he was only given very limited time to get the job done*.
Mark then gave his approval on the final new mixes and proposed Guy to share a drink at the local pub...
* unfotunately Guy ran out of credits while working on the transition between PB and TOL
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Regarding unreleased classics - I'm sure Sultans Of Swing from the '92 tour sounded pretty terrible.
The drum sound isn't great on the Basel video. And yes it's a thrash fest. Something I regret but also a product of circumstances.
We had a B kit, which probably didn't sound as nice as my main kit. I was also set up right in front of Mark's very loud guitar speakers. I couldn't really hear anything but guitar, which made me thrash the kit and over play. Mark's guitar would have been loud in all the drum mics too.
With modern digital technology you could probably rescue it - which is I'm sure why Guy started to work on all those old recordings for the box set.
For me the OES tour was the only Dire Straits tour I saw live. And I pretty happy that I saw that tour and in my opinion it was a great experience to hear those songs live and was blown away. If I read al the “behind the scenes stories” I can imagine for the musicians it was different and difficult to work with Knopfler. But as music-lover I had a great time at the shows I have visited.
And I am also really happy with the Live box with the extra tracks the only thing in my opinion what could have been better was if they put “The Bug” on the spot after “Romeo & Juliet” like on the original video and “Solid Rock” and “local Hero “ after BiA then you had the perfect 2cd of the OTN expanded and than they didn’t had to add the Encores single as bonus disc.
But in the end i am happy we got after all these years these extra live tracks!!
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It would be a significant expense to go back to the film and edit new songs from the raw footage, also the audio has to match the video, so the audio would also have to be remixed. Cost versus benefit? How many people would want to buy a second (expanded) version of the On The Night DVD?
MK can sell thousands of those 100 euros special boxes for new albums.
Imho an On The Night box would very easily outsell.
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I don't think so.
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It would be a significant expense to go back to the film and edit new songs from the raw footage, also the audio has to match the video, so the audio would also have to be remixed. Cost versus benefit? How many people would want to buy a second (expanded) version of the On The Night DVD?
MK can sell thousands of those 100 euros special boxes for new albums.
Imho an On The Night box would very easily outsell.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but was On The Night shot digitally? If so, it'll never be updated. Also, I remember Guy said the multitracks for it are either hard to find, or even worse, it only exists in the stereo mixdown form. So if it's all true, technically speaking, you can barely find things to improve in this DVD and it exists in its final form already.
The new 2023 mix sounds exactly like the original anyway. And the picture... It's still in glorious 1x1 pixels high definition to this day.
The expanded and remastered version sure could be successful as it's 1) desirable, 2) coming from dIRE sTRAITS (not every day you see something new from this band) and not solo Knopfler, 3) would neatly fall into the nostalgia wave for many people who saw the band live 30 years ago. Releasing it 10 years ago would be even better though :lol
But overall, honestly, as someone who dreamed of a proper remaster of On The Night for over a decade, I can say forget about it.
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The treatment given to Dire Straits releases is historically modest, often bordering on mediocrity, and lately with the presence of "nickel hunting", the tenth edition of the album BIA, look at the way MK's solo albums have been released since 2009, you have to be willing to spend a lot of money to get what the record company imposes, this latest release is... discouraging, the marketing team is a disaster, oddly enough, it shows amateurism, look at the photos and information recently posted on the official channels, even the date of the videos...
And yet you are a hardcore fan?? ??
Being a smash hit artist, multi-millionaire and powerful entity almost as the sole controller of Dire Straits and his solo career, you can't blame a record company for the last 20 years of releases. mark has signed off on everything, from solo albums, to re-issues to photo sessions.
Yes, like everything in life there are two sides, this is the side that for me leaves something to be desired, that fails when it comes to DS and MK and I'm not just blaming the record company, it's clear that for decades MK has had control over what he wants to do with his work, for me it's clear that all of this is the consequence of a set of decisions that go through the Marketing team, record company, producer and of course, the greatest weight of the decision is MK's. And yet, I am a hardcore fan, because when I weigh it up, the songs he made with Dire Straits are greater than these modest release choice policies that I highlighted, the albums are incredible, the songs are wonderful, I love every tour the band did during their time of activity and I am deeply connected to their entire work like nothing else in this world, simply like that, and yet, this does not make me a blind and alienated fan, incapable of self-criticism of the band and artists that I admire the most, far from it, the fact of knowing my research object naturally leads me to realize where the gaps are, at least from my point of view. If everyone involved in the production of the DS release had a bolder and less modest outlook, we would have at some point had videos of these songs that were left out of Alchemy and On The Night. The Live 78/92 box set was a very positive sign, hopefully it sold well to encourage them to produce more material like this instead of releasing yet another version of the BIA album that would be more of the same.
Totally agree about two sides... Being a fan of MK is definitely a love–hate relationship, that's why you see so much of "hate" on this forum. A lot of love too. But it's not hate really, it's simply the annoyance from observing things that could be done vs. what was done. You don't even need to be a hardcore fan, a child can sometimes find how to improve things.
And remember we don't live in the vacuum and everybody can see how the legacy can be treated, how many bonus tracks, unreleased materials and remastered versions can see the light of day, crazy ideas from live multi-angle features from 2003 to instrumental versions of songs, updated visuals, demos, interviews, you name it. We're lucky to get at least something.
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And you could finish an unfinished Picasso at the same time. Really, I've seen some crazy stuff on this forum and this line of argument takes the biscuit.
The comparison of a lost Picasso and the On The Night album makes me chuckle, bwah ha ha ha!
MK may be reluctant to revisit these times for other reasons but at the end of the day this will come down to cold hard cash. There might have been a window where it was financially viable to pay someone to edit this footage together when DVDs were still selling but that ship sailed a long time ago.
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Well the way the Dire Straits legacy is managed remains mysterious for me.
That Dire Straits live boxset was a complete surprise.
I dreamed of but was not too optimistic.
Why this boxset, why now ?
I would like to know what made it possible.
Did it sold well enough?
Is there another things to come or it is just a one off as Live At The BBC was one in 1995.
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The CD version of the live box appears to be sold out on Amazon UK, so using that non scientific benchmark it appears to have sold well.
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Pavel brought a good discussion point.
Chris, I don't wanna be disrespectful in any way. However, the way that people consumes music is way different than 20 years ago. So, the music (as a product) that we know, are dead.
Long story short, Youtube is a free world where anyone can put anything. Just because are such horrible cover songs played there, you cannot put everyone on the same level. There are plenty of amazing digital artists, designers, developers and, yes, musicians delivering top notch material.
Pavel spoke about game developers and he is right. There are a bunch of modded video-games there are way better than the original. These guys don't need to work for Electronic Arts to be sucessfull anymore as a independent or consulting developers.
There are also amazing movies made using cellphones and digital art. There is a brazilian Netflix show called 3%. The original one was a short-movie that was avaliable on YT. The original was way better than the released streamed show.
The HBO series Westworld launched a score competition and the winner would be part of the show composers. The producers saw people adding their own sondtracks on scenes from the series and, some of them was pretty awasome.
Mark Knopfler launched a campaign for the video-clip of one of his songs and the winner was a small artist.
There are very, very competent people doing their jobs online.
As music, Internet is a free territory. Full of crap and also very good stuff.
Shit happens on corporative world. ( A LOT)
You told about fill uncompleted art, however, the almighty Guy Fletcher added fake drums on Fade To Black (from the live compilation) ruining the song mood. Would better to leave it out in my opinion.
There are major bands delivering 'almost raw' material as official release. Stones, Pink Floyd, Dylan... even DS has some 'almost official' releases on Youtube Music.
Mahavishnu Orchestra, witch I love, released a lot of 'almost raw' material with, also, incomplete songs.
Museums all aroud the world puts temporary exibitions of unfinished jobs from famous artists.
Of course that are cons about it (I doubt if Picasso would authorize people to see his unfinished paintings). Artists need to have control of their art to not be associated with some trash or something.
The world have changed and musicians are, unfortunately, struggling for their rights looking for a prism that has long gone. (this is other subject that I would like to talk)
MK concerts had decreasing his audience thru the last years.
Almost no publicity. MK Management thinks that, his audience is made of very rich people that buys Aston Martins, Expensive Gins and """"audiophiles"""" that spents tons of money on headphones.
How they "know" that?
Because MK sells a good amount of vinyls on Sweden, Austria and Luxembourg. This is insane.
There is no fanbase recycling.
The new generation doesn't speak the same language as MK Management.
There are fans and fans.
I agree that MK have a good amount fans that are stunning professionals that absolutely could deliver a fantastic job with his material.
Sorry the long post.
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The CD version of the live box appears to be sold out on Amazon UK, so using that non scientific benchmark it appears to have sold well.
I had a quick look and it is sold out on several platforms.
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The CD version of the live box appears to be sold out on Amazon UK, so using that non scientific benchmark it appears to have sold well.
It was a limited edition?
Also, extremely expensive.
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There are fans and fans.
I agree that MK have a good amount fans that are stunning professionals that absolutely could deliver a fantastic job with his material.
Professionals want to be paid right?
What the free access to Spotify and YouTube has resulted in is a mountain of mediocre content. It's not me saying it....it's a very common comment by a lot of 'fans'. Why is there no good music any more? There is, it's just hidden behind a tsunami of crap.
I now record drums for people remotely. I've made my own EP records in the past and videos. Yeah, it's cheap and easy to do something basic to a minimum level. It is very hard to do something excellent, even harder to do something that would have stood up 25 years ago.
Even colour grading video to look good is an actual professional career in itself, requiring hours of training and years of experience.
In the On The Night era you had multiple people with vast experience all doing separate jobs - mixing the audio, colour grading the video, editing the video, mixing the video with the audio. To expect one 'fan' to do all that now is......dreaming.
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The CD version of the live box appears to be sold out on Amazon UK, so using that non scientific benchmark it appears to have sold well.
It was a limited edition?
Also, extremely expensive.
Extremely expensive? I paid 45 euro’s for 8 cd’s. Its not quite expensive in my opinion.
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I paid £50. The vinyl was a lot more expensive....£150+?
I'm not talking about 'expensive' for fans or per CD, I'm just saying paying £50 is not an instant purchase for many people in a cost of living crisis. At the time a lot of people were struggling to heat their homes, or put food on the table.
I couldn't justify purchasing The Waterboys 'This Is The Sea' box set, I think it was £80?
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I thought the CD box set was good value and while I am by no means wealthy I am fortunate enough to be able to make a discretionary purchase of £50 without it making a massive impact. Also, it was a good birthday present for my wife to get me :)
Would have been nice to get the vinyl set but I am done with MK and DS vinyl until they stop using the GZ plant which is a total lottery quality wise.
Overall DS/MK aren't the worst offenders in this area.
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Yeah, I didn't suggest anything was a rip off. All these Super Deluxe Editions are limited editions.
So it's not really proving the enduring popularity of Dire Straits when the 78-92 box set sells out.
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I thought the CD box set was good value and while I am by no means wealthy I am fortunate enough to be able to make a discretionary purchase of £50 without it making a massive impact. Also, it was a good birthday present for my wife to get me :)
Would have been nice to get the vinyl set but I am done with MK and DS vinyl until they stop using the GZ plant which is a total lottery quality wise.
Overall DS/MK aren't the worst offenders in this area.
I thought the CD box set was amazing value at £50 and a very nice addition to my collection. Vinyls are overpriced these days imo.
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The CD version of the live box appears to be sold out on Amazon UK, so using that non scientific benchmark it appears to have sold well.
I probably shouldn't have mentioned the price. £50 was expensive for me. Especially the way musicians are paid these days. Also, as I said, it came out when the news was full of people struggling to heat their homes.
My MAIN point was that a well researched and marketed limited edition having sold out, doesn't really demonstrate that there is a strong general market for more Dire Straits releases.
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Yeah, I didn't suggest anything was a rip off. All these Super Deluxe Editions are limited editions.
So it's not really proving the enduring popularity of Dire Straits when the 78-92 box set sells out.
That means that the project was done accordingly whith the current market state.
I ignore how much profitable it was but selling out means that they did not lost money on it.
Regarding the price itself, maybe some of us did have a biased view as UK is not in the best economic situation : I checked my bill, the box in France did sell in 2023 for only £36. Ouch!
So our view can differ because we have just one world but we live in different ones.
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Professionals want to be paid right?
What the free access to Spotify and YouTube has resulted in is a mountain of mediocre content. It's not me saying it....it's a very common comment by a lot of 'fans'. Why is there no good music any more? There is, it's just hidden behind a tsunami of crap.
I now record drums for people remotely. I've made my own EP records in the past and videos. Yeah, it's cheap and easy to do something basic to a minimum level. It is very hard to do something excellent, even harder to do something that would have stood up 25 years ago.
Even colour grading video to look good is an actual professional career in itself, requiring hours of training and years of experience.
In the On The Night era you had multiple people with vast experience all doing separate jobs - mixing the audio, colour grading the video, editing the video, mixing the video with the audio. To expect one 'fan' to do all that now is......dreaming.
I agree 100% about Spotify/Youtube mediocre content. And I am not talking about the Spotify payments...
I know a bunch of great musicians that not put his music on digital platforms or even put them fisically on the streets because how music is consumed.
This is a lost battle.
The main problem with Spotify content is that anyone can put enything on there. In the past, making demos and showing them to specific people, resulted on a big filter that not exists anymore.
I remember reading EC self-biograpy and the line was: "Music scenario didn't change from my youth to nowadays. 5% of good music and 95% of crap"
The problem is that these 5% is composed by 5% of good music and 95% of crap hahahaha.
Good music is a niche.
When I say that are fans and fans. It's because there are very competent people (with years of experience) that could be, also, a Dire Straits. Those people are not locked on his bedrooms eating cheetos and putting themselves on places that they don't belong. There are real jobs, teams, and real professionalism.
I am not saying that they don't need to be payed. They must be.
Universal Music tercerizes a lot of his jobs. In this "new" scenario, there are content (raw data) that could be worked by this small and very competent teams.
There is a lot of crap, yes. And putting the delusional fan aside, there are things that could be delivered by people who admires somebodies work.
You are saying that I am suposing that just one fan doing all the job. NO.
There are real teams working on real work.
I agree 100% about Spotify/Youtube mediocre content. And I am not talking about the Spotify payments...
I know a bunch of great musicians that not put his music on digital platforms or even put them on the streets because how music is consumed.
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Yeah, I didn't suggest anything was a rip off. All these Super Deluxe Editions are limited editions.
So it's not really proving the enduring popularity of Dire Straits when the 78-92 box set sells out.
100% agree.
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I guess I'm naive but I find it amazing that a musician that played on the bloody thing has to shell out to buy a copy, same goes for The Waterboys release. I'm sure it wasn't part of contracts back in the day etc but you would think that a complimentary copy might be offered as a gesture of goodwill.
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That means that the project was done accordingly whith the current market state.
I ignore how much profitable it was but selling out means that they did not lost money on it.
Yes. The debate is whether it's worth the effort and cost involved to release more material from the OES tour, or videos from John's POV etc...
The limited edition box set was cited as evidence for.
I'm highly sceptical.
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You are saying that I am suposing that just one fan doing all the job. NO.
There are real teams working on real work.
I agree 100% about Spotify/Youtube mediocre content. And I am not talking about the Spotify payments...
I know a bunch of great musicians that not put his music on digital platforms or even put them on the streets because how music is consumed.
I'm saying that back in the day, teams of experienced professionals worked on 'On The Night' and 'Alchemy Live'.
Would you see something as good or better after giving that raw material to DS fans? I'm highly sceptical.
It would be interesting to know how long Guy spent working on the box set remixes. I'm gonna guess many months.
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Thanks for your inputs, Rolo, it's refreshing to see at least some people sometimes agreeing with me :lol
I like this "5% of good music and 95% of crap" quote as much as I like another famous quote/axiom, "There's two types of music — good music and bad music."
This "today's music is crap" debate propelled by the likes of Rick Beato and other "boomer" journalists is highly misleading, I think, because good music has always been a victim of survivorship bias. You may think most of today's music is crap, Spotify sucks, and most YouTube videos are lousy, well, in fact, it's always been true, now you just can see all this crap unfiltered. Which is... Even better, in a way?
People who grew up with better filters and a higher chance of good content getting to them think young folks today can't distinguish between talent and mediocrity. One of the most important things about upbringing and learning is the ability to see both sides of life, so in a way, beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I mean, my Spotify and YouTube feed consists of amazing creators and contemporary music, I don't know about you.
You can always detect talent no matter what, and there is tons of good music nowadays, and I'm happy to have such a large ocean to go fishing for good stuff.
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I guess I'm naive but I find it amazing that a musician that played on the bloody thing has to shell out to buy a copy, same goes for The Waterboys release.
Paul McCartney's office contacted me asking for my address before sending me the limited edition reissue of 'Flowers In The Dirt'. At another time they also sent me the very nice 'singles collection'. That was classy.
No one from Mark's team offered me 78/92 box set. Nor did they offer it to Chris White.
I fell out with Mike Scott after I left The Waterboys, so I wasn't surprised not to be offered a copy.
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This "today's music is crap" debate propelled by the likes of Rick Beato and other "boomer" journalists is highly misleading, I think, because good music has always been a victim of survivorship bias. You may think most of today's music is crap, Spotify sucks, and most YouTube videos are lousy, well, in fact, it's always been true, now you just can see all this crap unfiltered.
Actually I've always been of this view. There is the SAME amount of great music out there, arguably even better music.
The difference is that there was much less released music back in the day, and it was all curated. Record labels didn't sign anyone who was writing songs. And radio stations never played all releases.
So I do not think ALL music today is crap, nor ALL musicians. It's just harder to find because it isn't being curated by record labels and radio stations.
I'm only reflecting the view of ordinary consumers - which I think Beato is also doing. if you go on music forums, people very often claim all current music is crap. They think that because there is an overwhelming amount of mediocre content they have to navigate through in order to find the good stuff.
Before, all you had to do was visit your favourite independent record store, or listen to your favourite radio station, or turn on The Old Grey Whistle Test.
The first time I ever heard 'Sultans Of Swing' and the day I first heard of the band 'Dire Straits' was on UK pop radio.
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"The first time I ever heard 'Sultans Of Swing' and the day I first heard of the band 'Dire Straits' was on UK pop radio"
Great times when a radio presenter decided what song to play. Now computers do it with a playlist. Rotation, repetition and so on. >:(
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You are saying that I am suposing that just one fan doing all the job. NO.
There are real teams working on real work.
I agree 100% about Spotify/Youtube mediocre content. And I am not talking about the Spotify payments...
I know a bunch of great musicians that not put his music on digital platforms or even put them on the streets because how music is consumed.
I'm saying that back in the day, teams of experienced professionals worked on 'On The Night' and 'Alchemy Live'.
Would you see something as good or better after giving that raw material to DS fans? I'm highly sceptical.
It would be interesting to know how long Guy spent working on the box set remixes. I'm gonna guess many months.
Yeah, but the term "raw material" is extremely vague. In this example, raw material simply means "uncut video tracks" that have already been colour-graded, shot on location, and with already mixed audio because I highly doubt you can find truly raw material for any of these things. Even some of The Beatles' original masters ended up thrown away into a bin by Abbey Road Studio's janitor, let alone On The Night masters and tapes.
With this definition of raw material, I think it's pretty safe to assume you don't need to be a Hollywood-level professional to stitch it together.
One of my favourite pictures is the one with a table full of crap like video cameras, photo cameras, music players, books, alarm clocks, phones, flashlights, gaming consoles, notebooks, radios, calculators, newspapers, audio recorders, TVs, navigators, compasses and photo albums, and one smartphone on another empty table that replaced it all.
Teams of experienced professionals used to work on great many things, even elevators used to have lift attendants, but progress is progress.
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I guess I'm naive but I find it amazing that a musician that played on the bloody thing has to shell out to buy a copy, same goes for The Waterboys release. I'm sure it wasn't part of contracts back in the day etc but you would think that a complimentary copy might be offered as a gesture of goodwill.
Indeed. Everyone who's name is credited on an album should automatically get a copy, I am serious. Imagine guys like Richard or Glen working on thousands of albums. I would expect them to have at least one copy of every album they have worked on. It sure enough would not ruin a record company or an artist to give away 20 or 30 copies to the people involved. Better deserved than music journalists....
LE
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I guess I'm naive but I find it amazing that a musician that played on the bloody thing has to shell out to buy a copy, same goes for The Waterboys release.
Paul McCartney's office contacted me asking for my address before sending me the limited edition reissue of 'Flowers In The Dirt'. At another time they also sent me the very nice 'singles collection'. That was classy.
No one from Mark's team offered me 78/92 box set. Nor did they offer it to Chris White.
I fell out with Mike Scott after I left The Waterboys, so I wasn't surprised not to be offered a copy.
Great to hear! (About Macca, not so much about the falling out. Although the new Waterboys album about Dennis Hopper sounds interesting at least).
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"The first time I ever heard 'Sultans Of Swing' and the day I first heard of the band 'Dire Straits' was on UK pop radio"
Great times when a radio presenter decided what song to play. Now computers do it with a playlist. Rotation, repetition and so on. >:(
Mmm, I seem to recall MK's story about Doris and the BBC Radio 1 playlist committee...
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Until recently I was among the people that though that nowaday popular (ie chart) music was not crappier than past music.
I insinst about the "chart" word.
There is still lot of talented people but the core question is about being played and listened.
In all fairness I admit that my opinion on the matter is now challenged.
I mean comparing creativity, complexity of charting songs today compared to the previous decadeS, if we listen to people doing research on that matter, yes we have lost in quality.
That being said, I know that I am OUT. Most of the artist that are charting the top 40 singles today are mostly unknown names for me.
The time have changed and the medium that kept me informed about the pop music have disappeared.
I am believing in the value of education in a wide sense, not only scholar education, but the way a society rely on leveling up culturaly. I don't know if the lowering of the top 40 has to be a real concern, I am not an expert.
This is the paradox, with internet you can access almost every kind of music at no additionnal cost.
But in the same time, lower quality music is spreading.
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The classical musicians and fans would have bemoaned the quality of jazz and blues music when that was popular.
The jazz and blues musicians and fans would have bemoaned the quality of rock and roll music when that was popular.
Now we old farts on the forum of an act that was called boring even at the height of it's popularity are bemoaning the quality of today's new music.
It was ever thus :)
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Yes. The debate is whether it's worth the effort and cost involved to release more material from the OES tour, or videos from John's POV etc...
The limited edition box set was cited as evidence for.
I'm highly sceptical.
Regarding OES I am also sceptical because it is not a single night and even the songs themselves are composite from different night.
I have no idea of the cost implied doing that work.
Still, Eric Clapton's Definitive 24tNights release is a signal that publishing that kind of material is still possible.
How big as a selling artist Eric now is compared to Dire Straits ?
Somewhere in the vault regarding Dire Straits and Mark Knopfler, there are live video already edited and coming from single nights, so a SD release of the NHB '90 or Live In '85 with premium stereo audio does not sound to me as highly improbable.
So If I could interview the man behind the live boxset project, I would be interested to have his view on these questions.
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The classical musicians and fans would have bemoaned the quality of jazz and blues music when that was popular.
The jazz and blues musicians and fans would have bemoaned the quality of rock and roll music when that was popular.
Now we old farts on the forum of an act that was called boring even at the height of it's popularity are bemoaning the quality of today's new music.
It was ever thus :)
I have a few Jazz musician scorn for Rock N roll example and it is laughable.
But from musical studies, some ABBA's song may be way more complex than they seem to be.
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You are saying that I am assuming that just one fan doing all the job. NODE.
There are real teams working on real work.
I agree 100% about Spotify/Youtube mediocre content. And I am not talking about the Spotify payments...
I know a bunch of great musicians that don't put their music on digital platforms or even put them on the streets because how music is consumed.
I'm saying that back in the day, teams of experienced professionals worked on 'On The Night' and 'Alchemy Live'.
Would you see something as good or better after giving that raw material to DS fans? I'm highly skeptical.
It would be interesting to know how long Guy spent working on the box set remixes. I'm gonna guess many months.
Yeah, but the term "raw material" is extremely vague. In this example, raw material simply means "uncut video tracks" that have already been color-graded, shot on location, and with already mixed audio because I highly doubt you can find truly raw material for any of these things. Even some of The Beatles' original masters ended up thrown away into a bin by Abbey Road Studio's janitor, let alone On The Night masters and tapes.
With this definition of raw material, I think it's pretty safe to assume you don't need to be a Hollywood-level professional to stitch it together.
One of my favorite pictures is the one with a table full of crap like video cameras, photo cameras, music players, books, alarm clocks, phones, flashlights, gaming consoles, notebooks, radios, calculators, newspapers, audio recorders, TVs, navigators, compasses and photo albums, and a smartphone on another empty table that replaced it all.
Teams of experienced professionals used to work on great many things, even elevators used to have lift attendants, but progress is progress.
Exactly, that's my point, it's possible, you don't need to be a Hollywood film professional to achieve something relevant and satisfactory, especially because, being produced by a group of capable fans, I have no doubt that the result would be much better than what happened with Alchemy and On The Night, the vision is different when it's fan to fan.
As I mentioned in a private conversation with my friend Rolo, the big truth is that things are the way they are for a very specific reason, this happened in 1996. I'll explain right after this data:
DS's official YT channel.
2.4M subscribers
Mark Knopfler's YT channel. 1M subscribers.
But look at the contrast:
Queen. 18M subscribers.
Bohenian Rhapsody - 1.9 Billion plays
Led Zeppelin - 4M
Pink Floyd - 4.5M
Beatles - 8.8M
So far, MK has worked hard to bury the band DS, everything possible to remove the band from any media evidence was concentrated effort, anything that makes the band relevant today loses strength because of years and years of this type of politics. I'm still really surprised that the DS YouTube channel has 2.4M subscribers, given the circumstances I mentioned.
Anyway, Box Live 78/92 was a pleasant surprise, an outlier, but that doesn't change the past of modest releases and questionable direction and production of material like Alchemy and On The Night. The main person responsible is probably the person who most wanted to bury the band and its legacy.
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The classical musicians and fans would have bemoaned the quality of jazz and blues music when that was popular.
The jazz and blues musicians and fans would have bemoaned the quality of rock and roll music when that was popular.
Now we old farts on the forum of an act that was called boring even at the height of it's popularity are bemoaning the quality of today's new music.
It was ever thus :)
I have a few Jazz musician scorn for Rock N roll example and it is laughable.
But from musical studies, some ABBA's song may be way more complex than they seem to be.
I was in a band in the 1990s and the drummer was a jazz snob. He was FURIOUS that the Notting Hillbillies were being allowed to play "country and festering music" in the hallowed grounds of Ronnie Scott's ha ha.
ABBA as you say is complex, and The Beatles' chord sequences were much more intersting than other bands at the time... but who says complex is better? Anyone think that any Dire Straits' music will be around longer than Sugar Sugar by The Archies?
Queen's people have done a quite incredible job promoting the act since Freddie Mercury died.
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You are saying that I am assuming that just one fan doing all the job. NODE.
There are real teams working on real work.
I agree 100% about Spotify/Youtube mediocre content. And I am not talking about the Spotify payments...
I know a bunch of great musicians that don't put their music on digital platforms or even put them on the streets because how music is consumed.
I'm saying that back in the day, teams of experienced professionals worked on 'On The Night' and 'Alchemy Live'.
Would you see something as good or better after giving that raw material to DS fans? I'm highly skeptical.
It would be interesting to know how long Guy spent working on the box set remixes. I'm gonna guess many months.
Yeah, but the term "raw material" is extremely vague. In this example, raw material simply means "uncut video tracks" that have already been color-graded, shot on location, and with already mixed audio because I highly doubt you can find truly raw material for any of these things. Even some of The Beatles' original masters ended up thrown away into a bin by Abbey Road Studio's janitor, let alone On The Night masters and tapes.
With this definition of raw material, I think it's pretty safe to assume you don't need to be a Hollywood-level professional to stitch it together.
One of my favorite pictures is the one with a table full of crap like video cameras, photo cameras, music players, books, alarm clocks, phones, flashlights, gaming consoles, notebooks, radios, calculators, newspapers, audio recorders, TVs, navigators, compasses and photo albums, and a smartphone on another empty table that replaced it all.
Teams of experienced professionals used to work on great many things, even elevators used to have lift attendants, but progress is progress.
The main person responsible is probably the person who most wanted to bury the band and its legacy.
But why would Mark continue to promote and market a band that is effectively dead and while having a very successful solo career? I can understand that some people want to see more Dire Straits, but I think it's just a case of people being stuck in the past.
For myself, I would be much more excited about seeing the Henrik Hansen documentary than a Wembley '85 release.
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I had mentioned a real video of the song WICTY on OTN (instead of this childish joke that they posted on the official channel) because theoretically it is more likely that the raw material that was used to select what would make it to the VHS release in 1993 exists, since OTN was an initiative of the band itself, unlike the songs that are missing from the video broadcast at Wembley arena 85, songs like Ride Acros The River, Romeo and Juliet... Since the latter was an external production, made for a TV show, TUBE, if I'm not mistaken. So, it could be that this material really existed in a place similar to where the Rainbow Theatre 79 archives and the extra songs from Alchemy and OTN were.
Unfortunately, there is no official information on whether or not such material exists (the full Alchemy video, videos of the shows used for OTN, two nights in Nimes and two in Rotterdam. There is also no official information about audio or video for Paris 83...). They probably no longer exist, have been lost or damaged. On the other hand, it was a great surprise to see a show like Rainbow Theatre 79 being released in the box, as well as the previously unreleased tracks on the other CDs. This was a good sign that there must be more unreleased material than previously thought. It would be amazing if there were a survey of data on this, to know what exists and what has been lost.
Who knows, if one day the DS copyrights are sold, something more consistent will happen through a change in the band's release policy. Who knows, maybe everything can be measured with a vision at least (inspired by) the releases of Eric Clapton, Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, Beatles... I said inspired.🤌🏻
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You are saying that I am assuming that just one fan doing all the job. NODE.
There are real teams working on real work.
I agree 100% about Spotify/Youtube mediocre content. And I am not talking about the Spotify payments...
I know a bunch of great musicians that don't put their music on digital platforms or even put them on the streets because how music is consumed.
I'm saying that back in the day, teams of experienced professionals worked on 'On The Night' and 'Alchemy Live'.
Would you see something as good or better after giving that raw material to DS fans? I'm highly skeptical.
It would be interesting to know how long Guy spent working on the box set remixes. I'm gonna guess many months.
Yeah, but the term "raw material" is extremely vague. In this example, raw material simply means "uncut video tracks" that have already been color-graded, shot on location, and with already mixed audio because I highly doubt you can find truly raw material for any of these things. Even some of The Beatles' original masters ended up thrown away into a bin by Abbey Road Studio's janitor, let alone On The Night masters and tapes.
With this definition of raw material, I think it's pretty safe to assume you don't need to be a Hollywood-level professional to stitch it together.
One of my favorite pictures is the one with a table full of crap like video cameras, photo cameras, music players, books, alarm clocks, phones, flashlights, gaming consoles, notebooks, radios, calculators, newspapers, audio recorders, TVs, navigators, compasses and photo albums, and a smartphone on another empty table that replaced it all.
Teams of experienced professionals used to work on great many things, even elevators used to have lift attendants, but progress is progress.
The main person responsible is probably the person who most wanted to bury the band and its legacy.
But why would Mark continue to promote and market a band that is effectively dead and while having a very successful solo career? I can understand that some people want to see more Dire Straits, but I think it's just a case of people being stuck in the past.
For myself, I would be much more excited about seeing the Henrik Hansen documentary than a Wembley '85 release.
Take a look at the number of subscribers on Dire Straits' official channel and then see how many subscribers there are on MK's solo channel. Then look at the sales figures for DS and MK, and you should be able to find some practical answers. When you do, if you can, post your thoughts here.
Do you know how many people would make the same choice as you? I won't mention it so as not to scare you. 👽
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DS's official YT channel.
2.4M subscribers
Mark Knopfler's YT channel. 1M subscribers.
But look at the contrast:
Queen. 18M subscribers.
Bohenian Rhapsody - 1.9 Billion plays
Led Zeppelin - 4M
Pink Floyd - 4.5M
Beatles - 8.8M
Interesting to add a few other big britts names of rock music :
Eric Clapton - 1.54 M
TheRollingStones - 3.4 M
U2official - 3.13 M
EltonJohn - 4.79 M
DeepPurpleOfficial - 1.37 M
And from the other side of the Atlantic :
BobDylan - 1.5 M
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You are saying that I am assuming that just one fan doing all the job. NODE.
There are real teams working on real work.
I agree 100% about Spotify/Youtube mediocre content. And I am not talking about the Spotify payments...
I know a bunch of great musicians that don't put their music on digital platforms or even put them on the streets because how music is consumed.
I'm saying that back in the day, teams of experienced professionals worked on 'On The Night' and 'Alchemy Live'.
Would you see something as good or better after giving that raw material to DS fans? I'm highly skeptical.
It would be interesting to know how long Guy spent working on the box set remixes. I'm gonna guess many months.
Yeah, but the term "raw material" is extremely vague. In this example, raw material simply means "uncut video tracks" that have already been color-graded, shot on location, and with already mixed audio because I highly doubt you can find truly raw material for any of these things. Even some of The Beatles' original masters ended up thrown away into a bin by Abbey Road Studio's janitor, let alone On The Night masters and tapes.
With this definition of raw material, I think it's pretty safe to assume you don't need to be a Hollywood-level professional to stitch it together.
One of my favorite pictures is the one with a table full of crap like video cameras, photo cameras, music players, books, alarm clocks, phones, flashlights, gaming consoles, notebooks, radios, calculators, newspapers, audio recorders, TVs, navigators, compasses and photo albums, and a smartphone on another empty table that replaced it all.
Teams of experienced professionals used to work on great many things, even elevators used to have lift attendants, but progress is progress.
The main person responsible is probably the person who most wanted to bury the band and its legacy.
But why would Mark continue to promote and market a band that is effectively dead and while having a very successful solo career? I can understand that some people want to see more Dire Straits, but I think it's just a case of people being stuck in the past.
For myself, I would be much more excited about seeing the Henrik Hansen documentary than a Wembley '85 release.
Take a look at the number of subscribers on Dire Straits' official channel and then see how many subscribers there are on MK's solo channel. Then look at the sales figures for DS and MK, and you should be able to find some practical answers. When you do, if you can, post your thoughts here.
Do you know how many people would make the same choice as you? I won't mention it so as not to scare you. 👽
I couldn't give a donkey's dong about the number of subscribers of whatever, really.
In the real world, not the virtual one, Mark got fed up of Dire Straits and all that's associated with it, started a successful solo career and never looked back. Some fans moved on with him, others stayed behind with DS and that's okay. But all this crying about there not existing more DS releases and that the band isn't popular on social media is quite childish, I think.
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DS's official YT channel.
2.4M subscribers
Mark Knopfler's YT channel. 1M subscribers.
But look at the contrast:
Queen. 18M subscribers.
Bohenian Rhapsody - 1.9 Billion plays
Led Zeppelin - 4M
Pink Floyd - 4.5M
Beatles - 8.8M
Interesting to add a few other big britts names of rock music :
Eric Clapton - 1.54 M
TheRollingStones - 3.4 M
U2official - 3.13 M
EltonJohn - 4.79 M
DeepPurpleOfficial - 1.37 M
And from the other side of the Atlantic :
BobDylan - 1.5 M
Haha! I've already had quite a lot of battles with Dusty here, discussing the popularity of artists and comparing the numbers. What I learned is that you do not perceive popularity by looking at numbers as much as you "feel" popularity. Bob Dylan is all over my X feed, especially after the movie about him came out, and when he started writing his own posts, it had the effect of a nuclear weapon. Bob Dylan is as popular as he ever was, what a guy.
You feel the popularity of someone. You feel the popularity of Taylor Swift, you see videos about her on YouTube all the time, you see the billboards, you see her name in the news. If she feels popular, she's popular. Now, when it comes to Mark Knopfler, obviously, this man doesn't feel popular at all. People barely talk about him, there are not a lot of interviews, he's not touring anymore, and the numbers are pretty modest, too.
When I was mentioned in Mark's social media 3 times, it wasn't nuclear at all. Yes, I got a few weeks' worth of views and comments, but it wasn't like my inbox was filled to the top and then some. I actually managed to answer every single comment and email in a couple of days. If someone with John Mayer and Bob Dylan's scale mentioned me in a tweet, I'd be drinking my favourite pineapple juice in the Maldives now.
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Sometimes I don't care, and sometimes I'm annoyed why MK is overlooked and rarely quoted. It's unfair and incomprehensible.
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Sometimes I don't care, and sometimes I'm annoyed why MK is overlooked and rarely quoted. It's unfair and incomprehensible.
I know what you mean. Life's not fair and I have a liftime of following underrated artists, listening to underrated music and even choosing underrated occupations (like teacher, sound designer, editor, or even defender in football). Somehow, I always felt like fighting on the side of the underdog. But life is also extremely predictable and you're not going to become famous if you don't want to become famous. A known fame hater, Mark did everything he could to be as underrated as possible, and hence become the perfect "musician's musician". I usually don't care, too. Mainly becasue I talk about his music virtually every day and damn, can he write good songs. Good songs he writes, he can write good songs. Boy, what a songwriter.
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Sometimes I don't care, and sometimes I'm annoyed why MK is overlooked and rarely quoted. It's unfair and incomprehensible.
It's clear to me that the reason for this is that Mark worked tirelessly to bury the band that made him famous, DS, and continued his solo career in a low-profile manner. There's no way to plant beans and harvest watermelons. I find it impressive that DS's official channel has 2.4M subscribers, and even more impressive that his solo channel has 1M subscribers.
The paradox is that we're talking about a band that has sold over 100 million albums. It seems to me that not even Van Halen has reached that figure, also Scorpions, Iron Maiden, Metallica, Nirvana... Dire Straits is on a similar level to Bruce Springsteen, something close to 120 million. There's nothing modest about that. They're undoubtedly among the 20 best-selling bands on the planet. That's pretty significant even if they were in the top 30 or 40 best sellers.
Dire Straits just doesn't have the relevance it should and deserves to have, because the band's leader spared no effort to diminish its importance and legacy. I don't know if this is related to some trauma from the last two tours the band did (especially the OES tour 91/92), but, looking back, when it comes to DS, "MK ran away like the devil runs away from the cross." Nothing is by chance, if DS's rights were bought and managed by someone else, I believe things would start to be different. Who knows if the future will show if my point of view is correct?
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Sometimes I don't care, and sometimes I'm annoyed why MK is overlooked and rarely quoted. It's unfair and incomprehensible.
I know what you mean. Life's not fair and I have a liftime of following underrated artists, listening to underrated music and even choosing underrated occupations (like teacher, sound designer, editor, or even defender in football). Somehow, I always felt like fighting on the side of the underdog. But life is also extremely predictable and you're not going to become famous if you don't want to become famous. A known fame hater, Mark did everything he could to be as underrated as possible, and hence become the perfect "musician's musician". I usually don't care, too. Mainly becasue I talk about his music virtually every day and damn, can he write good songs. Good songs he writes, he can write good songs. Boy, what a songwriter.
It's all true. I increasingly think that Mark has created a niche for himself and feels good in it. It's incredible what a journey he's taken.
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DS is dead, and Mark wanted to fly under the radar. Like a silent fart. And now he's an old fart. An old silent fart. And you wonder why he's not in vogue?
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You can relate obviously?
LE
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You can relate obviously?
LE
I can pass silent farts, if that's what you meant.
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I partially agree with Hunter.
DS is dead and MK flies under the radar.
However, every artist (musicians) that made some success on the past could be reinserted on the market.
What needs to be reinserted is the comunication with the audience.
Look at Kate Bush as an example. She is great and was introduced to the new generation, briefly, because Netlix's The Stranger Things.
Bob Dylan (after selling his rights) now have a movie on cinemas and, of course, will reach to the young people much more that the Scorcese's doc. People want profit and it's all about profit.
What happens its that DS/MK speaks a completely different language (audio or video) of the current generation.
Music as product needs comunication with the current audience. MK's doesn't.
I think that most of all on this forum are 40+.
The way that we consumes music is dead.
If MK sells his rights, the buyer will reintroduce his music to make profit.
I cannot see Mark's music appealing even for musicians. Rick Beato is possible the greatest vehicle of "true musicians" and he barely speaks about DS/MK. There is no "What make this song great", "Quick lesson", Interviews.... nothing. Perhaps because Mark's music, for a skilled musician, is not that challenge.
I don't know.
I am a hopefully pessimist.
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Thanks for your inputs, Rolo, it's refreshing to see at least some people sometimes agreeing with me :lol
I like this "5% of good music and 95% of crap" quote as much as I like another famous quote/axiom, "There's two types of music — good music and bad music."
This "today's music is crap" debate propelled by the likes of Rick Beato and other "boomer" journalists is highly misleading, I think, because good music has always been a victim of survivorship bias. You may think most of today's music is crap, Spotify sucks, and most YouTube videos are lousy, well, in fact, it's always been true, now you just can see all this crap unfiltered. Which is... Even better, in a way?
People who grew up with better filters and a higher chance of good content getting to them think young folks today can't distinguish between talent and mediocrity. One of the most important things about upbringing and learning is the ability to see both sides of life, so in a way, beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I mean, my Spotify and YouTube feed consists of amazing creators and contemporary music, I don't know about you.
You can always detect talent no matter what, and there is tons of good music nowadays, and I'm happy to have such a large ocean to go fishing for good stuff.
Good points, Pavel.
I think that music, as we know, it's a niche.
The current star is the person who attends a concert. Not the artist.
People want to register his own moments during the event. They don't want to remember how great was some concert. Paying attention to an artist is boring. As the world bacame more selfish, music is secondary.
Unfortunately, people don't have time do do anything.
There is a critic that says: "Years ago, when we took a cab, the journey was a free time. Nowadays, at the cab, we answer some whatsapp messages, read 4 emails, post on instagram, organize a work's presentation..."
It means that, the very short period that people have "free time", they don't want to listen do Debussy. They want to listen the simplier and viral thing that is possible. Or they wanna listed the same old shit just because is comfortably. All of that, if those people want to listen to the music.
Spotify and Youtube, for me its GREAT. Almost 100% that i want to see or listen is there. I like to listen/watch interviews with musicians. These cats ALWAYS brings a great amount of knowledge about music and musicians (new and old). So, after that it's easy. Is just check them out. Worth almost every time.
It puts me on a niche. And this post repeats again.
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I heard Rick Beato speak once about Dire Straits and it was positively so I am OK with that. I don't need him to speak about him every week or so.
Regarding YT suscribed number I feel disparity between these figures and their real band success. I don't explain these.
I would also point out that Mark kept playing during his whole solo career songs from the Dire Straits catalogue.
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I heard Rick Beato speak once about Dire Straits and it was positively so I am OK with that. I don't need him to speak about him every week or so.
Regarding YT suscribed number I feel disparity between these figures and their real band success. I don't explain these.
I would also point out that Mark kept playing during his whole solo career songs from the Dire Straits catalogue.
Rick did a "Sultans" episode.
In my opinion, it was forced.
He talked much more about his former guitar teacher, Jimmy Page and Stairway than Sultans or MK itself.
That's ok. He is not obligated to like DS/MK.
However, I only saw 2 musicians speaking very briefly about MK on Rick's show: Keith Urban and Guthrie Trapp.
He is a vehicle for another kind of music. I really like when he talks about Allan Holdsworth or Pat Metheny, per example.
I don't think that Social Media subscribers reflects a artist popularity. React channels are way more popular than bands ones.
About DS/MK, I always laught about the citation of my dear friend Brunno Nunes.
"After DS, MK worked hard to buried his band"
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If MK sells his rights, the buyer will reintroduce his music to make profit.
I cannot see Mark's music appealing even for musicians. Rick Beato is possible the greatest vehicle of "true musicians" and he barely speaks about DS/MK. There is no "What make this song great", "Quick lesson", Interviews.... nothing. Perhaps because Mark's music, for a skilled musician, is not that challenge.
Mark's music is simple only on the surface. Everybody who tries to play it knows it's as deep as you want to fall into this rabbit hole, and even the greatest of players suddenly fail when trying to play some of Mark's riffs and songs. With playing single-note solos, people became very good, but it's serving the song and playing riffs that I personally see the most problematic. If you want to impress me, I don't want to hear the Sultans' solo; I want to hear Song For Sonny Liston.
Rick Beato hinted at a possible interview, and actually, funny enough, Mark was mentioned in his recent interview with Hans Zimmer in the first 5 minutes. But he was mentioned alongside Jeff Beck as an example of a distinctive Stratocaster sound, so even freaking Hans Zimmer respects Mark as a player of Sultans Of Swing and not as a songwriter, it seems. That, if anything, has become so old it's not even funny anymore. I'm sure for Rick, it's also all about Sultans. His most recent video about Knopfler is complete garbage, and I mean it. Apart from the entire video being a shameless plug for Rick's courses, the rest of the video is the shallowest analysis of Mark's work you can find. But the video has got more than a million views because it's Rick Beato talking about underrated Mark Knopfler. End of rant.
I'm not worried about Mark's legacy, and I'm sure it will be better after selling the rights if it happens. The way I think about it is simple: if you love good songs, you'll like Mark Knopfler because he writes good songs, nobody can take it away from him. What we should do is make sure people around us can learn about good music and can open their ears to good music, and sure enough, and I can guarantee it, everybody can find something to love about MK's music.
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The way I think about it is simple: if you love good songs, you'll like Mark Knopfler because he writes good songs, nobody can take it away from him. What we should do is make sure people around us can learn about good music and can open their ears to good music, and sure enough, and I can guarantee it, everybody can find something to love about MK's music.
Sultans, to me, is THE guitar song. Ever.
As many, I decided to learn guitar because of Sultans.
Everything about Mark's music, to me, is about his guitar playing and the musicianship athmosphere thru the songs. I love his lyrics, however, to me, his playing is much more powerfull than his lyrics.
It's all about Sultans, after all.
When MK started to deliver simpler songs focused mainly on lyrics. I lost a huge part of interest about his music. For me, Mark's music lost 'the magic'
Mark's music could be considered "hard" just because his distictive playing. He made all his cons into pros. Well, he holds the guitar like a plumber ahahahah.
You can pick a great band to cover the hardest DS song ever. All musicians can copy all the detais, except the guitar player. You can be a flawless picker like Greg Koch, but he'll not sound like MK.
I am saying that because I like complicated and visceral music as I like good songs. I love John Mclaughlin and Allan Holdsworth as I love Bob Dylan and George Harrison. I listen to John Coltrane's A Love Supreme with the same enthusiast that I listen do DS first album.
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I can't find it anymore but I remember that Rick Beato put MFN as the #1 guitar riff of all time
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I can't find it anymore but I remember that Rick Beato put MFN as the #1 guitar riff of all time
Right! I forgot about that one. Rick has made so many lists videos it's hard to follow. Let me say for the record — I hate list-type videos. But that perfectly encapsulates the entire discussion: people are willing to place MK on the podium or even give him the 1st place for his achievements in specific categories and yet outside of that ignore him as if he's not on the list altogether. Truly superhero moves from an old silent fart :lol
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Sometimes I don't care, and sometimes I'm annoyed why MK is overlooked and rarely quoted. It's unfair and incomprehensible.
It's clear to me that the reason for this is that Mark worked tirelessly to bury the band that made him famous, DS, and continued his solo career in a low-profile manner. There's no way to plant beans and harvest watermelons. I find it impressive that DS's official channel has 2.4M subscribers, and even more impressive that his solo channel has 1M subscribers.
The paradox is that we're talking about a band that has sold over 100 million albums. It seems to me that not even Van Halen has reached that figure, also Scorpions, Iron Maiden, Metallica, Nirvana... Dire Straits is on a similar level to Bruce Springsteen, something close to 120 million. There's nothing modest about that. They're undoubtedly among the 20 best-selling bands on the planet. That's pretty significant even if they were in the top 30 or 40 best sellers.
Dire Straits just doesn't have the relevance it should and deserves to have, because the band's leader spared no effort to diminish its importance and legacy. I don't know if this is related to some trauma from the last two tours the band did (especially the OES tour 91/92), but, looking back, when it comes to DS, "MK ran away like the devil runs away from the cross." Nothing is by chance, if DS's rights were bought and managed by someone else, I believe things would start to be different. Who knows if the future will show if my point of view is correct?
Absolutely agree with you
Also I heard that 120 million DS figure sales many times already 25-30 years ago, It must be much higher now, just never been updated
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But why would Mark continue to promote and market a band that is effectively dead and while having a very successful solo career? I can understand that some people want to see more Dire Straits, but I think it's just a case of people being stuck in the past.
For myself, I would be much more excited about seeing the Henrik Hansen documentary than a Wembley '85 release.
It appeared to me that Mark was over DS on the first days of rehearsal for a more than Ione year world tour. He didn't really want to play MFN any more.
he never thought Sultans had been played properly (even before me), and that is partly because he asked his drummers to play very loud, and Sultans has a lighter groove (Pick talks about this).
Once the tour ended at Zaragoza and Mark embarked on his solo career I think he was mighty relieved.
When I say he doesn't want to revisit the past with it's negative memories, it isn't about personal stuff, it's that he moved on with his life and doesn't want to go back. I think on recent solo tours he reluctantly accepted he'd written some amazing songs for DS, and that they were important to his fans, so he put some back in the set.
He had zero interest in the R&R Hall Of Fame.
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I'm amazed also people feel so sorry for Mark and feel he hasn't been appreciated enough.
The guy never needs to work again. He's a multi-millionaire. He's widely regarded as a guitar god, even by many of his peers (Clapton etc).
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Sometimes I don't care, and sometimes I'm annoyed why MK is overlooked and rarely quoted. It's unfair and incomprehensible.
I know what you mean. Life's not fair and I have a liftime of following underrated artists, listening to underrated music and even choosing underrated occupations (like teacher, sound designer, editor, or even defender in football). Somehow, I always felt like fighting on the side of the underdog. But life is also extremely predictable and you're not going to become famous if you don't want to become famous. A known fame hater, Mark did everything he could to be as underrated as possible, and hence become the perfect "musician's musician". I usually don't care, too. Mainly becasue I talk about his music virtually every day and damn, can he write good songs. Good songs he writes, he can write good songs. Boy, what a songwriter.
I have always found the whole overlooked or underrated thing strange when used for Mark Knopfler, because both of those words really have nothing to do with Mark, the fame thing yes, but I think those things apply more to Mike Oldfield, who was painfully shy and introverted even before Tubular Bells, after that album was a success it made him even worse, hence him then shutting himself away in a house on the England/Wales border to write and record his next album by himself!! He is almost never quoted as being in the great guitarists list, even though he clearly is, and one of the greatest writers and musicians ever, so, really Mark is very popular and well known, but, he makes an effort to stay as low key as possible, I think I would do the same if I was in his situation, even more so now than in the Dire Straits heydays on the 1980's when Brother in Arms made it hard for him to not be known everywhere. He has had all that adoration back then, and he made the most of it.
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And his work is still played today by other artist. Sam Fender starting his tour a few days ago with GH on the setlist.
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Bob Dylan is as popular as he ever was
Which isn't actually all that popular ;)
When you look at cold hard sales figures, Bob isn't really that popular. Culturally significant, critically lauded etc, yes, but the fact is that Bringing Down The Horse by The Wallflowers (Bob's son's Jakob's band) sold more copies than any Bob release ever did.
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DS is dead, and Mark wanted to fly under the radar. Like a silent fart. And now he's an old fart. An old silent fart. And you wonder why he's not in vogue?
Brilliant!
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By the way, lists are doo-doo.
They are by and large based on popularity. And moreover, music and creativity isn't a sport. It can't be measured, one player against another.
I HIGHLY doubt Mark cares about whether he's appeared on any 'best guitarist' top tens. He obviously didn't care DS were inducted into the 'hall of fame'.
Most of these things are marketing based.
Mark doesn't need to be affirmed as a great guitarist, or have Dire Straits awarded legendary status. The real reward is more tangible - a life long career in music, bank accounts bulging with funds, and a legacy of songs cherished by many.
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Bob Dylan is as popular as he ever was
Which isn't actually all that popular ;)
When you look at cold hard sales figures, Bob isn't really that popular. Culturally significant, critically lauded etc, yes, but the fact is that Bringing Down The Horse by The Wallflowers (Bob's son's Jakob's band) sold more copies than any Bob release ever did.
Bob has many albums in his catalogue which sold more than 1, 1,5 or even more than 2 Million copies. He has also albums that hardly sold 80.000, but the pure amount of albums, the long time span of his career and some real classics sum up to many million (I read 125 million) sold albums which indeed translates into "popular" from my point of view.
LE
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Bob Dylan is as popular as he ever was
Which isn't actually all that popular ;)
When you look at cold hard sales figures, Bob isn't really that popular. Culturally significant, critically lauded etc, yes, but the fact is that Bringing Down The Horse by The Wallflowers (Bob's son's Jakob's band) sold more copies than any Bob release ever did.
Bob has many albums in his catalogue which sold more than 1, 1,5 or even more than 2 Million copies. He has also albums that hardly sold 80.000, but the pure amount of albums, the long time span of his career and some real classics sum up to many million (I read 125 million) sold albums which indeed translates into "popular" from my point of view.
LE
also. the truly ENDLESS touring. i wonder if i would still go to so many MK shows as i have done would he have been as prolific as bob.
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Bob Dylan is as popular as he ever was
Which isn't actually all that popular ;)
When you look at cold hard sales figures, Bob isn't really that popular. Culturally significant, critically lauded etc, yes, but the fact is that Bringing Down The Horse by The Wallflowers (Bob's son's Jakob's band) sold more copies than any Bob release ever did.
Bob has many albums in his catalogue which sold more than 1, 1,5 or even more than 2 Million copies. He has also albums that hardly sold 80.000, but the pure amount of albums, the long time span of his career and some real classics sum up to many million (I read 125 million) sold albums which indeed translates into "popular" from my point of view.
LE
That suggests he has a RELATIVELY small but loyal fanbase.
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At the end of the day, Dylan is going to go down as one of the most important songwriters of the 20th Century.
Successful albums, unsuccessful albums etc I don't think an artist would care if they felt they'd made an historic impact on our culture, which Dylan definitely has.
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At the end of the day, Dylan is going to go down as one of the most important songwriters of the 20th Century.
Successful albums, unsuccessful albums etc I don't think an artist would care if they felt they'd made an historic impact on our culture, which Dylan definitely has.
Correct, but I think we are discussing this in the context of the viability of "popularity" and the commercial viability of releasing archive material.
Dyland has been releasing any old crap (along with a some true gems) through The Bootleg Series for nearly 35 years.
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I'm amazed also people feel so sorry for Mark and feel he hasn't been appreciated enough.
The guy never needs to work again. He's a multi-millionaire. He's widely regarded as a guitar god, even by many of his peers (Clapton etc).
I don't think that we are sorry for Mark.
He made a life as a musician.
Very, very sucessfull musician.
Worked hard and built an empire for his own.
Mark could be the coolest guy in town.
He have all the artistic and speech freedom.
Instead of it, looks like that he hates to be an artist.
Most of our complain about DS is that, it reached the very limit as a product. There is a lot of things that could be released that could made the fans happier. As Ed said, MK's music is 100% supported by his die-hard fans (or something like that)
Even John seems to be much polited about his storyes.
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At the end of the day, Dylan is going to go down as one of the most important songwriters of the 20th Century.
Successful albums, unsuccessful albums etc I don't think an artist would care if they felt they'd made an historic impact on our culture, which Dylan definitely has.
Correct, but I think we are discussing this in the context of the viability of "popularity" and the commercial viability of releasing archive material.
Dyland has been releasing any old crap (along with a some true gems) through The Bootleg Series for nearly 35 years.
Yes, and the ironic thing is, I bet Mark himself bought all those bootleg albums.
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Again, as usual a lot of speculation to support people's impression of MK.
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Again, as usual a lot of speculation to support people's impression of MK.
Indeed, as well as feeling sorry for him we also have one poster who thinks he was unlucky!
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Ha, Ha :thumbsup
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I'm amazed also people feel so sorry for Mark and feel he hasn't been appreciated enough.
The guy never needs to work again. He's a multi-millionaire. He's widely regarded as a guitar god, even by many of his peers (Clapton etc).
I don't think that we are sorry for Mark.
He made a life as a musician.
Very, very sucessfull musician.
Worked hard and built an empire for his own.
Mark could be the coolest guy in town.
He have all the artistic and speech freedom.
Instead of it, looks like that he hates to be an artist.
Most of our complain about DS is that, it reached the very limit as a product. There is a lot of things that could be released that could made the fans happier. As Ed said, MK's music is 100% supported by his die-hard fans (or something like that)
Even John seems to be much polited about his storyes.
To say that Mark hates to be an artist must be one of the most bizarre and insane statements I've ever read in this forum. And all because he doesn't want to release old Dire Straits crap any longer.
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Again, as usual a lot of speculation to support people's impression of MK.
Indeed, as well as feeling sorry for him we also have one poster who thinks he was unlucky!
Yeah, Mark got soooooo lucky when the worst tour, worst album (in his own words), divorce, death of his band and death of his father all happened within months from each other, and everybody and their mom thought he was an a-hole. Damn, I'd want to be in his shoes. So lucky. Boy, what a happy time. Give me two, give me two now. Obviously, "luck" is very subjective.
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Mark doesn't hate to be an artist. He just could do without the fame bit, which he has stated one million times.
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Again, as usual a lot of speculation to support people's impression of MK.
Indeed, as well as feeling sorry for him we also have one poster who thinks he was unlucky!
Yeah, Mark got soooooo lucky when the worst tour, worst album (in his own words), divorce, death of his band and death of his father all happened within months from each other, and everybody and their mom thought he was an a-hole. Damn, I'd want to be in his shoes. So lucky. Boy, what a happy time. Give me two, give me two now. Obviously, "luck" is very subjective.
None of the things you mention have anything to do with luck or lack of luck. Apart from the death of his father - which was sad, but something that everyone has to experience - everything else was the result of Mark's own choices. (OK, I'm speculating about the divorce, but anyone who's been or is married knows it takes two to tango ...)
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Again, as usual a lot of speculation to support people's impression of MK.
Indeed, as well as feeling sorry for him we also have one poster who thinks he was unlucky!
Yeah, Mark got soooooo lucky when the worst tour, worst album (in his own words), divorce, death of his band and death of his father all happened within months from each other, and everybody and their mom thought he was an a-hole. Damn, I'd want to be in his shoes. So lucky. Boy, what a happy time. Give me two, give me two now. Obviously, "luck" is very subjective.
Well, for all but one, maybe two of those situations, the old saying "you make your own luck" comes to mind.
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Yeah, Mark got soooooo lucky when the worst tour, worst album (in his own words), divorce, death of his band and death of his father all happened within months from each other, and everybody and their mom thought he was an a-hole.
Again of lot of that is very overdramatic and not factual.
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None of the things you mention have anything to do with luck or lack of luck. Apart from the death of his father - which was sad, but something that everyone has to experience - everything else was the result of Mark's own choices. (OK, I'm speculating about the divorce, but anyone who's been or is married knows it takes two to tango ...)
Yes, pretty much everything except the death of his father. It also wasn't 'the worst tour' or 'worst album'.
I'm sure Mark was very happy with OES, it just wasn't as big a hit as BIA. I'm sure Mark regretted agreeing to the tour once it became a reality, but at the same time it netted Mark and John millions and they walked out to 25,000-60,000 people screaming adulation most nights.
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Re the OES album, Mark said during interviews at the time that that album he actually could listen to, whereas the previous DS albums made him feel uncomfortable. I could imagine his opinion of it now would be very different.
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Not necessarily, It's still his favorite DS album.
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He reintroduced On Every Street on recent tours so presumably it wasn't too triggering.
Or maybe that was just the bad luck of hiring a saxophonist and needing songs that he could play.
(https://farm3.static.flickr.com/2797/4278879265_6bf095b650_o.png)
Poor MK, what an unlucky bastard. If he fell into a bucket of tits he'd come out sucking his thumb.
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Hahahaha!
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Or maybe that was just the bad luck of hiring a saxophonist and needing songs that he could play.
More like pedal steel.
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Am I the only one who finds CW's posts extremely annoying and evidently full of irritation towards the person the forum is dedicated to?
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Funny, Because I've actually been defending Mark for most of this thread.
Oh well ::)
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Am I the only one who finds CW's posts extremely annoying and evidently full of irritation towards the person the forum is dedicated to?
Don't leave reality spoils your dream
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Am I the only one who finds CW's posts extremely annoying and evidently full of irritation towards the person the forum is dedicated to?
Brief history lesson about how this forum came about if I may.
There used to be an official forum where even the slightest of criticism was not tolerated.
This forum was established to allow free and full discussion in a respectful way. I must say, I don’t think any of us ever imagined that an actual member of Dire Straits would join to talk about their real life experience being in the band for the best part of two years, or indeed the Dire Straits manager who was there from start to finish.
Rather than being annoyed, I’m extremely grateful for this input.
An actual member of Dire Straits answering questions? I’m tempted to say “you don’t know you’re born”…
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Am I the only one who finds CW's posts extremely annoying and evidently full of irritation towards the person the forum is dedicated to?
Obviously yes.
I guess you are just not used to a guy who delivers absolute clear thoughts and first hand knowledge, seldomly opinions, practically no trash talk and who is after the facts only. Humour might lacking (seemingly) which sometimes leads to a somewhat cold atmosphere around his posts, but if you are really honest to yourself you cannot nail a single post where Chris said something about MK that was not true. Worshipping is just not his thing, it seems. And why should he. However 90% of members come here to take a daily bath in a lot of hot MK love and feel comfortable among others to dive deep into praising our hero.
I for my part think that the forum has become much more relevant since Ed and Chris decided to post here on a more or less regular base.
I feel uncomfortable to write about a guy and knowing that he will read it. But I did it to point out the fact that I don't like it and to mirror the way you wrote. We better should talk WITH each other, not about others. Just my two cents.
LE
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Honest question; who are these 90% which you claim bath in hot MK love? I don't see a single one, and very, VERY seldom read anything even near that. None of us thinks MK behaved like an angel!! Geeez, can we move forward??!
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To go back to OES I remember that Mark objected songs on this album being too much cynical.
Recently Mark even said that MFN lyrics were kind of unfair toward working class people.
He could wrote a song about that on his next album.
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Honest question; who are these 90% which you claim bath in hot MK love? I don't see a single one, and very, VERY seldom read anything even near that. None of us thinks MK behaved like an angel!! Geeez, can we move forward??!
Do you want me to list the names here?
"Can we move forward". Nobody prevents you from posting more interesting stuff if you are bored by this.
LE
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To go back to OES I remember that Mark objected songs on this album being too much cynical.
Recently Mark even said that MFN lyrics were kind of unfair toward working class people.
He could wrote a song about that on his next album.
If I remember correctly, Mark said he wouldn't write Money For Nothing today.
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(thanks ds1984 :-) He probably had a lot of dark things to get off his chest, and felt he had to excuse it? Of course it is only my feelings and not facts, but for me the difference in mood from OES to Golden heart is huge. "Darling pretty" is love flowing over, you can't help but smile, it is such a happy song! It is said that bad things makes great songs, and I think that is the case for OES. "When it comes to you" was an instant favorite, same with You and your friend and also Iron hand.
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I really like 'When It Comes To You'.
I haven't said anything 'bad' about Mark in this thread.
When people started saying Dire Straits should release all the outtakes and unreleased video and music, I just explained why I thought mark hadn't already and probably wouldn't going forward.
It isn't anything negative about Mark. At the time of the OES tour I think he had already moved on from a 'band' and was eager to go solo.
He was excited to explore new avenues instead of playing the same songs that he'd been playing for 10-15 years.
If you find that so negative you can't take it....then I'm sorry.
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Chris, what do you think of Fade To Black? A very dark song, but I can't imagine it missing from the album on every street.
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I like it.
Tough one for me to play. I'm not great with brushes or a jazz feel.
I like a lot of the songs on OES, which is why I ended up doing the tour. The songs 'On Every Street', 'You And Your Friend' and 'Calling Elvis', plus WICTY.
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I like it.
Tough one for me to play. I'm not great with brushes or a jazz feel.
I like a lot of the songs on OES, which is why I ended up doing the tour. The songs 'On Every Street', 'You And Your Friend' and 'Calling Elvis', plus WICTY.
:thumbsup
Thanks for all your memories Chris. The bitter ones too.
I wrote once before but today again: never would I have thought that I would live to see the time when my questions would be answered by the DRUMMER of dIRE sTRAITS :)
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Like I said, I've moved on. I don't think about the bad things much any more, unless someone brings them up.
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None of the things you mention have anything to do with luck or lack of luck. Apart from the death of his father - which was sad, but something that everyone has to experience - everything else was the result of Mark's own choices. (OK, I'm speculating about the divorce, but anyone who's been or is married knows it takes two to tango ...)
Yes, pretty much everything except the death of his father. It also wasn't 'the worst tour' or 'worst album'.
I'm sure Mark was very happy with OES, it just wasn't as big a hit as BIA. I'm sure Mark regretted agreeing to the tour once it became a reality, but at the same time it netted Mark and John millions and they walked out to 25,000-60,000 people screaming adulation most nights.
But Ed said something along the lines of; Mark said: "I've made a crappy record". And it clearly wasn't as big as BIA. And the tour was "strange", to say the least. So I don't know, guys. I still think... Well, maybe it wasn't "unlucky", it's the wrong word for it, but it certainly wasn't the best time to be Mark Knopfler. Don't you think?
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Am I the only one who finds CW's posts extremely annoying and evidently full of irritation towards the person the forum is dedicated to?
Brief history lesson about how this forum came about if I may.
There used to be an official forum where even the slightest of criticism was not tolerated.
This forum was established to allow free and full discussion in a respectful way. I must say, I don’t think any of us ever imagined that an actual member of Dire Straits would join to talk about their real life experience being in the band for the best part of two years, or indeed the Dire Straits manager who was there from start to finish.
Rather than being annoyed, I’m extremely grateful for this input.
An actual member of Dire Straits answering questions? I’m tempted to say “you don’t know you’re born”…
AMIT is the best forum I have ever seen. I'm dead serious. The sheer fact it's still alive in the year 2025 alone deserves some kind of medal. Who on Earth uses forums nowadays anyway? Nobody! How it combines so many people from so many countries and walks of life, and many of the members have been there for a two-digit number of years, it seems.
I'm actually surprised not so many band members checked in because, seriously, it's the best source of information and fun in the MK world. Yes, discussions often go out of hand, but I've explained a million times the limitations of digital correspondence, and a lot of people on this forum are walking encyclopaedias when it comes to MK&DS.
Does anybody have problems with these statements? Let's respect each other and our unique contributions to this unique place. Now, I'm ready to take rotten tomatoes! :lol
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If so, why did he say in interviews that it was his favorite album. The only DS album he can listen to.
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If so, why did he say in interviews that it was his favorite album. The only DS album he can listen to.
Because he was promoting and marketing it at the time?
Did you expect him to say: "You know what, this album we've just made is absolutely shit. I can't listen to it."
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Am I the only one who finds CW's posts extremely annoying and evidently full of irritation towards the person the forum is dedicated to?
Brief history lesson about how this forum came about if I may.
There used to be an official forum where even the slightest of criticism was not tolerated.
This forum was established to allow free and full discussion in a respectful way. I must say, I don’t think any of us ever imagined that an actual member of Dire Straits would join to talk about their real life experience being in the band for the best part of two years, or indeed the Dire Straits manager who was there from start to finish.
Rather than being annoyed, I’m extremely grateful for this input.
An actual member of Dire Straits answering questions? I’m tempted to say “you don’t know you’re born”…
AMIT is the best forum I have ever seen. I'm dead serious. The sheer fact it's still alive in the year 2025 alone deserves some kind of medal. Who on Earth uses forums nowadays anyway? Nobody! How it combines so many people from so many countries and walks of life, and many of the members have been there for a two-digit number of years, it seems.
I'm actually surprised not so many band members checked in because, seriously, it's the best source of information and fun in the MK world. Yes, discussions often go out of hand, but I've explained a million times the limitations of digital correspondence, and a lot of people on this forum are walking encyclopaedias when it comes to MK&DS.
Does anybody have problems with these statements? Let's respect each other and our unique contributions to this unique place. Now, I'm ready to take rotten tomatoes! :lol
I joined the official forum in 2006 because, after reading the posts for a while, I really wanted to join in with the discussions and everyone seemed to be having a lot of fun. However, there were lots of drawbacks which became more and more apparent. One of these was that members were only allowed six posts a day which meant that lengthy discussions were just about impossible. Also emojis were frowned on and, as Dusty has said, criticism wasn't tolerated.
Eventually, mainly because of the restrictions, in 2008 AMIT was born and everything changed. We could discuss topics 'til the cows came home, as happens now. Also, we can have healthy discussions about MK/DS without posts being edited.
I have been a member since the beginning and even though there are inevitably ups and downs it has been a very happy time and I have had the pleasure of meeting lots of other members at MK concerts, some of whom are now friends. Even though I don't post as much these days, I do read the posts every day! :)
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On OES -
I never got the sense Mark was disappointed by it. It was the exact album he wanted to make at the time.
He absolutely LOVED working with Jeff Porcaro and Paul Franklin.
As I say, I think he had moved on from DS anyway, so wasn't too concerned about needing 'hit singles'.
I'm sure he looks back now, 35 years later, and can put the album in perspective alongside his other work, but I highly doubt he even dislikes it, let alone 'hates it'.
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Am I the only one who finds CW's posts extremely annoying and evidently full of irritation towards the person the forum is dedicated to?
Brief history lesson about how this forum came about if I may.
There used to be an official forum where even the slightest of criticism was not tolerated.
This forum was established to allow free and full discussion in a respectful way. I must say, I don’t think any of us ever imagined that an actual member of Dire Straits would join to talk about their real life experience being in the band for the best part of two years, or indeed the Dire Straits manager who was there from start to finish.
Rather than being annoyed, I’m extremely grateful for this input.
An actual member of Dire Straits answering questions? I’m tempted to say “you don’t know you’re born”…
AMIT is the best forum I have ever seen. I'm dead serious. The sheer fact it's still alive in the year 2025 alone deserves some kind of medal. Who on Earth uses forums nowadays anyway? Nobody! How it combines so many people from so many countries and walks of life, and many of the members have been there for a two-digit number of years, it seems.
I'm actually surprised not so many band members checked in because, seriously, it's the best source of information and fun in the MK world. Yes, discussions often go out of hand, but I've explained a million times the limitations of digital correspondence, and a lot of people on this forum are walking encyclopaedias when it comes to MK&DS.
Does anybody have problems with these statements? Let's respect each other and our unique contributions to this unique place. Now, I'm ready to take rotten tomatoes! :lol
I joined the official forum in 2006 because, after reading the posts for a while, I really wanted to join in with the discussions and everyone seemed to be having a lot of fun. However, there were lots of drawbacks which became more and more apparent. One of these was that members were only allowed six posts a day which meant that lengthy discussions were just about impossible. Also emojis were frowned on and, as Dusty has said, criticism wasn't tolerated.
Eventually, mainly because of the restrictions, in 2008 AMIT was born and everything changed. We could discuss topics 'til the cows came home, as happens now. Also, we can have healthy discussions about MK/DS without posts being edited.
I have been a member since the beginning and even though there are inevitably ups and downs it has been a very happy time and I have had the pleasure of meeting lots of other members at MK concerts, some of whom are now friends. Even though I don't post as much these days, I do read the posts every day! :)
Love you Val! Can you believe it will be 18 years in May since Hay on Wye? My then 8 week old baby son is now an 18 year old man, driving on the roads and off to university soon!
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Am I the only one who finds CW's posts extremely annoying and evidently full of irritation towards the person the forum is dedicated to?
Brief history lesson about how this forum came about if I may.
There used to be an official forum where even the slightest of criticism was not tolerated.
This forum was established to allow free and full discussion in a respectful way. I must say, I don’t think any of us ever imagined that an actual member of Dire Straits would join to talk about their real life experience being in the band for the best part of two years, or indeed the Dire Straits manager who was there from start to finish.
Rather than being annoyed, I’m extremely grateful for this input.
An actual member of Dire Straits answering questions? I’m tempted to say “you don’t know you’re born”…
AMIT is the best forum I have ever seen. I'm dead serious. The sheer fact it's still alive in the year 2025 alone deserves some kind of medal. Who on Earth uses forums nowadays anyway? Nobody! How it combines so many people from so many countries and walks of life, and many of the members have been there for a two-digit number of years, it seems.
I'm actually surprised not so many band members checked in because, seriously, it's the best source of information and fun in the MK world. Yes, discussions often go out of hand, but I've explained a million times the limitations of digital correspondence, and a lot of people on this forum are walking encyclopaedias when it comes to MK&DS.
Does anybody have problems with these statements? Let's respect each other and our unique contributions to this unique place. Now, I'm ready to take rotten tomatoes! :lol
I joined the official forum in 2006 because, after reading the posts for a while, I really wanted to join in with the discussions and everyone seemed to be having a lot of fun. However, there were lots of drawbacks which became more and more apparent. One of these was that members were only allowed six posts a day which meant that lengthy discussions were just about impossible. Also emojis were frowned on and, as Dusty has said, criticism wasn't tolerated.
Eventually, mainly because of the restrictions, in 2008 AMIT was born and everything changed. We could discuss topics 'til the cows came home, as happens now. Also, we can have healthy discussions about MK/DS without posts being edited.
I have been a member since the beginning and even though there are inevitably ups and downs it has been a very happy time and I have had the pleasure of meeting lots of other members at MK concerts, some of whom are now friends. Even though I don't post as much these days, I do read the posts every day! :)
Love you Val! Can you believe it will be 18 years in May since Hay on Wye? My then 8 week old baby son is now an 18 year old man, driving on the roads and off to university soon!
Wow! How time flies! :o
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(https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/ce/Have_bell_will_travel._Peter_Moore%2C_Town_Crier_to_the_Mayor_of_London_and_the_Greater_London_Authority_%E2%80%A6_promotions%2C_parades%2C_openings_etc._%281388747790%29.jpg)
Hear ye, hear ye! The following posts are from our friend Ed Bicknell. Thank you once again Ed for taking the time to share your insight and much more importantly, giving us many laughs.
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Once in a while I have a look to see what’s happening ( or not ) on AMIT.
The When It Comes To You thread running at the moment is truly mind boggling in parts so let's see If you can tolerate the reality instead of the dreamworld it seems to represent.
Some of you are not going to enjoy this, nothing personal…I don't know you but I just can't let this pass it’s so surreal.
WICTY Video….that smacks of desperation, really…...what is the point of that, a blank screen would be better. Or a shot of Danny Cumming’s guiro.
Pretty good quality sound.
I would have liked to play WICTY more often.
We played it on the first NHB’s tour and it disappeared during that never to reappear.
Maybe the crew member who was making up the set lists didn't like it and left it off.
It’s a great song to play because of the tempo and almost “swing” feel.
Pretty good quality sound.
I would have liked to play WICTY more often.
This song is a gem from the OES tour, I've never been able to understand why it wasn't played more often, in fact, it was probably played less than Fade to Black and the wonderful You and Your Friend.
Chris, by the way, can you believe this song was filmed, like the others in the On The Night video? It would be so nice to be able to watch the band perform on video.
Any show that was filmed was filmed in it’s entirety ( only those two venues on that tour ) .
No act tries to second guess how any song might turn out on any particular night ….that’s common sense.
So presumably the whole thing exists somewhere but…...WHERE?
Actually where is my ointment dispenser? Using my finger is so messy.
Especially there 🤞
The September shows in Nimes and Rotterdam. Not the first Nimes run.
Dear Chris, as we know, the OTN is made up of shows in Nimes and Rotterdam, both in May 1992, with a difference of 10 days between one city and the other. In the OTN video, we can see scenes from both places. See below the tracks contained in the On the Night show and which shows were chosen for the release on video, VHS and DVD.
1-Calling Elvis
2-Walk of life
3-Heavy fuel
4-Romeo and Juliet
5-The bug
6-Private investigations
7-Your latest trick
8-On every street
9-You and your friend
10-Money for nothing
11-Brothers in arms
12-Solid rock
13-Wild theme
Les Arenes, Nimes FRA 20. 05.92 [3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8]
Les Arenes, Nimes FRA 21. 05.92 [1]
Feyenoord, Rotterdam HOL 30.05.92 [,2,13]
Feyenoord, Rotterdam HOL 31.05.92 [9, 10, 11,12]
As you can see, most of the songs were taken from the show in Les Arenes, Nimes FRA 20. 05. 92*, seven songs (which increases the possibility that this show was filmed in full), followed by the show in Feyenoord, Rotterdam HOL 31. 05. 92 with six songs.
For this reason, I wonder, if there were cameras filming both shows, did they film the full shows and then choose which ones they would use for the release at the time? Or did they only film what they were going to use, so that this had already been decided before the shows took place? I think the second option is unlikely, I believe that all the shows chosen for an official release were recorded in audio and filmed in full, only more than two decades later were the songs that were left out released in audio, such as WICTY, Fade to Black, ITILTM, SOS... But, until then, no one wanted to invest time and money in publishing the videos. Just a hypothesis.
The tracks used were principally chosen by Mark with input from John and myself and whoever mixed them ( I've forgotten…Neil D and Guy?) but they were pretty obvious selections at the time.
Of course we didn't have some of you to consult on the content, that would have made all the difference even if you were toddlers then 👶.👼 <<— fan toddlers.
From memory they were ALL mixed at the same time including the 4 you mention …no one was going to revisit live tracks 20 years later, not even a month later.
I had renegotiated the record deal prior to the OES recording ( for the umpteenth time) and that was the “ trade ” the record co’s got.
The 29th september gig in Nîmes was aired live on french Canal+ channel.
I wonder if the band did record that show on multitrack or not as it was not used at all for OTN.
As often with Mark, this leg was featuring shorter setlist.
It was?
Don't recall ( and I’m surprised).
They own the tapes if they paid for them, not DS ( I don’t know HOW they transmitted that show technically).
That’s why it wasn’t used for OTN ( and anyway we didn't need given the May recordings).
No idea if they still exist, probably not.
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Oh yeah, May 1992. I got confused when writing my post.
I can't remember the actual details, but when you have a remote studio set up and have hired film crew etc, you are not going to just film and record certain songs or certain shows.
The idea is to film and record all the shows in one venue, then you can go through and pick out the best performances for each song.
The venues chosen were Nimes and Rotterdam.
Exactly, that's what I thought, all these shows were filmed in full too, a selection was made of what would be used for the official VHS release in 1993.
We always come back to the question of a few thousand euros... Where are the tapes (these videos)? The Live 78/92 box set was a precious gift, at least we have these wonderful new tracks to contemplate in audio, it's really incredible, a new experience to listen to OTN, as well as Alchemy and the completely unreleased Live at The Rainbow 79, ironically, both shows were filmed, but unfortunately we are not so lucky to have these recordings in full on video, that luck only for fans of other bands and artists. But, I am grateful for the aforementioned box set, better late than never.
This is where we walk up to the doors of DREAMLAND ( apologies in advance Brunno, I can smell the weed from here )
First para..correct as per Chris and I ( weed must have kicked in around now).
Do you honestly think that the need for “ a few thousand euros” is the reason all this stuff you seem to so desperately desire isn’t out there?
Really?
An aside ..when I say “ where are the tapes” it's because I can't recall who ended up with what, where stuff was stored ( that would usually be the Phonogram UK vaults ..a dark and mysterious place with inadequate lighting, unusual smells and a sticky floor), and more precisely, do they still exist given the thefts, chaotic record keeping, damage ( eg damp) and the Universal fire ( no one seems to know or is saying what was actually destroyed in that ) ?
The same applies to demos, paperwork, contracts, correspondence, all missing or destroyed ( ridiculous really).
So…it's not a case of investing money but it IS a case of investing the time and having the will to trawl thru all this stuff when it's long behind you, IF it can be located that is.
I’m amazed you got the live box you refer to ….I suspect that without Guy’s input and new technology that would never have surfaced.
And the discovery of the tapes of course , I wonder where they were and what else is there, probably some misfiled Status Quo tapes they are desperately looking for ?
But that's speculation..about Quo I mean .
It would be a significant expense to go back to the film and edit new songs from the raw footage, also the audio has to match the video, so the audio would also have to be remixed. Cost versus benefit? How many people would want to buy a second (expanded) version of the On The Night DVD?
Well Chris is right but see my point above.
He is completely correct re how many people would be interested or not.
In my opinion, very few. AMIT does NOT represent the general public/music fans for whom DS are ancient history if they’ve heard of them at all that is.
And what would be the problem with releasing the raw version so that fans, for example, could edit it at an amateur/pro level?
What is the advantage of keeping them locked away instead of releasing them in their current version, technically speaking?
I have no vested interest in this but I’m genuinely curious - what gives any of you the RIGHT to second guess Mark or ANY of the musicians/producers involved and say, well if you won’t do it, give us the tapes and WE will do it?
When is anybody qualified to dismiss the opinion of the artist and say that a tiny number of so - called “ fans " should be ENTITLED to mix/distribute that artist’s music ( leaving aside the numerous legal and copyright hurdles that would arise which none of you pursuing this notion seem to understand or have even considered eg that all record deals are exclusive ).
The creative process and the decision of what to release, what not to release and when, has NOTHING TO DO WITH YOU, whether mistaken or not.
It would be a significant expense to go back to the film and edit new songs from the raw footage, also the audio has to match the video, so the audio would also have to be remixed. Cost versus benefit? How many people would want to buy a second (expanded) version of the On The Night DVD?
I would defenitely buy an expanded version on dvd. I would love to have a completer version of this album. For example I am also a big fan of the remixed and edited version of Pink Floyds live album Delicate Sound of thunder of the boxset or 24 nights from Eric Clapton. Or how the Rolling Stones releases the vault concerts
Well I doubt you're going to get the chance.
What other acts do is irrelevant, that is their choice and none of the ones you mention has allowed fans to take over the creative process as far as I know.
Indeed I've never heard of any artist doing that ( any offers?) and any act that's been going for more than say 5 years will likely have loads of unreleased material, be it demoed/live/studio/mixed/unmixed, with vocals, without vocals and so on .
Why do you think that is?
BECAUSE THEY DECIDED NOT TO RELEASE IT, finished or unfinished or just changed their minds about putting it out.
That happens alot with all artists in my experience eg in DS case Private Dancer would qualify, the story of which you know by now.
And what would be the problem with releasing the raw version so that fans, for example, could edit it at an amateur/pro level?
What is the advantage of keeping them locked away instead of releasing them in their current version, technically speaking?
Exactly.
That was the best question, the most appropriate one could ask when faced with this! If there are recordings, what's the point in keeping them out of reach of fans? If this material were given to some people here on this forum (I include myself in this list), I guarantee that with a small investment, we would be able to do a good job of producing this recording and giving it the treatment it has always deserved, even if the cost were paid for by everyone involved. I know that this won't happen, but if someone who has access to this band's material made it available for fans to finance the production, even if on a small scale, I have no doubt that the overwhelming majority of the fans most present here on this forum and on other social networks would participate in a crowdfunding campaign. There are ways, but initiative and willingness on the part of those who could provide this raw material is what is lacking, unfortunately. I would love to put this proposal out there for anyone who could lead me to someone who could verify this material (Guy, John?). A collective campaign could be started to finance the production, all that was needed was access to the existing material. Now, if nothing exists, forget everything I wrote, but, seeing a release like the content of the live box set 78-92, having a gem like Rainbow 79... I still have hope that there is more material that could receive the treatment it deserves for the sake of Dire Straits' historical memory.
You have my answer.
OES and OTN fell into the period when for better or worse I was running things business and planning wise and Mark was running things creatively including his fashionable shirts 👔 and up to OES he, John and I were perfectly in step because we wore the same brown shoes, like these 👞 << — brown shoes.
We put in a huge effort to try and prevent the audience from being ripped off in both the pricing of tickets, merchandise, records/visual material ( in so far as we could control that) and the content of what was released eg by not duplicating some of the songs on Alchemy and OTN, by not releasing what we considered to be filler material eg the songs that didn’t get to appear on LOG which you have never heard except Tina’s version of PD.
Based on this part of the thread, it seems that the barrel has be scraped to the maximum because nothing that the artist/management decides is ever enough for a minuscule group of so called “ fans” and make no mistake, the vast number of the audience don’t care or even think about any of the following…. by example from some of the other threads ;
Demos? ( lost in a box somewhere gathering dust, never intended for release which is why they are called “ demos”.)
Communique outtakes ? ( there are none ) .
Rehearsal tapes ? ( there are none ).
The DS unfinished version of PD? ( in my storage somewhere ).
A load of live recordings where no one knows where the tapes are or who owns them ( if they haven’t been wiped that is eg by the TV companies who couldn’t care less about all this, the tape is more valuable if it can be used again ).
Reading this stream of unconsciousness, it feels like we were wasting our time exercising what I’ll call “ quality control ”, trying to be fair to the audience, trying to give them the best work we could, but we must have been doing something right otherwise this site wouldn’t exist.
Then there’s this stuff about “ people on this site…...for a small investment….the treatment it has always deserved…...”
Since when are YOU …...any of you subscribing to this idea…...qualified to step into the artist’s shoes, and it’s wholly irrelevant whether you have the required skills, so what ?
You even have the blind arrogance to suggest that this theoretical exercise be crowdfunded and that it only requires YOUR “ initiative and willingness” , because apparently those who created the work in the first place don’t have that motivation.
And what happens if you fuck it up, are you going to refund those monies…actually that’s irrelevant because in your deluded state anything you produce would by definition be “better” than Mark or the band could ever hope to achieve .
And after all that wasted debate you admit “ this won’t happen”, but to even FLOAT the idea is breathtaking in it's arrogance.
Then we come to your justification for this idiocy…...“ for the sake of DS historical memory ”.
So you think YOU are the arbiter, that YOU should be the one to decide what their musical legacy should be if any, that you and the other delusional folks on this site should be the ones to determine that and the creators should be sidelined because you know better than they do.
Am I pissed off ?
Is urine running down my leg and pooling on the floor?
YES, because you are rubbishing the talent, time and considerable effort we made to do our jobs as best we could and because apparently that wasn’t enough for you and some others on AMIT. ( I've no idea how many actually subscribe to this rubbish excepting those who’ve posted on the topic).
We were not making music for you, some of you weren’t even born back then!
And let’s not forget that the word “fan” is derived from “ fanatic” 👺 << — a fanatic. .
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What the record company will try to cash in for BIA 40th aniversary release?
I think the only correct approach is about market and money.
Is there a way that releasing the full Live in Wembley Arena being worthly profitable for Universal ?
The record co works with what they are given, surely you get that?
Why does the 40th anniversary need celebrating at all, that album was beaten to death eons ago and I don’t need reminding of my age 👨🦳<<- old incontinent rock manager.
They don’t own the tapes so no, anyway, where are the tapes?
And what would be the problem with releasing the raw version so that fans, for example, could edit it at an amateur/pro level?
What is the advantage of keeping them locked away instead of releasing them in their current version, technically speaking?
The first line is madness. No credible artists releases raw, unedited art for 'fans' to do their own thing with.
The advantage of 'locking them away' is that the artist is in control of their legacy. They recorded 6 to 8 shows and edited, finished the best performances for the fans. Why would anyone give you the less good stuff....seriously?
Exactly.
That was the best question, the most appropriate one could ask when faced with this! If there are recordings, what's the point in keeping them out of reach of fans? If this material were given to some people here on this forum (I include myself in this list), I guarantee that with a small investment, we would be able to do a good job of producing this recording and giving it the treatment it has always deserved, even if the cost were paid for by everyone involved.
And you could finish an unfinished Picasso at the same time. Really, I've seen some crazy stuff on this forum and this line of argument takes the biscuit.
The people who work on video and audio production have decades of experience. Anyone who gets to work on a product by a major artist like Dire Straits has years of experience at the highest level and a track record of delivering outstanding work. And you think Mark and John are going to release raw content for you to finish?????????????
For the record - I wouldn't put MYSELF in that frame, let alone an amateur fan.
Meanwhile, for other bands you can even find stuff like "Live At Wembley ‘86 - Bass Player's Camera Angle HD":
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bL8j3DC8M_g
What the record company will try to cash in for BIA 40th aniversary release?
I think the only correct approach is about market and money.
Is there a way that releasing the full Live in Wembley Arena being worthly profitable for Universal ?
I imagine Mark has final say on any such projects. What is HIS motivation to add to the On Every Street, On The Night film and audio.
I imagine it's not a particularly happy memory for him, not one of his proudest moments.
I think the recent box set is probably his last word on remixes, extra songs and re-releases.
Meanwhile, for other bands you can even find stuff like "Live At Wembley ‘86 - Bass Player's Camera Angle HD":
Where does that video come from?
Also, Queen are still en entity, playing shows, promoting their band and selling tickets. DS ended effectively in 1992. Where is the advantage for Mark and John going back to live video and editing a John Illsley camera angle?
Chris has eloquently reduced my indignation ( and irritation ) to a brief statement over 4 responses.
“ Takes the biscuit” is 100% correct, as is every thing else he says.
I suspect he is also correct re that Box set being the last word.
His comment re a JI “angle” is hilarious and I bet John would find it so..really funny, just daft, you might just as well film Chris Whiten's shapely ankle on the intro to Local Hero, resting, waiting silently for the thing to kick in.
That would be exciting.
Exactly.
That was the best question, the most appropriate one could ask when faced with this! If there are recordings, what's the point in keeping them out of reach of fans? If this material were given to some people here on this forum (I include myself in this list), I guarantee that with a small investment, we would be able to do a good job of producing this recording and giving it the treatment it has always deserved, even if the cost were paid for by everyone involved.
And you could finish an unfinished Picasso at the same time. Really, I've seen some crazy stuff on this forum and this line of argument takes the biscuit.
The people who work on video and audio production have decades of experience. Anyone who gets to work on a product by a major artist like Dire Straits has years of experience at the highest level and a track record of delivering outstanding work. And you think Mark and John are going to release raw content for you to finish?????????????
For the record - I wouldn't put MYSELF in that frame, let alone an amateur fan.
Jokes aside, fans often do a far better job than official parties. Take a look at the gaming industry, where releases by big corporations are often complete trash that then gets improved by fans, sometimes single-handedly. A good example from recent history: Grand Theft Auto: The Trilogy – The Definitive Edition. From 1998 Trespasser to this day, the gaming industry is constantly being improved by fans and their mods. Heck, even "Counter-Strike" originally was a mod. Don't underestimate the power of fans.
Personally, I lost any confidence in anything "official" as the quality of the product is often mediocre, so if it's official it doesn't automatically mean quality. Not to say live videos are bad though as USUALLY they are done great. What Brunno meant was, I think, is should these "raw" tracks be available somehow, official or not, fans could (and they would) combine raw tracks and audio into something pretty good. As an editor myself, I can say editing is not rocket science, and it would be fun to mess with OES tracks.
Irrelevant rubbish ..absolute drivel.
Arrogance that is quite startling.
If you think you are so expert at this, form a band, get out there, see how easy it all is, start your own fan site, see how many fanatics you can attract.
Hand over raw footage to fans for them to work on ... Get real, folks.
As for 'When it comes to you', such a depressing song. I used to love it 30 years ago, but now don't even think it's a good song. The live version is very dead, Mark's singing terrible and his guitar playing really nothing special.
Thank you Hunter for a much needed bit of common sense.
Jokes aside, fans often do a far better job than official parties.
I guess it depends how you quantify 'a better job'.
If you look at fans 'cover song' videos on Youtube both the audio and video quality are often terrible.
Hand over raw footage to fans for them to work on ... Get real, folks.
Musical quality also usually suck. But cover versions have nothing to do with editing a video. I'd say it's easier to combine a few professionally recorded and graded video tracks into a somewhat watchable material than spend 20 years mastering both your playing and recording skills. It's like semi-finished already, you only need to decide on angles and cuts, which could be done by a fan, believe me. Even in iMovie!
I just wanted to say, many fans are professionals in their respective fields. You can have professional video editors, sound engineers, DPs, musicians, lawyers or whoever else as your fans, and yes, sometimes they can do a better job, without getting paid and time constraints. I don't understand what's so controversial about this simple statement and why everybody gangs up on me again. Are all fans unemployed?
Indeed, nobody will ever "hand over" anything to fans or anyone else, we're discussing thin air here. Fans can't do anything because we don't have anything, and the artist can't do anything because they don't care, and all we get is this animation. And nothing goes south again, just a natural off-topic. I'll just drop here a masterpiece of an official video, and curious to see if the officialness of it makes it better:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e1g9eTjpZXU
One of my favourite examples of fans vs. professionals is this video right there (coincidentally, it's about Queen, hehe):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4dn8Fd0TYek
P.S. I'm sorry for going off-topic, but it's an interesting topic, and as usual, you either have fun "discussing" things on a discussion forum or force people like me into an argument... Then just shut down all the topics, open a new topic after the slightest movement towards another topic, or better yet — execute me because I'm talking too much and you don't agree with my opinion! :lol
Well a drop of reality.
No one is going to…is right.
Don't care? Maybe they actually care too much to release what they/MK consider less than 100% material or stuff that just doesn’t “fit” with the rest.
The rest is irrelevant, just filling space with no purpose.
And what would be the problem with releasing the raw version so that fans, for example, could edit it at an amateur/pro level?
What is the advantage of keeping them locked away instead of releasing them in their current version, technically speaking?
The first line is madness. No credible artists release raw, unedited art for 'fans' to do their own thing with.
The advantage of 'locking them away' is that the artist is in control of their legacy. They recorded 6 to 8 shows and edited, finishing the best performances for the fans. Why would anyone give you the least good stuff....seriously?
You are entering a territory of pure subjectivity at this point, what is good, what is bad for the fans is decided by the artist, ok, but, this is not always a guarantee that they are getting it right, OTN is an example, from the point of view of a release that intended to show a show from the band's last tour, in my opinion and that of many fans I know, it left a lot to be desired, in several aspects, I will only highlight one aspect here: the repertoire, there is not a show in the history of Dire Straits that has not played SOS, but, OTN was released like this, without SOS, (not to mention other classics like TOL and TR, both with new arrangements and format, different from how they were played in the 80s.) This is an example of a mistaken perspective on the part of whoever made this choice, more than 30 years later, they corrected this mistake with Box Live 78/92 and made the dream of many come true, especially the band's most assiduous fans, releasing OTN and Alchemy with all the songs that had been played, regardless of whether the production was criticized or not, we have the songs and that is the most important thing. Understand that the people who want this type of material from the band the most are people who are used to Bootlegs that are not always of good quality, but that is just one aspect of the product, generally the recording itself is worth it for the fan collector, imagine something like this Live 78/92 box, professionally produced?
Finally, Dire Straits' legacy is far from having received the due care it deserves, judging by the releases since the beginning, especially live ones, there are several gaps, (the Live 78/92 box is one of the few exceptions), we easily find anachronistic information on official channels, photos of the BIA tour 85/86 being released as from the OES tour 91/92, even John's book is full of errors and to make matters worse, MK doesn't care at all about DS's legacy, he put a damper on it when he was absent from the RRHF ceremony in 2018. None of this was by chance.
And what would be the problem with releasing the raw version so that fans, for example, could edit it at an amateur/pro level?
What is the advantage of keeping them locked away instead of releasing them in their current version, technically speaking?
The first line is madness. No credible artists releases raw, unedited art for 'fans' to do their own thing with.
The advantage of 'locking them away' is that the artist is in control of their legacy. They recorded 6 to 8 shows and edited, finished the best performances for the fans. Why would anyone give you the less good stuff....seriously?
And why do you think there are no qualified people here on the forum who can take the raw material and transform it into a commercial product? Especially with all the technology available today, unlike in the 90s... Even if there were no qualified people for this here on the forum, in the utopia I conjectured (utopia, because of course they wouldn't do that) they would ask for a qualified producer to produce the recording in a professional manner, all financed by fans interested in covering the costs, if that were the case, since no one who owns these recordings has ever been interested in releasing them.
I've noticed that you sometimes underestimate many of us here on the forum. I respect you a lot as a musician, your resume, especially for having participated in Dire Straits' last tour and having played with the Beatles. However, unlike everyone else here, you are not a fan of the band. Your perspective is different, very valid for contextualizing the historical period of 91/92. However, the perspective of a loyal fan of the band is a totally different universe from yours as a former member, and I understand that perfectly. I asked you a question on page 1 of this thread: did you believe that this song was filmed, like the others in the On The Night video? The idea here is to understand the reason why they didn't give us the complete product. There is nothing that justifies the absence of footage of these songs to this day (the same goes for Alchemy), unless it simply doesn't exist, someone deleted it, erased it, destroyed it, which would be a shame. Again, in the end, what is good, what is bad will always be subjective, we want the opportunity to see it so we can make our own judgment, just like those who were there in the audience, especially if this footage exists, we already have the audio, and it wasn't bad at all, on the contrary, it would have been very well received by fans upon its first release in 1993.
And what would be the problem with releasing the raw version so that fans, for example, could edit it at an amateur/pro level?
What is the advantage of keeping them locked away instead of releasing them in their current version, technically speaking?
The first line is madness. No credible artists releases raw, unedited art for 'fans' to do their own thing with.
The advantage of 'locking them away' is that the artist is in control of their legacy. They recorded 6 to 8 shows and edited, finished the best performances for the fans. Why would anyone give you the less good stuff....seriously?
And why do you think there are no qualified people here on the forum who can take the raw material and transform it into a commercial product? Especially with all the technology available today, unlike in the 90s... Even if there were no qualified people for this here on the forum, in the utopia I conjectured (utopia, because of course they wouldn't do that) they would ask for a qualified producer to produce the recording in a professional manner, all financed by fans interested in covering the costs, if that were the case, since no one who owns these recordings has ever been interested in releasing them.
I've noticed that you sometimes underestimate many of us here on the forum. I respect you a lot as a musician, your resume, especially for having participated in Dire Straits' last tour and having played with the Beatles. However, unlike everyone else here, you are not a fan of the band. Your perspective is different, very valid for contextualizing the historical period of 91/92. However, the perspective of a loyal fan of the band is a totally different universe from yours as a former member, and I understand that perfectly. I asked you a question on page 1 of this thread: did you believe that this song was filmed, like the others in the On The Night video? The idea here is to understand the reason why they didn't give us the complete product. There is nothing that justifies the absence of footage of these songs to this day (the same goes for Alchemy), unless it simply doesn't exist, someone deleted it, erased it, destroyed it, which would be a shame. Again, in the end, what is good, what is bad will always be subjective, we want the opportunity to see it so we can make our own judgment, just like those who were there in the audience, especially if this footage exists, we already have the audio, and it wasn't bad at all, on the contrary, it would have been very well received by fans upon its first release in 1993.
What the record company will try to cash in for BIA 40th aniversary release?
I think the only correct approach is about market and money.
Is there a way that releasing the full Live in Wembley Arena being worthly profitable for Universal ?
I imagine Mark has final say on any such projects. What is HIS motivation to add to the On Every Street, On The Night film and audio.
I imagine it's not a particularly happy memory for him, not one of his proudest moments.
I think the recent box set is probably his last word on remixes, extra songs and re-releases.
Personal problems are something that should never be above art. What you did was art and entertainment during the tour, you brought great joy to fans around the world during the OES tour 91/92. More than three decades have passed since this adventure. Both those who had the chance to see you back then and those who didn't would love to see Dire Straits' legacy receive less modest, fairer and more caring treatment. This idea that it's not a good memory for him is something that should be absent from the equation. All we want is to consume art, nothing more. It's the art that matters, it's the art that gives us good emotions. We want the recordings, the songs. This is the most basic thing any band leader should know. I've always thought of it as a two-way street. The artist produces art to be consumed by his audience, which supports his career. It's a shame that things aren't always like this, but they should be. Thank goodness we have great examples of preserving their legacy, the Beatles, Dylan, Hendrix, Pink Floyd... not all is lost in this sense, but Dire Straits still needs to improve a lot, who knows one day...
Exactly.
That was the best question, the most appropriate one could ask when faced with this! If there are recordings, what's the point in keeping them out of reach of fans? If this material were given to some people here on this forum (I include myself in this list), I guarantee that with a small investment, we would be able to do a good job of producing this recording and giving it the treatment it has always deserved, even if the cost were paid for by everyone involved.
And you could finish an unfinished Picasso at the same time. Really, I've seen some crazy stuff on this forum and this line of argument takes the biscuit.
The people who work on video and audio production have decades of experience. Anyone who gets to work on a product by a major artist like Dire Straits has years of experience at the highest level and a track record of delivering outstanding work. And you think Mark and John are going to release raw content for you to finish?????????????
For the record - I wouldn't put MYSELF in that frame, let alone an amateur fan.
Jokes aside, fans often do a far better job than official parties. Take a look at the gaming industry, where releases by big corporations are often complete trash that then gets improved by fans, sometimes single-handedly. A good example from recent history: Grand Theft Auto: The Trilogy – The Definitive Edition. From 1998 Trespasser to this day, the gaming industry is constantly being improved by fans and their mods. Heck, even "Counter-Strike" originally was a mod. Don't underestimate the power of fans.
Personally, I lost any confidence in anything "official" as the quality of the product is often mediocre, so if it's official it doesn't automatically mean quality. Not to say live videos are bad though as USUALLY they are done great. What Brunno meant was, I think, is should these "raw" tracks be available somehow, official or not, fans could (and they would) combine raw tracks and audio into something pretty good. As an editor myself, I can say editing is not rocket science, and it would be fun to mess with OES tracks.
Exactly that, quizzaciously, that's my perspective, it's blatant that many official releases are mediocre, especially from Dire Straits. (Starting in 1978, the video for Sultans of Swing has a cut when the climax of the song begins, its final solo. Do you want something more mediocre than that, because it doesn't stop there.)
The treatment given to Dire Straits releases is historically modest, often bordering on mediocrity, and lately with the presence of "nickel hunting", the tenth edition of the album BIA, look at the way MK's solo albums have been released since 2009, you have to be willing to spend a lot of money to get what the record company imposes, this latest release is... discouraging, the marketing team is a disaster, oddly enough, it shows amateurism, look at the photos and information recently posted on the official channels, even the date of the videos...
Here we go again…..you know better than the artist…..Brunno please can I get whatever it is you are smoking?
People "getting it wrong" is entirely subjective and in the end the audience decides from a choice of one whether to buy or not.
I’ve dealt with why SOS wasn’t included.
You do realise that 99% of listeners don't care if the arrangements change, develop, get longer ( nothing ever got shorter), they just listen to the song/performance overall and either like it or don’t, and it wasn’t like Alchemy had been deleted.
I've told you who made the choices.
I’m sorry they didn’t suit you, it sold well over 5 million physical sales so a few hardy souls were happy with the track listing that was clear on all the packaging, nobody forced them to buy it. The band played 211 shows on that tour, would you have liked us to release 211 live versions of SOS? Or TR? Or Heavy Fuel?
Because that’s what you’re implying.
Most folks are not “ fan collectors ”, they are just ordinary people who liked the hit singles and bought the album or DVD, played it 5 times and put it on the shelf to make way for the next Coldplay album, the DS of now.
Maybe you are right re the legacy bit ( that is SO pompous) but I quit in 2000 and up to then I did the best job I could with what I had to work with which overall was tremendous, magical, none of us were thinking about legacy back then, we were thinking about tomorrow.
I never heard that word mentioned once.
We couldn’t foretell the future, especially the technological future, and I had no idea that 25 years on I’d be debating this with folks who consider they have a better take on things than the person they started this site for…..oh, and by the way, the legacy you speak of had NOTHING to do with the ROH shit show, nothing. ZERO, though the consequence may have unintentionally been as you say.
Your next post is barely worth addressing…...irrelevant, unrealistic, silly.
As I’ve said, you don’t have the right to know why DS OR ANY ARTIST releases what they release and doesn’t release what they don’t.
It has nothing to do with you, they don't have to justify it .
THAT’S what pisses me off about this thread and is why I've spent this time trying to give you and others like you a dose of reality.
Why on earth do you think the artist owes you an explanation of why they didn’t give you the "complete product” ?
Why? Are you special in some way?
Because you’re on this site?
I'm fascinated as to how you get to that position, and what justifies the "absence of footage" is the artist’s choice, it’s not your choice for fux sake.
The complete product IS what they initially release, whoever it is, at that moment.
IF later on they release extra stuff, then that becomes the complete product.
If they don’t it remains the original release eg LOG which I can assure you is the great album it is because the fillers were dumped .
If you think this about the legacy issue, contact Crockford, I’m sure he’d love to hear from you
🕺 <<—Crockford at the Purple Pussy Disco in Tottenham Mews. .
After all “personal problems should never be above art” even if they are the impetus that creates the art in the first place eg R and J.
What arrogant nonsense that is, mind boggling in it’s lack of humanity ( I don’t think you really believe that ).
If it’s not art and disposable pop does that mean personal problems are ok to take precedence?
You are entering a territory of pure subjectivity at this point, what is good, what is bad for the fans is decided by the artist, ok, but,
But nothing.... Like it or not, artists in ALL disciplines have been the final word on what is published.
You don't get to re-edit Citizen Kane, remix Rumours, or touch up the Mona Lisa.
This idea that it's not a good memory for him is something that should be absent from the equation.
I wasn't really talking about personal issues, but anyway you can't ask people NOT to be human with their decision making. The OES album was a disappointment after BIA. No real hits, the album itself didn't sell as well. Critics said it wasn't as good an album as previous releases. The tour didn't match BIA in terms of records broken, Live Aid in the afternoon, sold out show at Wembley in the evening etc...
So as an artist what is the motivation to revisit one of your less successful periods?
The treatment given to Dire Straits releases is historically modest, often bordering on mediocrity, and lately with the presence of "nickel hunting", the tenth edition of the album BIA, look at the way MK's solo albums have been released since 2009, you have to be willing to spend a lot of money to get what the record company imposes, this latest release is... discouraging, the marketing team is a disaster, oddly enough, it shows amateurism, look at the photos and information recently posted on the official channels, even the date of the videos...
And yet you are a hardcore fan?? ??
Being a smash hit artist, multi-millionaire and powerful entity almost as the sole controller of Dire Straits and his solo career, you can't blame a record company for the last 20 years of releases. mark has signed off on everything, from solo albums, to re-issues to photo sessions.
Correct as usual except I wouldn’t say OES didn’t sell, it did, over 12 million physical which is huge, but it wasn’t “hot” as I've explained before.
BIG difference.
BIA was on fire a bit like a few of the sphincters after the usual Friday curries the caterers invented , much beloved by Adrian Fitzpatrick, monitor mixer.
42 is 100% correct.
The way you see record companies is way off the mark.
Disposable art said Ed.
Live video editing or event audio editing is not painting. One is mostly technicall skill, the other one is Art.
And fans can only control what Mark and the record company are ready to allow them (almost nothing).
For the umpteenth time the record co’s work with what they are given but good point, though to me it is and always will be disposable pop and that is NOT to devalue it in the mind of the listener. I absolutely accept that’s just my opinion but it’s correct of course.
But nothing.... Like it or not, artists in ALL disciplines have been the final word on what is published.
Chris I am sorry to say you that you are wrong.
The producer, the one who is putting the money on the table has the final word in many cases unlike the painter.
The artist is not always the king.
I don't remember which big star just said "I recorded this album only for the money..."
Being king or queen in pop music depends on how commercially successful you are ( preferably on a consistent basis) .
Just about any artist would say that especially these days.
Chris I am sorry to say you that you are wrong.
The producer, the one who is putting the money has also the final word in many case.
Don't you think that is Mark since the end of Dire Straits? I'm not sure even how much a record label was involved in 'On Every Street'. If you watch all the background videos online, it seems like Mark pretty much called the shots on what was recorded, where it was recorded and who was involved.
Since he went solo he's worked in his own, highly sophisticated recording studio. Most artists like him make the record they want to make, then license it to a label to release. Mark also puts out stuff on his own website.
That's what happens when you have hit after hit and become a multi-millionaire, you gain the ability to control everything yourself, you no longer need a label. mark doesn't even have a regular manager any more....likewise Paul McCartney.
Chris I am sorry to say you that you are wrong.
The producer, the one who is putting the money has also the final word in many case.
Don't you think that is Mark since the end of Dire Straits? I'm not sure even how much a record label was involved in 'On Every Street'. If you watch all the background videos online, it seems like Mark pretty much called the shots on what was recorded, where it was recorded and who was involved.
Since he went solo he's worked in his own, highly sophisticated recording studio. Most artists like him make the record they want to make, then license it to a label to release. Mark also puts out stuff on his own website.
That's what happens when you have hit after hit and become a multi-millionaire, you gain the ability to control everything yourself, you no longer need a label. mark doesn't even have a regular manager any more....likewise Paul McCartney.
Read again to what I was anwering :
But nothing.... Like it or not, artists in ALL disciplines have been the final word on what is published.
That is exactly my point, Mark Knopfler in this case is the one who put the money, he is the producer.
And I stand on my point that it is inacurate to write sentence such as "artists in ALL disciplines have been the final word on what is published'".
How many film directors in the US would have liked you to be true !!!
Chris I am sorry to say you that you are wrong.
The producer, the one who is putting the money has also the final word in many case.
Don't you think that is Mark since the end of Dire Straits? I'm not sure even how much a record label was involved in 'On Every Street'. If you watch all the background videos online, it seems like Mark pretty much called the shots on what was recorded, where it was recorded and who was involved.
Since he went solo he's worked in his own, highly sophisticated recording studio. Most artists like him make the record they want to make, then license it to a label to release. Mark also puts out stuff on his own website.
That's what happens when you have hit after hit and become a multi-millionaire, you gain the ability to control everything yourself, you no longer need a label. mark doesn't even have a regular manager any more....likewise Paul McCartney.
Read again to what I was anwering :
But nothing.... Like it or not, artists in ALL disciplines have been the final word on what is published.
That is exactly my point, Mark Knopfler in this case is the one who put the money, he is the producer.
And I stand on my point that it is inacurate to write sentence such as "artists in ALL disciplines have been the final word on what is published'".
How many film directors in the US would have liked you to be true !!!
It was obviously a generalisation, but it is generally true.
The label isn't in the studio telling you what is a good take or not, making you keep a guitar solo you'd rather redo.
The label isn't writing the songs. 99% of the time the label isn't controlling which songs go on a live album and which get ignored.
After Brothers In Arms I think ~Mark pretty much controlled all decisions.
He shocked everyone around him by deciding to make another DS album. The label and management allowed the album to be released with no obvious hit song on it. The tour was all mark's ides, including the band members, the length of the tour. No one outside of Mark decided which songs we would play on the tour, even which songs we would play each show.
Just to clarify, after the first album the rec co’s were not involved in any way with anything subsequent to that.
Not content, mixes, producers, artwork, videos, compilations.
NOTHING except choice of singles (except PI ) which in turn determined the videos , and obviously manufacturing, distribution, marketing, promotion, advertising, TV campaigns (then), which is what record companies DO.
Same with McCartney or anyone who “ buys” themselves out of the rec co orbit eg Adele, Queen, Elton, YE. Mustn’t forget YE.
Or Sir Francis DRAKE one of history’s greatest rappers.
Movies generally cost millions to make ( as Chris has correctly said ) .
Albums can be recorded for chump change, you don’t need a studio or a bank.
Mark “ controlled ” creative decisions way before BIA, or I did eg licensing, and we worked 100% harmoniously up to OES .
I wouldn’t say “ allowed”….that's what we had to work with and by that point our relationship had changed ( after BIA ).
Example, there was a big disagreement about the CE video which I thought was mediocre but after spending £100,000 ( not the band ) we couldn’t change it and I lost that one!
Lesson…do not leave your artist alone in a bar at 2 am with a video director and a bottle of Chateau Rothschild Gnat’s Piss 1990 🍷= 🤮
It was obviously a generalisation, but it is generally true.
We won't agree about the "generally true" part.
The label isn't in the studio telling you what is a good take or not, making you keep a guitar solo you'd rather redo.
This is the job of the record producer. If as an artist you have signed a 360 deal artist contract with a label, the producer in working for the lablel and represent the label.
The label isn't writing the songs.
This is not the job of the label
99% of the time the label isn't controlling which songs go on a live album and which get ignored.
I don't see much difference between a studio and a live album apart that most of the time a live album used not to sell as well as a studio album.
Again if you have signed a 360 deal artist contract with the label...
After Brothers In Arms I think ~Mark pretty much controlled all decisions.
He shocked everyone around him by deciding to make another DS album. The label and management allowed the album to be released with no obvious hit song on it. The tour was all mark's ides, including the band members, the length of the tour. No one outside of Mark decided which songs we would play on the tour, even which songs we would play each show.
I agree with you on that, as Mark owned the money he got freedom and powership.
Regarding Calling Elvis, it was a hit as the band had before BIA.
The problem was not OES but BIA.
BIA was a lucky accident.
No artist represented by me ever entered into a 360 deal which I consider to be draconian, wholly unfair and probably unenforceable., but nobody cares what I think anymore, even I don’t care.
That was never a factor and thus irrelevant here.
Interesting point re BIA but it was what it was ( and hardly an accident....it was a case of perfect alignment as my GF calls “luck” which is quite close to “fuck” , only just noticed that )
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"He shocked everyone around him by deciding to make another DS album"
Why was it shocking? It was a great event in the media. DS is back after 6 years! But I'm definitely wrong again. However, I will stick to my memories :)
How many film directors in the US would have liked you to be true !!!
I read it the first time.
Hollywood is just about the only exception, where you have to raise millions of investment dollars just to cast a movie. And actually I think it's a minority of incidents where the4 director is unhappy with the Final Cut.
In art, photography, writing, the creative process is pretty much 100% controlled by the artist. People are always scrapping their work rather than release something they can't stand behind.
In music people mostly make their records in home studios, without the label meddling.
In the CONTEXT of this discussion, people were blaming 'labels' and 'producers' for the lack of Dire Straits and Mark Knopfler unreleased material.
So in this CONTEXT, the releases would be completely under the control of Mark and John, mostly Mark.
Try bringing up your film directors again - it's basically the exception to what we are actually discussing.
I don't see much difference between a studio and a live album apart that most of the time a live album used not to sell as well as a studio album.
No idea what you are talking about.
In the studio you have a set number of songs, maybe 12. You work on each song until you are happy with it (multiple takes).
Live you have 25+ songs, they are all a single take where you really need a nine piece band to all play it well in order to choose it. Then you have multiple shows. So you have hours of material and dozens of songs to choose from. Completely unlike making a studio album.
Regarding Calling Elvis, it was a hit as the band had before BIA.
The problem was not OES but BIA.
BIA was a lucky accident.
Calling Elvis really wasn't a hit. There was nothing on OES to match Brothers In Arms and Money For Nothing (the songs).
[/quote]
I don't see much difference between a studio and a live album apart that most of the time a live album used not to sell as well as a studio album.
No idea what you are talking about.
In the studio you have a set number of songs, maybe 12. You work on each song until you are happy with it (multiple takes).
Live you have 25+ songs, they are all a single take where you really need a nine piece band to all play it well in order to choose it. Then you have multiple shows. So you have hours of material and dozens of songs to choose from. Completely unlike making a studio album.
Regarding Calling Elvis, it was a hit as the band had before BIA.
The problem was not OES but BIA.
BIA was a lucky accident.
Calling Elvis really wasn't a hit. There was nothing on OES to match Brothers In Arms and Money For Nothing (the songs).
[/quote]
I don't see much difference between a studio and a live album apart that most of the time a live album used not to sell as well as a studio album.
No idea what you are talking about.
In the studio you have a set number of songs, maybe 12. You work on each song until you are happy with it (multiple takes).
Live you have 25+ songs, they are all a single take where you really need a nine piece band to all play it well in order to choose it. Then you have multiple shows. So you have hours of material and dozens of songs to choose from. Completely unlike making a studio album.
Regarding Calling Elvis, it was a hit as the band had before BIA.
The problem was not OES but BIA.
BIA was a lucky accident.
Calling Elvis really wasn't a hit. There was nothing on OES to match Brothers In Arms and Money For Nothing (the songs).
[/quote]
Why was it shocking?
because no one involved expected it. John was shocked, Ed Bicknell was shocked. Everyone felt mark had changed and moved on since the end of the BIA tour and several years had passed. NO ONE expected another DS album, let alone a lengthy world tour.
Maybe it wasn't about the hits. Times had changed. Dire Straits in the early 90s were different too. But the level of the On Every Street album was high. For me:)
Why was it shocking?
because no one involved expected it. John was shocked, Ed Bicknell was shocked. Everyone felt mark had changed and moved on since the end of the BIA tour and several years had passed. NO ONE expected another DS album, let alone a lengthy world tour.
Chris do you think the last album and tour should have happened sooner?
I think it would have been logical to follow up the huge success of BIA with a new album and tour within two years, yes.
Regarding unreleased classics - I'm sure Sultans Of Swing from the '92 tour sounded pretty terrible.
The drum sound isn't great on the Basel video. And yes it's a thrash fest. Something I regret but also a product of circumstances.
We had a B kit, which probably didn't sound as nice as my main kit. I was also set up right in front of Mark's very loud guitar speakers. I couldn't really hear anything but guitar, which made me thrash the kit and over play. Mark's guitar would have been loud in all the drum mics too.
With modern digital technology you could probably rescue it - which is I'm sure why Guy started to work on all those old recordings for the box set.
It was surprising ( not shocking , that would be the REAL reason once revealed ) given the band’s history up to the Mandela gig in 88.
I thought that was it .
Sadly it wasn’t as I have laid out in detail previously ( ditto Chris, Joop and just about everyone involved if you asked them) .
I realise many reading this don’t agree, especially those who only saw that tour.
The media is no judge of anything, they print what sells.
All Chris’ comments are correct ( and a bit of an eye opener for me re the kits etc)
The treatment given to Dire Straits releases is historically modest, often bordering on mediocrity, and lately with the presence of "nickel hunting", the tenth edition of the album BIA, look at the way MK's solo albums have been released since 2009, you have to be willing to spend a lot of money to get what the record company imposes, this latest release is... discouraging, the marketing team is a disaster, oddly enough, it shows amateurism, look at the photos and information recently posted on the official channels, even the date of the videos...
And yet you are a hardcore fan?? ??
Being a smash hit artist, multi-millionaire and powerful entity almost as the sole controller of Dire Straits and his solo career, you can't blame a record company for the last 20 years of releases. mark has signed off on everything, from solo albums, to re-issues to photo sessions.
Yes, like everything in life there are two sides, this is the side that for me leaves something to be desired, that fails when it comes to DS and MK and I'm not just blaming the record company, it's clear that for decades MK has had control over what he wants to do with his work, for me it's clear that all of this is the consequence of a set of decisions that go through the Marketing team, record company, producer and of course, the greatest weight of the decision is MK's. And yet, I am a hardcore fan, because when I weigh it up, the songs he made with Dire Straits are greater than these modest release choice policies that I highlighted, the albums are incredible, the songs are wonderful, I love every tour the band did during their time of activity and I am deeply connected to their entire work like nothing else in this world, simply like that, and yet, this does not make me a blind and alienated fan, incapable of self-criticism of the band and artists that I admire the most, far from it, the fact of knowing my research object naturally leads me to realize where the gaps are, at least from my point of view. If everyone involved in the production of the DS release had a bolder and less modest outlook, we would have at some point had videos of these songs that were left out of Alchemy and On The Night. The Live 78/92 box set was a very positive sign, hopefully it sold well to encourage them to produce more material like this instead of releasing yet another version of the BIA album that would be more of the same.
Brunno, you are obviously an intelligent guy, why are you writing this nonsense?
Haven't you read what I've said previously?
I doubt M EVER did anything based on a “set of decisions” , the marketing, promotion, record co and so on you mention, he certainly didn’t on my watch, that was part of my job and to make him and John aware of the likely consequences if we did X or Y.
They both followed my advice 100% until post BIA/Mandela and when they didn’t which led to 🤐 😪😰😱 …...
I kept the band away from rec co people especially senior management since they were so dull ( the exceptions being Ramon Lopez and Maurice Oberstein ).
Of course we all played the game as the game was back then eg except for PI I let the record co's pick the singles since they had to work them, but it was never the “ consequence” of what you think.
Sorry we failed you ( I'm not being sarcastic).
From what I know I think all this re-releasing, hits compilations etc is just a commercial exercise that's been overdone but I don’t know what they sell, rather less than you might imagine I’m guessing.
Personal view but I wouldn’t have done it to that extent.
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I wonder how much UNinvolved Mark was in the live boxset release.
I do my own speculation on the matter.
Mark love his fans - he has a true attention for us even if we are always asking for more and better.
Who know who asked him to give his blessing on issuing a live boxset featuring unreleased material and he instantly agreed.
So no other than Guy was hired for the project, but as it is a budget release, he was only given very limited time to get the job done*.
Mark then gave his approval on the final new mixes and proposed Guy to share a drink at the local pub...
* unfotunately Guy ran out of credits while working on the transition between PB and TOL
Well I wasn’t there but speculating I’d say not alot.
Who initiated all that I’ve no idea, it’s almost like someone tripped over the tapes lying on that sticky floor. ( I’m laughing ) .
Very observant and funny post.
It would be a significant expense to go back to the film and edit new songs from the raw footage, also the audio has to match the video, so the audio would also have to be remixed. Cost versus benefit? How many people would want to buy a second (expanded) version of the On The Night DVD?
MK can sell thousands of those 100 euros special boxes for new albums.
Imho an On The Night box would very easily outsell.
I don't think so.
It would be a significant expense to go back to the film and edit new songs from the raw footage, also the audio has to match the video, so the audio would also have to be remixed. Cost versus benefit? How many people would want to buy a second (expanded) version of the On The Night DVD?
MK can sell thousands of those 100 euros special boxes for new albums.
Imho an On The Night box would very easily outsell.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but was On The Night shot digitally? If so, it'll never be updated. Also, I remember Guy said the multitracks for it are either hard to find, or even worse, it only exists in the stereo mixdown form. So if it's all true, technically speaking, you can barely find things to improve in this DVD and it exists in its final form already.
The new 2023 mix sounds exactly like the original anyway. And the picture... It's still in glorious 1x1 pixels high definition to this day.
The expanded and remastered version sure could be successful as it's 1) desirable, 2) coming from dIRE sTRAITS (not every day you see something new from this band) and not solo Knopfler, 3) would neatly fall into the nostalgia wave for many people who saw the band live 30 years ago. Releasing it 10 years ago would be even better though :lol
But overall, honestly, as someone who dreamed of a proper remaster of On The Night for over a decade, I can say forget about it.
The treatment given to Dire Straits releases is historically modest, often bordering on mediocrity, and lately with the presence of "nickel hunting", the tenth edition of the album BIA, look at the way MK's solo albums have been released since 2009, you have to be willing to spend a lot of money to get what the record company imposes, this latest release is... discouraging, the marketing team is a disaster, oddly enough, it shows amateurism, look at the photos and information recently posted on the official channels, even the date of the videos...
And yet you are a hardcore fan?? ??
Being a smash hit artist, multi-millionaire and powerful entity almost as the sole controller of Dire Straits and his solo career, you can't blame a record company for the last 20 years of releases. mark has signed off on everything, from solo albums, to re-issues to photo sessions.
Yes, like everything in life there are two sides, this is the side that for me leaves something to be desired, that fails when it comes to DS and MK and I'm not just blaming the record company, it's clear that for decades MK has had control over what he wants to do with his work, for me it's clear that all of this is the consequence of a set of decisions that go through the Marketing team, record company, producer and of course, the greatest weight of the decision is MK's. And yet, I am a hardcore fan, because when I weigh it up, the songs he made with Dire Straits are greater than these modest release choice policies that I highlighted, the albums are incredible, the songs are wonderful, I love every tour the band did during their time of activity and I am deeply connected to their entire work like nothing else in this world, simply like that, and yet, this does not make me a blind and alienated fan, incapable of self-criticism of the band and artists that I admire the most, far from it, the fact of knowing my research object naturally leads me to realize where the gaps are, at least from my point of view. If everyone involved in the production of the DS release had a bolder and less modest outlook, we would have at some point had videos of these songs that were left out of Alchemy and On The Night. The Live 78/92 box set was a very positive sign, hopefully it sold well to encourage them to produce more material like this instead of releasing yet another version of the BIA album that would be more of the same.
Totally agree about two sides... Being a fan of MK is definitely a love–hate relationship, that's why you see so much of "hate" on this forum. A lot of love too. But it's not hate really, it's simply the annoyance from observing things that could be done vs. what was done. You don't even need to be a hardcore fan, a child can sometimes find how to improve things.
And remember we don't live in the vacuum and everybody can see how the legacy can be treated, how many bonus tracks, unreleased materials and remastered versions can see the light of day, crazy ideas from live multi-angle features from 2003 to instrumental versions of songs, updated visuals, demos, interviews, you name it. We're lucky to get at least something.
The treatment given to Dire Straits releases is historically modest, often bordering on mediocrity, and lately with the presence of "nickel hunting", the tenth edition of the album BIA, look at the way MK's solo albums have been released since 2009, you have to be willing to spend a lot of money to get what the record company imposes, this latest release is... discouraging, the marketing team is a disaster, oddly enough, it shows amateurism, look at the photos and information recently posted on the official channels, even the date of the videos...
And yet you are a hardcore fan?? ??
Being a smash hit artist, multi-millionaire and powerful entity almost as the sole controller of Dire Straits and his solo career, you can't blame a record company for the last 20 years of releases. mark has signed off on everything, from solo albums, to re-issues to photo sessions.
Yes, like everything in life there are two sides, this is the side that for me leaves something to be desired, that fails when it comes to DS and MK and I'm not just blaming the record company, it's clear that for decades MK has had control over what he wants to do with his work, for me it's clear that all of this is the consequence of a set of decisions that go through the Marketing team, record company, producer and of course, the greatest weight of the decision is MK's. And yet, I am a hardcore fan, because when I weigh it up, the songs he made with Dire Straits are greater than these modest release choice policies that I highlighted, the albums are incredible, the songs are wonderful, I love every tour the band did during their time of activity and I am deeply connected to their entire work like nothing else in this world, simply like that, and yet, this does not make me a blind and alienated fan, incapable of self-criticism of the band and artists that I admire the most, far from it, the fact of knowing my research object naturally leads me to realize where the gaps are, at least from my point of view. If everyone involved in the production of the DS release had a bolder and less modest outlook, we would have at some point had videos of these songs that were left out of Alchemy and On The Night. The Live 78/92 box set was a very positive sign, hopefully it sold well to encourage them to produce more material like this instead of releasing yet another version of the BIA album that would be more of the same.
Totally agree about two sides... Being a fan of MK is definitely a love–hate relationship, that's why you see so much of "hate" on this forum. A lot of love too. But it's not hate really, it's simply the annoyance from observing things that could be done vs. what was done. You don't even need to be a hardcore fan, a child can sometimes find how to improve things.
And remember we don't live in the vacuum and everybody can see how the legacy can be treated, how many bonus tracks, unreleased materials and remastered versions can see the light of day, crazy ideas from live multi-angle features from 2003 to instrumental versions of songs, updated visuals, demos, interviews, you name it. We're lucky to get at least something.
And you could finish an unfinished Picasso at the same time. Really, I've seen some crazy stuff on this forum and this line of argument takes the biscuit.
The comparison of a lost Picasso and the On The Night album makes me chuckle, bwah ha ha ha!
MK may be reluctant to revisit these times for other reasons but at the end of the day this will come down to cold hard cash. There might have been a window where it was financially viable to pay someone to edit this footage together when DVDs were still selling but that ship sailed a long time ago.
I don’t think so either.
Interestingly I think DS could sell alot of tickets ( nostalgia) to a certain age group but boxed sets…...NO.
It depends what you mean by “thousands” …..2000 is thousands.
And yes, 10 maybe 15 years ago would definitely have been better..that's a generation plus in disposable pop music terms.
I completely agree with Dusty’s comment re DVD’s.
Well the way the Dire Straits legacy is managed remains mysterious for me.
That Dire Straits live boxset was a complete surprise.
I dreamed of but was not too optimistic.
Why this boxset, why now ?
I would like to know what made it possible.
Did it sold well enough?
Is there another things to come or it is just a one off as Live At The BBC was one in 1995.
Pavel brought a good discussion point.
Chris, I don't wanna be disrespectful in any way. However, the way that people consumes music is way different than 20 years ago. So, the music (as a product) that we know, are dead.
Long story short, Youtube is a free world where anyone can put anything. Just because are such horrible cover songs played there, you cannot put everyone on the same level. There are plenty of amazing digital artists, designers, developers and, yes, musicians delivering top notch material.
Pavel spoke about game developers and he is right. There are a bunch of modded video-games there are way better than the original. These guys don't need to work for Electronic Arts to be sucessfull anymore as a independent or consulting developers.
There are also amazing movies made using cellphones and digital art. There is a brazilian Netflix show called 3%. The original one was a short-movie that was avaliable on YT. The original was way better than the released streamed show.
The HBO series Westworld launched a score competition and the winner would be part of the show composers. The producers saw people adding their own sondtracks on scenes from the series and, some of them was pretty awasome.
Mark Knopfler launched a campaign for the video-clip of one of his songs and the winner was a small artist.
There are very, very competent people doing their jobs online.
As music, Internet is a free territory. Full of crap and also very good stuff.
Shit happens on corporative world. ( A LOT)
You told about fill uncompleted art, however, the almighty Guy Fletcher added fake drums on Fade To Black (from the live compilation) ruining the song mood. Would better to leave it out in my opinion.
There are major bands delivering 'almost raw' material as official release. Stones, Pink Floyd, Dylan... even DS has some 'almost official' releases on Youtube Music.
Mahavishnu Orchestra, witch I love, released a lot of 'almost raw' material with, also, incomplete songs.
Museums all aroud the world puts temporary exibitions of unfinished jobs from famous artists.
Of course that are cons about it (I doubt if Picasso would authorize people to see his unfinished paintings). Artists need to have control of their art to not be associated with some trash or something.
The world have changed and musicians are, unfortunately, struggling for their rights looking for a prism that has long gone. (this is other subject that I would like to talk)
MK concerts had decreasing his audience thru the last years.
Almost no publicity. MK Management thinks that, his audience is made of very rich people that buys Aston Martins, Expensive Gins and """"audiophiles"""" that spents tons of money on headphones.
How they "know" that?
Because MK sells a good amount of vinyls on Sweden, Austria and Luxembourg. This is insane.
There is no fanbase recycling.
The new generation doesn't speak the same language as MK Management.
There are fans and fans.
I agree that MK have a good amount fans that are stunning professionals that absolutely could deliver a fantastic job with his material.
Sorry the long post.
From what I can see it’s not managed, It’s scraped together with no overall strategy but I don't know what they have to work with .
Being sold out on Amazon…but what does that mean?
Rolo has some good points ( see how I’ve calmed down, become that groovy and cool chap you’ve come to know and love? )
Wow..a Mahavishnu fan. Kudos.
John McLaughlin is an amazing guy ..so, peaceful….and on the Jeff Beck tribute gigs at the RAH he absolutely wiped the floor with the other guitar players and they knew it.
See on You Tube..ridiculously great female bass player and drummer.
I think you are referring to AI.
That will fuck things for sure, it already is.
For the truly creative that's a nuclear bomb.
Your comments on MK “management” are golden …MK has zero appeal to the audience of today. Zero.
You spoiled yourself with your last comment ( fantastic job ) .
DS's official YT channel.
2.4M subscribers
Mark Knopfler's YT channel. 1M subscribers.
But look at the contrast:
Queen. 18M subscribers.
Bohenian Rhapsody - 1.9 Billion plays
Led Zeppelin - 4M
Pink Floyd - 4.5M
Beatles - 8.8M
Interesting to add a few other big britts names of rock music :
Eric Clapton - 1.54 M
TheRollingStones - 3.4 M
U2official - 3.13 M
EltonJohn - 4.79 M
DeepPurpleOfficial - 1.37 M
And from the other side of the Atlantic :
BobDylan - 1.5 M
Haha! I've already had quite a lot of battles with Dusty here, discussing the popularity of artists and comparing the numbers. What I learned is that you do not perceive popularity by looking at numbers as much as you "feel" popularity. Bob Dylan is all over my X feed, especially after the movie about him came out, and when he started writing his own posts, it had the effect of a nuclear weapon. Bob Dylan is as popular as he ever was, what a guy.
You feel the popularity of someone. You feel the popularity of Taylor Swift, you see videos about her on YouTube all the time, you see the billboards, you see her name in the news. If she feels popular, she's popular. Now, when it comes to Mark Knopfler, obviously, this man doesn't feel popular at all. People barely talk about him, there are not a lot of interviews, he's not touring anymore, and the numbers are pretty modest, too.
When I was mentioned in Mark's social media 3 times, it wasn't nuclear at all. Yes, I got a few weeks' worth of views and comments, but it wasn't like my inbox was filled to the top and then some. I actually managed to answer every single comment and email in a couple of days. If someone with John Mayer and Bob Dylan's scale mentioned me in a tweet, I'd be drinking my favourite pineapple juice in the Maldives now.
As interesting and much more sensible as the posts are from 69 to 102, I don't have anything to add except Chris is correct in all he says and I’m in agreement with the general theme re the way DS has been allowed to “slide” ( or was pushed ).
It's a shame but inevitable given M’s personality which is too private for that kind of attention, “too much white light" as he calls it.
But then Pop is DISPOSABLE as I keep saying and now we have AI fucking it up even more.
Will AI artists have a legacy?
By the way…Brunno reply 99…for historical reasons going back to 1977 ( just pre me) , and unless something has changed which I doubt, MK/JI DO NOT OWN their masters ( Universal now) so they CAN’T sell them.
MK does own his song copyrights ( thank you Ed ) but he’d be mad to sell those, depending on tax advice, especially re the vicious 40% UK Inheritance Tax now he’s moving towards 80 , as we all are.
For once I agree with Pavel ( holy shit) with his discourse on numbers and popularity and where MK is in all that.
Yes, you “feel “ popularity, those numbers are a bit meaningless I think.
Taylor has worked tirelessly to get where she is, good for her, ditto the Queen operation ( brilliant ).
But they WANTED it , ALL of it ( “ I want it ALL” ) and you have to want it, like in the Rocky movies.
MK has almost dropped off the screen and since he’s now stopped touring he will disappear altogether, he’s light years away from the pop mainstream now and happy to be so I imagine, and let’s face it, we are OLD. Jack’s gone, Brendan’s gone , who’s next?
Sometimes I don't care, and sometimes I'm annoyed why MK is overlooked and rarely quoted. It's unfair and incomprehensible.
Sometimes I don't care, and sometimes I'm annoyed why MK is overlooked and rarely quoted. It's unfair and incomprehensible.
I know what you mean. Life's not fair and I have a liftime of following underrated artists, listening to underrated music and even choosing underrated occupations (like teacher, sound designer, editor, or even defender in football). Somehow, I always felt like fighting on the side of the underdog. But life is also extremely predictable and you're not going to become famous if you don't want to become famous. A known fame hater, Mark did everything he could to be as underrated as possible, and hence become the perfect "musician's musician". I usually don't care, too. Mainly becasue I talk about his music virtually every day and damn, can he write good songs. Good songs he writes, he can write good songs. Boy, what a songwriter.
Replies 104-105 are correct , DS are rarely if ever referenced re the 80’s/90’s now but bands like Duran Duran are, in part because they are still out there bashing away.
Iron Maiden are bigger than they’ve ever been.
Sting is still golden.
Paul Weller is still brass.
Depeche Mode, The Cure, even Human League are still beavering away.
Good guys and gals, they deserve it .
The public has short memories.
Sometimes I don't care, and sometimes I'm annoyed why MK is overlooked and rarely quoted. It's unfair and incomprehensible.
It's clear to me that the reason for this is that Mark worked tirelessly to bury the band that made him famous, DS, and continued his solo career in a low-profile manner. There's no way to plant beans and harvest watermelons. I find it impressive that DS's official channel has 2.4M subscribers, and even more impressive that his solo channel has 1M subscribers.
The paradox is that we're talking about a band that has sold over 100 million albums. It seems to me that not even Van Halen has reached that figure, also Scorpions, Iron Maiden, Metallica, Nirvana... Dire Straits is on a similar level to Bruce Springsteen, something close to 120 million. There's nothing modest about that. They're undoubtedly among the 20 best-selling bands on the planet. That's pretty significant even if they were in the top 30 or 40 best sellers.
Dire Straits just doesn't have the relevance it should and deserves to have, because the band's leader spared no effort to diminish its importance and legacy. I don't know if this is related to some trauma from the last two tours the band did (especially the OES tour 91/92), but, looking back, when it comes to DS, "MK ran away like the devil runs away from the cross." Nothing is by chance, if DS's rights were bought and managed by someone else, I believe things would start to be different. Who knows if the future will show if my point of view is correct?
Sometimes I don't care, and sometimes I'm annoyed why MK is overlooked and rarely quoted. It's unfair and incomprehensible.
It's clear to me that the reason for this is that Mark worked tirelessly to bury the band that made him famous, DS, and continued his solo career in a low-profile manner. There's no way to plant beans and harvest watermelons. I find it impressive that DS's official channel has 2.4M subscribers, and even more impressive that his solo channel has 1M subscribers.
The paradox is that we're talking about a band that has sold over 100 million albums. It seems to me that not even Van Halen has reached that figure, also Scorpions, Iron Maiden, Metallica, Nirvana... Dire Straits is on a similar level to Bruce Springsteen, something close to 120 million. There's nothing modest about that. They're undoubtedly among the 20 best-selling bands on the planet. That's pretty significant even if they were in the top 30 or 40 best sellers.
Dire Straits just doesn't have the relevance it should and deserves to have, because the band's leader spared no effort to diminish its importance and legacy. I don't know if this is related to some trauma from the last two tours the band did (especially the OES tour 91/92), but, looking back, when it comes to DS, "MK ran away like the devil runs away from the cross." Nothing is by chance, if DS's rights were bought and managed by someone else, I believe things would start to be different. Who knows if the future will show if my point of view is correct?
well over 135 million albums physical, I don't know how many streams.
And that was 25 years ago.
Ah Brunno, we are back on course, back in love, me on my purple velvet throne, you kneeling before me on the gold kneeling stool I borrowed from Bono. .
As stated they can't sell what they don't own, so that’s a non starter.
From Golden Heart on it seemed to me that consciously or maybe sub consciously, Mark was dismantling everything we had achieved with DS brick by brick , maybe because of the OES experience, maybe because he came to hate fame and celebrity, maybe because what he wanted to express in his songs had changed….after all he was 47 by that time….and maybe because he wanted to ensure that his personal life with Kitty which had happily come together by then, wasn’t damaged by the “monster” that DS had become and which had screwed several personal relationships over the years including one of mine, one of his, two of John's , and…and…many others ) .
But that’s just my personal view and I could be completely wrong.
He did find a niche and has had a satisfying solo career I imagine , one in which his farting became legendary amongst the drummers who were positioned directly behind him with just a can of Lake Como Fresh Air spray to protect them ( it didn’t work) .
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I partially agree with Hunter.
DS is dead and MK flies under the radar.
However, every artist (musicians) that made some success on the past could be reinserted on the market.
What needs to be reinserted is the comunication with the audience.
Look at Kate Bush as an example. She is great and was introduced to the new generation, briefly, because Netlix's The Stranger Things.
Bob Dylan (after selling his rights) now have a movie on cinemas and, of course, will reach to the young people much more that the Scorcese's doc. People want profit and it's all about profit.
What happens its that DS/MK speaks a completely different language (audio or video) of the current generation.
Music as product needs comunication with the current audience. MK's doesn't.
I think that most of all on this forum are 40+.
The way that we consumes music is dead.
If MK sells his rights, the buyer will reintroduce his music to make profit.
I cannot see Mark's music appealing even for musicians. Rick Beato is possible the greatest vehicle of "true musicians" and he barely speaks about DS/MK. There is no "What make this song great", "Quick lesson", Interviews.... nothing. Perhaps because Mark's music, for a skilled musician, is not that challenge.
I don't know.
I am a hopefully pessimist.
Thanks for your inputs, Rolo, it's refreshing to see at least some people sometimes agreeing with me :lol
I like this "5% of good music and 95% of crap" quote as much as I like another famous quote/axiom, "There's two types of music — good music and bad music."
This "today's music is crap" debate propelled by the likes of Rick Beato and other "boomer" journalists is highly misleading, I think, because good music has always been a victim of survivorship bias. You may think most of today's music is crap, Spotify sucks, and most YouTube videos are lousy, well, in fact, it's always been true, now you just can see all this crap unfiltered. Which is... Even better, in a way?
People who grew up with better filters and a higher chance of good content getting to them think young folks today can't distinguish between talent and mediocrity. One of the most important things about upbringing and learning is the ability to see both sides of life, so in a way, beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I mean, my Spotify and YouTube feed consists of amazing creators and contemporary music, I don't know about you.
You can always detect talent no matter what, and there is tons of good music nowadays, and I'm happy to have such a large ocean to go fishing for good stuff.
Good points, Pavel.
I think that music, as we know, it's a niche.
The current star is the person who attends a concert. Not the artist.
People want to register his own moments during the event. They don't want to remember how great was some concert. Paying attention to an artist is boring. As the world bacame more selfish, music is secondary.
Unfortunately, people don't have time do do anything.
There is a critic that says: "Years ago, when we took a cab, the journey was a free time. Nowadays, at the cab, we answer some whatsapp messages, read 4 emails, post on instagram, organize a work's presentation..."
It means that, the very short period that people have "free time", they don't want to listen do Debussy. They want to listen the simplier and viral thing that is possible. Or they wanna listed the same old shit just because is comfortably. All of that, if those people want to listen to the music.
Spotify and Youtube, for me its GREAT. Almost 100% that i want to see or listen is there. I like to listen/watch interviews with musicians. These cats ALWAYS brings a great amount of knowledge about music and musicians (new and old). So, after that it's easy. Is just check them out. Worth almost every time.
It puts me on a niche. And this post repeats again.
Thanks for your inputs, Rolo, it's refreshing to see at least some people sometimes agreeing with me :lol
I like this "5% of good music and 95% of crap" quote as much as I like another famous quote/axiom, "There's two types of music — good music and bad music."
This "today's music is crap" debate propelled by the likes of Rick Beato and other "boomer" journalists is highly misleading, I think, because good music has always been a victim of survivorship bias. You may think most of today's music is crap, Spotify sucks, and most YouTube videos are lousy, well, in fact, it's always been true, now you just can see all this crap unfiltered. Which is... Even better, in a way?
People who grew up with better filters and a higher chance of good content getting to them think young folks today can't distinguish between talent and mediocrity. One of the most important things about upbringing and learning is the ability to see both sides of life, so in a way, beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I mean, my Spotify and YouTube feed consists of amazing creators and contemporary music, I don't know about you.
You can always detect talent no matter what, and there is tons of good music nowadays, and I'm happy to have such a large ocean to go fishing for good stuff.
Good points, Pavel.
I think that music, as we know, it's a niche.
The current star is the person who attends a concert. Not the artist.
People want to register his own moments during the event. They don't want to remember how great was some concert. Paying attention to an artist is boring. As the world bacame more selfish, music is secondary.
Unfortunately, people don't have time do do anything.
There is a critic that says: "Years ago, when we took a cab, the journey was a free time. Nowadays, at the cab, we answer some whatsapp messages, read 4 emails, post on instagram, organize a work's presentation..."
It means that, the very short period that people have "free time", they don't want to listen do Debussy. They want to listen the simplier and viral thing that is possible. Or they wanna listed the same old shit just because is comfortably. All of that, if those people want to listen to the music.
Spotify and Youtube, for me its GREAT. Almost 100% that i want to see or listen is there. I like to listen/watch interviews with musicians. These cats ALWAYS brings a great amount of knowledge about music and musicians (new and old). So, after that it's easy. Is just check them out. Worth almost every time.
It puts me on a niche. And this post repeats again.
I heard Rick Beato speak once about Dire Straits and it was positively so I am OK with that. I don't need him to speak about him every week or so.
Regarding YT suscribed number I feel disparity between these figures and their real band success. I don't explain these.
I would also point out that Mark kept playing during his whole solo career songs from the Dire Straits catalogue.
I heard Rick Beato speak once about Dire Straits and it was positively so I am OK with that. I don't need him to speak about him every week or so.
Regarding YT suscribed number I feel disparity between these figures and their real band success. I don't explain these.
I would also point out that Mark kept playing during his whole solo career songs from the Dire Straits catalogue.
Rick did a "Sultans" episode.
In my opinion, it was forced.
He talked much more about his former guitar teacher, Jimmy Page and Stairway than Sultans or MK itself.
That's ok. He is not obligated to like DS/MK.
However, I only saw 2 musicians speaking very briefly about MK on Rick's show: Keith Urban and Guthrie Trapp.
He is a vehicle for another kind of music. I really like when he talks about Allan Holdsworth or Pat Metheny, per example.
I don't think that Social Media subscribers reflects a artist popularity. React channels are way more popular than bands ones.
About DS/MK, I always laught about the citation of my dear friend Brunno Nunes.
"After DS, MK worked hard to buried his band"
If MK sells his rights, the buyer will reintroduce his music to make profit.
I cannot see Mark's music appealing even for musicians. Rick Beato is possible the greatest vehicle of "true musicians" and he barely speaks about DS/MK. There is no "What make this song great", "Quick lesson", Interviews.... nothing. Perhaps because Mark's music, for a skilled musician, is not that challenge.
Mark's music is simple only on the surface. Everybody who tries to play it knows it's as deep as you want to fall into this rabbit hole, and even the greatest of players suddenly fail when trying to play some of Mark's riffs and songs. With playing single-note solos, people became very good, but it's serving the song and playing riffs that I personally see the most problematic. If you want to impress me, I don't want to hear the Sultans' solo; I want to hear Song For Sonny Liston.
Rick Beato hinted at a possible interview, and actually, funny enough, Mark was mentioned in his recent interview with Hans Zimmer in the first 5 minutes. But he was mentioned alongside Jeff Beck as an example of a distinctive Stratocaster sound, so even freaking Hans Zimmer respects Mark as a player of Sultans Of Swing and not as a songwriter, it seems. That, if anything, has become so old it's not even funny anymore. I'm sure for Rick, it's also all about Sultans. His most recent video about Knopfler is complete garbage, and I mean it. Apart from the entire video being a shameless plug for Rick's courses, the rest of the video is the shallowest analysis of Mark's work you can find. But the video has got more than a million views because it's Rick Beato talking about underrated Mark Knopfler. End of rant.
I'm not worried about Mark's legacy, and I'm sure it will be better after selling the rights if it happens. The way I think about it is simple: if you love good songs, you'll like Mark Knopfler because he writes good songs, nobody can take it away from him. What we should do is make sure people around us can learn about good music and can open their ears to good music, and sure enough, and I can guarantee it, everybody can find something to love about MK's music.
The way I think about it is simple: if you love good songs, you'll like Mark Knopfler because he writes good songs, nobody can take it away from him. What we should do is make sure people around us can learn about good music and can open their ears to good music, and sure enough, and I can guarantee it, everybody can find something to love about MK's music.
Sultans, to me, is THE guitar song. Ever.
As many, I decided to learn guitar because of Sultans.
Everything about Mark's music, to me, is about his guitar playing and the musicianship athmosphere thru the songs. I love his lyrics, however, to me, his playing is much more powerfull than his lyrics.
It's all about Sultans, after all.
When MK started to deliver simpler songs focused mainly on lyrics. I lost a huge part of interest about his music. For me, Mark's music lost 'the magic'
Mark's music could be considered "hard" just because his distictive playing. He made all his cons into pros. Well, he holds the guitar like a plumber ahahahah.
You can pick a great band to cover the hardest DS song ever. All musicians can copy all the detais, except the guitar player. You can be a flawless picker like Greg Koch, but he'll not sound like MK.
I am saying that because I like complicated and visceral music as I like good songs. I love John Mclaughlin and Allan Holdsworth as I love Bob Dylan and George Harrison. I listen to John Coltrane's A Love Supreme with the same enthusiast that I listen do DS first album.
I can't find it anymore but I remember that Rick Beato put MFN as the #1 guitar riff of all time
I can't find it anymore but I remember that Rick Beato put MFN as the #1 guitar riff of all time
Right! I forgot about that one. Rick has made so many lists videos it's hard to follow. Let me say for the record — I hate list-type videos. But that perfectly encapsulates the entire discussion: people are willing to place MK on the podium or even give him the 1st place for his achievements in specific categories and yet outside of that ignore him as if he's not on the list altogether. Truly superhero moves from an old silent fart :lol
Sometimes I don't care, and sometimes I'm annoyed why MK is overlooked and rarely quoted. It's unfair and incomprehensible.
It's clear to me that the reason for this is that Mark worked tirelessly to bury the band that made him famous, DS, and continued his solo career in a low-profile manner. There's no way to plant beans and harvest watermelons. I find it impressive that DS's official channel has 2.4M subscribers, and even more impressive that his solo channel has 1M subscribers.
The paradox is that we're talking about a band that has sold over 100 million albums. It seems to me that not even Van Halen has reached that figure, also Scorpions, Iron Maiden, Metallica, Nirvana... Dire Straits is on a similar level to Bruce Springsteen, something close to 120 million. There's nothing modest about that. They're undoubtedly among the 20 best-selling bands on the planet. That's pretty significant even if they were in the top 30 or 40 best sellers.
Dire Straits just doesn't have the relevance it should and deserves to have, because the band's leader spared no effort to diminish its importance and legacy. I don't know if this is related to some trauma from the last two tours the band did (especially the OES tour 91/92), but, looking back, when it comes to DS, "MK ran away like the devil runs away from the cross." Nothing is by chance, if DS's rights were bought and managed by someone else, I believe things would start to be different. Who knows if the future will show if my point of view is correct?
Absolutely agree with you
Also I heard that 120 million DS figure sales many times already 25-30 years ago, It must be much higher now, just never been updated
Rolo has it well summed up, DS is not only dead, It’s entered the spirit world.
Rick Beato does hold that Sultans is the greatest guitar riff ever ( I think Crockford sent him $5 for that ) …ah I see there’s a conversation about that.
I doubt there will be any MK movies ( I’m laughing at that one ), no demand to start with, no actor bald enough and you are correct about the "completely different language” issue.
Commercially he needed to reinvent himself years ago but neither he nor Crockford think about these things and in a way I get that, M was never going to be Madonna even though he occasionally wears thigh boots and cracks a whip Crockford bought him in an act of grovelling.
Plus you are right about being over 40 and the way music is listened to ( 40? I’d say 30).
I haven’t put a CD on in years and now in the UK vinyl outsells everything else not streamed. Ironic…artwork perhaps? .
Hey! I listen to Debussy and Flaer Smin…...give her a go on YT ( from Kazakstan )
Most folks think of MK as that bloke with the headband who plays the red guitar, if they think of him at all that is…..as I've previously said he’s a 4 or 5 hits artist to the general music public, MANY of whom only know BIA or have a “ Hits ” compilation. .
If the rights in the masters can't be sold what happens to this legacy you're so obsessed with after there’s no one to even vaguely look after it ( Universal won’t ) ?
It dies.
20 years from now or less, there will be no legacy and I doubt very much that M even thinks in those terms, it's so pretentious and self important and he’s not like that.
But why would Mark continue to promote and market a band that is effectively dead and while having a very successful solo career? I can understand that some people want to see more Dire Straits, but I think it's just a case of people being stuck in the past.
For myself, I would be much more excited about seeing the Henrik Hansen documentary than a Wembley '85 release.
It appeared to me that Mark was over DS on the first days of rehearsal for a more than Ione year world tour. He didn't really want to play MFN any more.
he never thought Sultans had been played properly (even before me), and that is partly because he asked his drummers to play very loud, and Sultans has a lighter groove (Pick talks about this).
Once the tour ended at Zaragoza and Mark embarked on his solo career I think he was mighty relieved.
When I say he doesn't want to revisit the past with it's negative memories, it isn't about personal stuff, it's that he moved on with his life and doesn't want to go back. I think on recent solo tours he reluctantly accepted he'd written some amazing songs for DS, and that they were important to his fans, so he put some back in the set.
He had zero interest in the R&R Hall Of Fame.
I'm amazed also people feel so sorry for Mark and feel he hasn't been appreciated enough.
The guy never needs to work again. He's a multi-millionaire. He's widely regarded as a guitar god, even by many of his peers (Clapton etc).
Very astute comment from Chris. Beautifully summed up, I would say 100% correct. The whole basis for OES was WRONG from the start ( I’ve been thru this several times) and yes re RRHOF ( which is totally fucked anyway and of no interest outside of the US).
If you do things for money they will inevitably backfire and if you do things for money for the wrong reason then you really are fucked.
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Sometimes I don't care, and sometimes I'm annoyed why MK is overlooked and rarely quoted. It's unfair and incomprehensible.
I know what you mean. Life's not fair and I have a liftime of following underrated artists, listening to underrated music and even choosing underrated occupations (like teacher, sound designer, editor, or even defender in football). Somehow, I always felt like fighting on the side of the underdog. But life is also extremely predictable and you're not going to become famous if you don't want to become famous. A known fame hater, Mark did everything he could to be as underrated as possible, and hence become the perfect "musician's musician". I usually don't care, too. Mainly becasue I talk about his music virtually every day and damn, can he write good songs. Good songs he writes, he can write good songs. Boy, what a songwriter.
I have always found the whole overlooked or underrated thing strange when used for Mark Knopfler, because both of those words really have nothing to do with Mark, the fame thing yes, but I think those things apply more to Mike Oldfield, who was painfully shy and introverted even before Tubular Bells, after that album was a success it made him even worse, hence him then shutting himself away in a house on the England/Wales border to write and record his next album by himself!! He is almost never quoted as being in the great guitarists list, even though he clearly is, and one of the greatest writers and musicians ever, so, really Mark is very popular and well known, but, he makes an effort to stay as low key as possible, I think I would do the same if I was in his situation, even more so now than in the Dire Straits heydays on the 1980's when Brother in Arms made it hard for him to not be known everywhere. He has had all that adoration back then, and he made the most of it.
I had several v pleasant meetings with Mike Oldfield re management but we weren’t on the same page for the reasons you set out.
He’s definitely shy! I’m definitely not!
I’m not sure I agree with “ he made the most of it” but I guess that depends on what you mean by “most”.
One of the sad things to me looking back is that he and John didn’t ENJOY that success, it became a burden.
Not Eric Burdon.
A burden.
And his work is still played today by other artist. Sam Fender starting his tour a few days ago with GH on the setlist.
Sam..nose. Mark..arse. Sam = brown nose. QED.
But joking aside that’s the exception ( though The Killers and Keith Urban perform R and J and SOS respectively and Elton used to do Les Boys ( in the bath playing with his rubber duck while David Furniture Polish loofah-ed his …NO! ).
DS is dead, and Mark wanted to fly under the radar. Like a silent fart. And now he's an old fart. An old silent fart. And you wonder why he's not in vogue?
Brilliant!
Brilliant! Seconded!
I love that Free song, The Hunter.
Bob Dylan is as popular as he ever was
Which isn't actually all that popular ;)
When you look at cold hard sales figures, Bob isn't really that popular. Culturally significant, critically lauded etc, yes, but the fact is that Bringing Down The Horse by The Wallflowers (Bob's son's Jakob's band) sold more copies than any Bob release ever did.
Bob has many albums in his catalogue which sold more than 1, 1,5 or even more than 2 Million copies. He has also albums that hardly sold 80.000, but the pure amount of albums, the long time span of his career and some real classics sum up to many million (I read 125 million) sold albums which indeed translates into "popular" from my point of view.
LE
Bob Dylan is as popular as he ever was
Which isn't actually all that popular ;)
When you look at cold hard sales figures, Bob isn't really that popular. Culturally significant, critically lauded etc, yes, but the fact is that Bringing Down The Horse by The Wallflowers (Bob's son's Jakob's band) sold more copies than any Bob release ever did.
Bob has many albums in his catalogue which sold more than 1, 1,5 or even more than 2 Million copies. He has also albums that hardly sold 80.000, but the pure amount of albums, the long time span of his career and some real classics sum up to many million (I read 125 million) sold albums which indeed translates into "popular" from my point of view.
LE
also. the truly ENDLESS touring. i wonder if i would still go to so many MK shows as i have done would he have been as prolific as bob.
Bob Dylan is as popular as he ever was
Which isn't actually all that popular ;)
When you look at cold hard sales figures, Bob isn't really that popular. Culturally significant, critically lauded etc, yes, but the fact is that Bringing Down The Horse by The Wallflowers (Bob's son's Jakob's band) sold more copies than any Bob release ever did.
Bob has many albums in his catalogue which sold more than 1, 1,5 or even more than 2 Million copies. He has also albums that hardly sold 80.000, but the pure amount of albums, the long time span of his career and some real classics sum up to many million (I read 125 million) sold albums which indeed translates into "popular" from my point of view.
LE
That suggests he has a RELATIVELY small but loyal fanbase.
At the end of the day, Dylan is going to go down as one of the most important songwriters of the 20th Century.
Successful albums, unsuccessful albums etc I don't think an artist would care if they felt they'd made an historic impact on our culture, which Dylan definitely has.
At the end of the day, Dylan is going to go down as one of the most important songwriters of the 20th Century.
Successful albums, unsuccessful albums etc I don't think an artist would care if they felt they'd made an historic impact on our culture, which Dylan definitely has.
Correct, but I think we are discussing this in the context of the viability of "popularity" and the commercial viability of releasing archive material.
Dylan has been releasing any old crap (along with a some true gems) through The Bootleg Series for nearly 35 years.
Aaah. Rambling. If I ever do a book the Dylan chapter might come out tops as the wackiest but songs..yep he’s written some mean songs ( UK word for “fucking great” ) There’s a very funny clip on YT where Jagger critiques Rambling’s vocal noise.
I'm amazed also people feel so sorry for Mark and feel he hasn't been appreciated enough.
The guy never needs to work again. He's a multi-millionaire. He's widely regarded as a guitar god, even by many of his peers (Clapton etc).
I don't think that we are sorry for Mark.
He made a life as a musician.
Very, very sucessfull musician.
Worked hard and built an empire for his own.
Mark could be the coolest guy in town.
He have all the artistic and speech freedom.
Instead of it, looks like that he hates to be an artist.
Most of our complain about DS is that, it reached the very limit as a product. There is a lot of things that could be released that could made the fans happier. As Ed said, MK's music is 100% supported by his die-hard fans (or something like that)
Even John seems to be much polited about his storyes.
Is this a poem?
At the end of the day, Dylan is going to go down as one of the most important songwriters of the 20th Century.
Successful albums, unsuccessful albums etc I don't think an artist would care if they felt they'd made an historic impact on our culture, which Dylan definitely has.
Correct, but I think we are discussing this in the context of the viability of "popularity" and the commercial viability of releasing archive material.
Dyland has been releasing any old crap (along with a some true gems) through The Bootleg Series for nearly 35 years.
Yes, and the ironic thing is, I bet Mark himself bought all those bootleg albums.
Oh Pink. PINK. You made me laugh out loud at this one. Actually Mark only buys his OWN bootlegs, because they are cheaper than Rambling’s…...demand being less I suppose.
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Again, as usual a lot of speculation to support people's impression of MK.
Again, as usual a lot of speculation to support people's impression of MK.
Indeed, as well as feeling sorry for him we also have one poster who thinks he was unlucky!
Ha, Ha :thumbsup
I'm amazed also people feel so sorry for Mark and feel he hasn't been appreciated enough.
The guy never needs to work again. He's a multi-millionaire. He's widely regarded as a guitar god, even by many of his peers (Clapton etc).
I don't think that we are sorry for Mark.
He made a life as a musician.
Very, very sucessfull musician.
Worked hard and built an empire for his own.
Mark could be the coolest guy in town.
He have all the artistic and speech freedom.
Instead of it, looks like that he hates to be an artist.
Most of our complain about DS is that, it reached the very limit as a product. There is a lot of things that could be released that could made the fans happier. As Ed said, MK's music is 100% supported by his die-hard fans (or something like that)
Even John seems to be much polited about his storyes.
To say that Mark hates to be an artist must be one of the most bizarre and insane statements I've ever read in this forum. And all because he doesn't want to release old Dire Straits crap any longer.
Again, as usual a lot of speculation to support people's impression of MK.
Indeed, as well as feeling sorry for him we also have one poster who thinks he was unlucky!
Yeah, Mark got soooooo lucky when the worst tour, worst album (in his own words), divorce, death of his band and death of his father all happened within months from each other, and everybody and their mom thought he was an a-hole. Damn, I'd want to be in his shoes. So lucky. Boy, what a happy time. Give me two, give me two now. Obviously, "luck" is very subjective.
Mark doesn't hate to be an artist. He just could do without the fame bit, which he has stated one million times.
Again, as usual a lot of speculation to support people's impression of MK.
Indeed, as well as feeling sorry for him we also have one poster who thinks he was unlucky!
Yeah, Mark got soooooo lucky when the worst tour, worst album (in his own words), divorce, death of his band and death of his father all happened within months from each other, and everybody and their mom thought he was an a-hole. Damn, I'd want to be in his shoes. So lucky. Boy, what a happy time. Give me two, give me two now. Obviously, "luck" is very subjective.
None of the things you mention have anything to do with luck or lack of luck. Apart from the death of his father - which was sad, but something that everyone has to experience - everything else was the result of Mark's own choices. (OK, I'm speculating about the divorce, but anyone who's been or is married knows it takes two to tango ...)
Yeah, Mark got soooooo lucky when the worst tour, worst album (in his own words), divorce, death of his band and death of his father all happened within months from each other, and everybody and their mom thought he was an a-hole.
Again of lot of that is very overdramatic and not factual.
None of the things you mention have anything to do with luck or lack of luck. Apart from the death of his father - which was sad, but something that everyone has to experience - everything else was the result of Mark's own choices. (OK, I'm speculating about the divorce, but anyone who's been or is married knows it takes two to tango ...)
Yes, pretty much everything except the death of his father. It also wasn't 'the worst tour' or 'worst album'.
I'm sure Mark was very happy with OES, it just wasn't as big a hit as BIA. I'm sure Mark regretted agreeing to the tour once it became a reality, but at the same time it netted Mark and John millions and they walked out to 25,000-60,000 people screaming adulation most nights.
But don't you just love it, Chris?
I especially like it when a few AMIT folks digitally transport themselves into M’s brain and then post what he’s thinking.
I've learned SO much from that, it explains why I quit .
With the help of a few of our friends here I came to realise the thought processes that got the two of us to the point where a light went on and I knew I had to stop.
But it's only now I understand WHY I had to stop ..the AMITS have explained it all, because they know what no one else knows, just like they know how the music should be chosen and released ( full circle I think) .
They truly are A Modest Intelligent Talented Shower.
And yes, let's not forget M had no luck in his life, it was all down to his natural talent and nothing more, he didn't even make his own luck , perfect alignment took over and no one else had any part to play.
Sarcasm may be the lowest form of wit but it comes in handy sometimes.
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Re the OES album, Mark said during interviews at the time that that album he actually could listen to, whereas the previous DS albums made him feel uncomfortable. I could imagine his opinion of it now would be very different.
Not necessarily, It's still his favorite DS album.
He reintroduced On Every Street on recent tours so presumably it wasn't too triggering.
Or maybe that was just the bad luck of hiring a saxophonist and needing songs that he could play.
(https://farm3.static.flickr.com/2797/4278879265_6bf095b650_o.png)
Poor MK, what an unlucky bastard. If he fell into a bucket of tits he'd come out sucking his thumb.
Or maybe that was just the bad luck of hiring a saxophonist and needing songs that he could play.
More like pedal steel.
It would.
When I knew him neither of us looked backwards, we rarely discussed our lives before we met ( except our time in Leeds and the music we listened to from age 13/14 on ).
So I'm a bit surprised by the quotes various of you mention and that he listens to the DS records at all.
But we are not in each other’s lives really.
The “ pedal steel” bit made me laugh.
I must say playing in the NHB’s with Paul F was a treat, especially soundcheck where he and I jammed.
Playing with all of them was but some of the musical policy …nah, never mind.
One of my life’s highlights, better than a well administered colonic.
So I’m told.
I LOVED the "bucket of tits" line. If only…..
Am I the only one who finds CW's posts extremely annoying and evidently full of irritation towards the person the forum is dedicated to?
Obviously yes.
I guess you are just not used to a guy who delivers absolute clear thoughts and first hand knowledge, seldomly opinions, practically no trash talk and who is after the facts only. Humour might lacking (seemingly) which sometimes leads to a somewhat cold atmosphere around his posts, but if you are really honest to yourself you cannot nail a single post where Chris said something about MK that was not true. Worshipping is just not his thing, it seems. And why should he. However 90% of members come here to take a daily bath in a lot of hot MK love and feel comfortable among others to dive deep into praising our hero.
I for my part think that the forum has become much more relevant since Ed and Chris decided to post here on a more or less regular base.
I feel uncomfortable to write about a guy and knowing that he will read it. But I did it to point out the fact that I don't like it and to mirror the way you wrote. We better should talk WITH each other, not about others. Just my two cents.
LE
Honest question; who are these 90% which you claim bath in hot MK love? I don't see a single one, and very, VERY seldom read anything even near that. None of us thinks MK behaved like an angel!! Geeez, can we move forward??!
To go back to OES I remember that Mark objected songs on this album being too much cynical.
Recently Mark even said that MFN lyrics were kind of unfair toward working class people.
He could wrote a song about that on his next album.
Chris first tried stand up comedy performing as The Paradiddle Penis but he couldn’t get on TV, not even late night.
So he dropped the Penis bit and stuck with paradiddles and look where that took him.
To this site ..you lucky drummer, you.
As you will have realised, I've essentially confirmed 95% of everything he’s posted.
He’s a very straightforward guy, no side to him, and I’m sure that there are bits of all this that have an element of getting stuff off both of our respective chests.
Some of what he’s said…..about his treatment by certain other band members ( disgusting ) , the whole issue of monitors and volume, song tempo stuff etc etc has actually shocked me.
I had two problems back then…..the whole tale underpinning that record and tour which I've probably exhausted ( as in what I can tell you ), and being so busy that I couldn’t see what was going on in front of me.
And of course no one told me , so I wasn’t able to at least try and remedy it.
As far as post 153 goes, well said and droll humour which I love eg the "daily bath of hot MK lurve "…sounds like a Barry White lyric.
Ed Greene who played drums on White’s records is one of the great unrecognised drummers.
To go back to OES I remember that Mark objected songs on this album being too much cynical.
Recently Mark even said that MFN lyrics were kind of unfair toward working class people.
He could wrote a song about that on his next album.
If I remember correctly, Mark said he wouldn't write Money For Nothing today.
He couldn’t write MFN today, Motley Crue have fucked off.
(thanks ds1984 :-) He probably had a lot of dark things to get off his chest, and felt he had to excuse it? Of course it is only my feelings and not facts, but for me the difference in mood from OES to Golden heart is huge. "Darling pretty" is love flowing over, you can't help but smile, it is such a happy song! It is said that bad things makes great songs, and I think that is the case for OES. "When it comes to you" was an instant favorite, same with You and your friend and also Iron hand.
Substitute Kitty for Pretty.
Meeting her changed everything once they’d sorted things out.
Everything.
Like I said, I've moved on. I don't think about the bad things much any more, unless someone brings them up.
Same, decades ago.
None of the things you mention have anything to do with luck or lack of luck. Apart from the death of his father - which was sad, but something that everyone has to experience - everything else was the result of Mark's own choices. (OK, I'm speculating about the divorce, but anyone who's been or is married knows it takes two to tango ...)
Yes, pretty much everything except the death of his father. It also wasn't 'the worst tour' or 'worst album'.
I'm sure Mark was very happy with OES, it just wasn't as big a hit as BIA. I'm sure Mark regretted agreeing to the tour once it became a reality, but at the same time it netted Mark and John millions and they walked out to 25,000-60,000 people screaming adulation most nights.
But Ed said something along the lines of; Mark said: "I've made a crappy record". And it clearly wasn't as big as BIA. And the tour was "strange", to say the least. So I don't know, guys. I still think... Well, maybe it wasn't "unlucky", it's the wrong word for it, but it certainly wasn't the best time to be Mark Knopfler. Don't you think?
Bugger me sideways, Pavel is heading towards Bono’s kneeling stool.
There's a problem with all this for me.
There’s a huge hole in the story that I just can't tell you about and if I did it would make sense of all this for you.
Stuff Chris, actually none of the musicians including John don't know, nor my office staff either.
And maybe they never will and it probably doesn’t matter.
It's a bit like buying a 1000 piece jigsaw puzzle and eventually finding 50 pieces are missing.
No, it wasn’t a good time but eventually it turned into the best time for him.
But it wasn’t as bad as the Communique late 79 episode.
Now THAT was truly fucked, the stuff of nightmares .
Am I the only one who finds CW's posts extremely annoying and evidently full of irritation towards the person the forum is dedicated to?
Brief history lesson about how this forum came about if I may.
There used to be an official forum where even the slightest of criticism was not tolerated.
This forum was established to allow free and full discussion in a respectful way. I must say, I don’t think any of us ever imagined that an actual member of Dire Straits would join to talk about their real life experience being in the band for the best part of two years, or indeed the Dire Straits manager who was there from start to finish.
Rather than being annoyed, I’m extremely grateful for this input.
An actual member of Dire Straits answering questions? I’m tempted to say “you don’t know you’re born”…
AMIT is the best forum I have ever seen. I'm dead serious. The sheer fact it's still alive in the year 2025 alone deserves some kind of medal. Who on Earth uses forums nowadays anyway? Nobody! How it combines so many people from so many countries and walks of life, and many of the members have been there for a two-digit number of years, it seems.
I'm actually surprised not so many band members checked in because, seriously, it's the best source of information and fun in the MK world. Yes, discussions often go out of hand, but I've explained a million times the limitations of digital correspondence, and a lot of people on this forum are walking encyclopaedias when it comes to MK&DS.
Does anybody have problems with these statements? Let's respect each other and our unique contributions to this unique place. Now, I'm ready to take rotten tomatoes! :lol
YES!
He’s on Bono’s kneeling stool .
He’s assumed the position .
It’s the ONLY forum I’ve ever seen and apart from some uninformed and loopy posts it’s been huge fun to interact with you lot, help fill in a few gaps and learn things.
It's difficult when you're the manager to know what fans think, looking at nude polaroids doesn’t really do it.
Shame this wasn’t around to help or confound me back then.
I completely agree about digital communication.
I like to look into the other person's eyes and smell their armpits , someone should develop computers that smell of bodily functions, that would eliminate so many misunderstandings.
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Am I the only one who finds CW's posts extremely annoying and evidently full of irritation towards the person the forum is dedicated to?
you cannot speak for me. i find it an absolute enrichement to have someone on board who was actually around while the DS days were happening. Be less sensitive and defensive of your MK god. he needs to go to the john too and am sure leaves some admirable logs.
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Am I the only one who finds CW's posts extremely annoying and evidently full of irritation towards the person the forum is dedicated to?
Brief history lesson about how this forum came about if I may.
There used to be an official forum where even the slightest of criticism was not tolerated.
This forum was established to allow free and full discussion in a respectful way. I must say, I don’t think any of us ever imagined that an actual member of Dire Straits would join to talk about their real life experience being in the band for the best part of two years, or indeed the Dire Straits manager who was there from start to finish.
Rather than being annoyed, I’m extremely grateful for this input.
An actual member of Dire Straits answering questions? I’m tempted to say “you don’t know you’re born”…
AMIT is the best forum I have ever seen. I'm dead serious. The sheer fact it's still alive in the year 2025 alone deserves some kind of medal. Who on Earth uses forums nowadays anyway? Nobody! How it combines so many people from so many countries and walks of life, and many of the members have been there for a two-digit number of years, it seems.
I'm actually surprised not so many band members checked in because, seriously, it's the best source of information and fun in the MK world. Yes, discussions often go out of hand, but I've explained a million times the limitations of digital correspondence, and a lot of people on this forum are walking encyclopaedias when it comes to MK&DS.
Does anybody have problems with these statements? Let's respect each other and our unique contributions to this unique place. Now, I'm ready to take rotten tomatoes! :lol
I joined the official forum in 2006 because, after reading the posts for a while, I really wanted to join in with the discussions and everyone seemed to be having a lot of fun. However, there were lots of drawbacks which became more and more apparent. One of these was that members were only allowed six posts a day which meant that lengthy discussions were just about impossible. Also emojis were frowned on and, as Dusty has said, criticism wasn't tolerated.
Eventually, mainly because of the restrictions, in 2008 AMIT was born and everything changed. We could discuss topics 'til the cows came home, as happens now. Also, we can have healthy discussions about MK/DS without posts being edited.
I have been a member since the beginning and even though there are inevitably ups and downs it has been a very happy time and I have had the pleasure of meeting lots of other members at MK concerts, some of whom are now friends. Even though I don't post as much these days, I do read the posts every day! :)
so happy to have gotten to know you and have you onboard here Val!
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Having read all that, I think the world will end when Ed finds something to disagree about with Chris, probably faster than Trump could ever do it (end the world) :lol
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I'd forgotten about emojis being banned by MK news. I think it was because they were too expensive? lols. Can you imagine trying to explain that to a kid these days?!
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Re the OES album, Mark said during interviews at the time that that album he actually could listen to, whereas the previous DS albums made him feel uncomfortable. I could imagine his opinion of it now would be very different.
Not necessarily, It's still his favorite DS album.
He reintroduced On Every Street on recent tours so presumably it wasn't too triggering.
Or maybe that was just the bad luck of hiring a saxophonist and needing songs that he could play.
(https://farm3.static.flickr.com/2797/4278879265_6bf095b650_o.png)
Poor MK, what an unlucky bastard. If he fell into a bucket of tits he'd come out sucking his thumb.
Or maybe that was just the bad luck of hiring a saxophonist and needing songs that he could play.
More like pedal steel.
It would.
When I knew him neither of us looked backwards, we rarely discussed our lives before we met ( except our time in Leeds and the music we listened to from age 13/14 on ).
So I'm a bit surprised by the quotes various of you mention and that he listens to the DS records at all.
But we are not in each other’s lives really.
The “ pedal steel” bit made me laugh.
I must say playing in the NHB’s with Paul F was a treat, especially soundcheck where he and I jammed.
Playing with all of them was but some of the musical policy …nah, never mind.
One of my life’s highlights, better than a well administered colonic.
So I’m told.
I LOVED the "bucket of tits" line. If only…..
Am I the only one who finds CW's posts extremely annoying and evidently full of irritation towards the person the forum is dedicated to?
Obviously yes.
I guess you are just not used to a guy who delivers absolute clear thoughts and first hand knowledge, seldomly opinions, practically no trash talk and who is after the facts only. Humour might lacking (seemingly) which sometimes leads to a somewhat cold atmosphere around his posts, but if you are really honest to yourself you cannot nail a single post where Chris said something about MK that was not true. Worshipping is just not his thing, it seems. And why should he. However 90% of members come here to take a daily bath in a lot of hot MK love and feel comfortable among others to dive deep into praising our hero.
I for my part think that the forum has become much more relevant since Ed and Chris decided to post here on a more or less regular base.
I feel uncomfortable to write about a guy and knowing that he will read it. But I did it to point out the fact that I don't like it and to mirror the way you wrote. We better should talk WITH each other, not about others. Just my two cents.
LE
Honest question; who are these 90% which you claim bath in hot MK love? I don't see a single one, and very, VERY seldom read anything even near that. None of us thinks MK behaved like an angel!! Geeez, can we move forward??!
To go back to OES I remember that Mark objected songs on this album being too much cynical.
Recently Mark even said that MFN lyrics were kind of unfair toward working class people.
He could wrote a song about that on his next album.
Chris first tried stand up comedy performing as The Paradiddle Penis but he couldn’t get on TV, not even late night.
So he dropped the Penis bit and stuck with paradiddles and look where that took him.
To this site ..you lucky drummer, you.
As you will have realised, I've essentially confirmed 95% of everything he’s posted.
He’s a very straightforward guy, no side to him, and I’m sure that there are bits of all this that have an element of getting stuff off both of our respective chests.
Some of what he’s said…..about his treatment by certain other band members ( disgusting ) , the whole issue of monitors and volume, song tempo stuff etc etc has actually shocked me.
I had two problems back then…..the whole tale underpinning that record and tour which I've probably exhausted ( as in what I can tell you ), and being so busy that I couldn’t see what was going on in front of me.
And of course no one told me , so I wasn’t able to at least try and remedy it.
As far as post 153 goes, well said and droll humour which I love eg the "daily bath of hot MK lurve "…sounds like a Barry White lyric.
Ed Greene who played drums on White’s records is one of the great unrecognised drummers.
To go back to OES I remember that Mark objected songs on this album being too much cynical.
Recently Mark even said that MFN lyrics were kind of unfair toward working class people.
He could wrote a song about that on his next album.
If I remember correctly, Mark said he wouldn't write Money For Nothing today.
He couldn’t write MFN today, Motley Crue have fucked off.
(thanks ds1984 :-) He probably had a lot of dark things to get off his chest, and felt he had to excuse it? Of course it is only my feelings and not facts, but for me the difference in mood from OES to Golden heart is huge. "Darling pretty" is love flowing over, you can't help but smile, it is such a happy song! It is said that bad things makes great songs, and I think that is the case for OES. "When it comes to you" was an instant favorite, same with You and your friend and also Iron hand.
Substitute Kitty for Pretty.
Meeting her changed everything once they’d sorted things out.
Everything.
Like I said, I've moved on. I don't think about the bad things much any more, unless someone brings them up.
Same, decades ago.
None of the things you mention have anything to do with luck or lack of luck. Apart from the death of his father - which was sad, but something that everyone has to experience - everything else was the result of Mark's own choices. (OK, I'm speculating about the divorce, but anyone who's been or is married knows it takes two to tango ...)
Yes, pretty much everything except the death of his father. It also wasn't 'the worst tour' or 'worst album'.
I'm sure Mark was very happy with OES, it just wasn't as big a hit as BIA. I'm sure Mark regretted agreeing to the tour once it became a reality, but at the same time it netted Mark and John millions and they walked out to 25,000-60,000 people screaming adulation most nights.
But Ed said something along the lines of; Mark said: "I've made a crappy record". And it clearly wasn't as big as BIA. And the tour was "strange", to say the least. So I don't know, guys. I still think... Well, maybe it wasn't "unlucky", it's the wrong word for it, but it certainly wasn't the best time to be Mark Knopfler. Don't you think?
Bugger me sideways, Pavel is heading towards Bono’s kneeling stool.
There's a problem with all this for me.
There’s a huge hole in the story that I just can't tell you about and if I did it would make sense of all this for you.
Stuff Chris, actually none of the musicians including John don't know, nor my office staff either.
And maybe they never will and it probably doesn’t matter.
It's a bit like buying a 1000 piece jigsaw puzzle and eventually finding 50 pieces are missing.
No, it wasn’t a good time but eventually it turned into the best time for him.
But it wasn’t as bad as the Communique late 79 episode.
Now THAT was truly fucked, the stuff of nightmares .
Am I the only one who finds CW's posts extremely annoying and evidently full of irritation towards the person the forum is dedicated to?
Brief history lesson about how this forum came about if I may.
There used to be an official forum where even the slightest of criticism was not tolerated.
This forum was established to allow free and full discussion in a respectful way. I must say, I don’t think any of us ever imagined that an actual member of Dire Straits would join to talk about their real life experience being in the band for the best part of two years, or indeed the Dire Straits manager who was there from start to finish.
Rather than being annoyed, I’m extremely grateful for this input.
An actual member of Dire Straits answering questions? I’m tempted to say “you don’t know you’re born”…
AMIT is the best forum I have ever seen. I'm dead serious. The sheer fact it's still alive in the year 2025 alone deserves some kind of medal. Who on Earth uses forums nowadays anyway? Nobody! How it combines so many people from so many countries and walks of life, and many of the members have been there for a two-digit number of years, it seems.
I'm actually surprised not so many band members checked in because, seriously, it's the best source of information and fun in the MK world. Yes, discussions often go out of hand, but I've explained a million times the limitations of digital correspondence, and a lot of people on this forum are walking encyclopaedias when it comes to MK&DS.
Does anybody have problems with these statements? Let's respect each other and our unique contributions to this unique place. Now, I'm ready to take rotten tomatoes! :lol
YES!
He’s on Bono’s kneeling stool .
He’s assumed the position .
It’s the ONLY forum I’ve ever seen and apart from some uninformed and loopy posts it’s been huge fun to interact with you lot, help fill in a few gaps and learn things.
It's difficult when you're the manager to know what fans think, looking at nude polaroids doesn’t really do it.
Shame this wasn’t around to help or confound me back then.
I completely agree about digital communication.
I like to look into the other person's eyes and smell their armpits , someone should develop computers that smell of bodily functions, that would eliminate so many misunderstandings.
did i mention how friggin (i could say FUCKING on this forum just prefer friggin) amazing it is to have you (kinda) on board here, along with CW?
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This by ED:
There's a problem with all this for me.
There’s a huge hole in the story that I just can't tell you about and if I did it would make sense of all this for you.
Stuff Chris, actually none of the musicians including John don't know, nor my office staff either.
And maybe they never will and it probably doesn’t matter.
It's a bit like buying a 1000 piece jigsaw puzzle and eventually finding 50 pieces are missing.
No, it wasn’t a good time but eventually it turned into the best time for him.
But it wasn’t as bad as the Communique late 79 episode.
Now THAT was truly fucked, the stuff of nightmares .
Ed already mentioned about that something in previous posts and had everyone of us wondering about it. Personally I thought it was something that at least John would be aware of, however I agree with Ed that it probably doesn't matter.
And in a way it does, as it would explain better all around the DS coming back, the OES recording sessions and the OES tour, but I guess that we all read a lot by people who's been there to make a general picture, so that's why I agree with Ed with it doesn't matter.
Yes, we are all so curious we would like to know to the smallest detail. But I'm ok with all what Ed and Chris told us. It was way more than I would ever dreamed.
I only wonder if there is anything more that Ed could tell us he didn't yet that would be important to understand any point of DS or MK solo career... Thanks Ed, Thanks Chris, Thanks Amit for provoking both of them to come here and talk about all of this. I'm quite certain that I was in part very guilty of that, first with my stupid comments about Chris playing and second with nonsense and bad informations I took as certains and stupidly posted here for years.
Sometimes a fan needs (has to) to be kicked out on his ass. Thanks again Chris and Ed. I love you both.
-
The main problem I have with this forum, and something I’m fed up with beyond belief and something that seriously makes me think of abandoning the place too often (I won’t announce it, of course), is too many people taking too many things too fucking seriously. I know you can’t buy a sense of humour and you can’t learn to laugh at yourself, but these are my observations from all recent discussions.
Take the entire "raw material" drama. Started as an innocent comment from a fan dreaming about an obviously impossible idea of having raw videos from On The Night, it quickly attracted an army led by Captain Obvious, thinking we took hostages and demanded to give us raw material or we’d start killing them one by one. And we’re a bunch of dorks who think we can do a better job than a team of professionals. I mean, what the fuck?
Nearly every, even slightly controversial, statement sparks 20 pages of pointless back-and-forth with a blind person talking to a deaf person, at the end of which Ed and Chris announce their victory in defeating stupid fans. There are a million ways to stop these dreams in a more polite, fun and less dramatic way, but people prefer to choose violence. And I, for one, is not somebody willing to turn the other cheek.
While I truly respect having the chance to discuss matters with actual people involved in such matters, the aftertaste from these discussions honestly gives me a gag reflex. That’s, of course, only my opinion, and I can imagine another group of people who would destroy me for saying that, but I had to say it. It’s an opinion (noun, a view or judgement formed about something, not necessarily based on fact or knowledge).
Chill out, folks. As I said many times, it’s a humble discussion forum that exists solely for people to politely discuss all things MK. Personal attacks, calling people names, stating obvious facts, twisting and distorting someone's words, and all this shit only make people angry for no reason, clog up threads and give us utterly false impressions about each other. A laugh saves the day!
-
This by ED:
There's a problem with all this for me.
There’s a huge hole in the story that I just can't tell you about and if I did it would make sense of all this for you.
Stuff Chris, actually none of the musicians including John don't know, nor my office staff either.
And maybe they never will and it probably doesn’t matter.
It's a bit like buying a 1000 piece jigsaw puzzle and eventually finding 50 pieces are missing.
No, it wasn’t a good time but eventually it turned into the best time for him.
But it wasn’t as bad as the Communique late 79 episode.
Now THAT was truly fucked, the stuff of nightmares .
Ed already mentioned about that something in previous posts and had everyone of us wondering about it. Personally I thought it was something that at least John would be aware of, however I agree with Ed that it probably doesn't matter.
And in a way it does, as it would explain better all around the DS coming back, the OES recording sessions and the OES tour, but I guess that we all read a lot by people who's been there to make a general picture, so that's why I agree with Ed with it doesn't matter.
Yes, we are all so curious we would like to know to the smallest detail. But I'm ok with all what Ed and Chris told us. It was way more than I would ever dreamed.
I only wonder if there is anything more that Ed could tell us he didn't yet that would be important to understand any point of DS or MK solo career... Thanks Ed, Thanks Chris, Thanks Amit for provoking both of them to come here and talk about all of this. I'm quite certain that I was in part very guilty of that, first with my stupid comments about Chris playing and second with nonsense and bad informations I took as certains and stupidly posted here for years.
Sometimes a fan needs (has to) to be kicked out on his ass. Thanks again Chris and Ed. I love you both.
Well said, Jules... I agree it doesn't matter. I don't want to know how this magic trick works.
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The main problem I have with this forum, and something I’m fed up with beyond belief and something that seriously makes me think of abandoning the place too often (I won’t announce it, of course), is too many people taking too many things too fucking seriously. I know you can’t buy a sense of humour and you can’t learn to laugh at yourself, but these are my observations from all recent discussions.
Take the entire "raw material" drama. Started as an innocent comment from a fan dreaming about an obviously impossible idea of having raw videos from On The Night, it quickly attracted an army led by Captain Obvious, thinking we took hostages and demanded to give us raw material or we’d start killing them one by one. And we’re a bunch of dorks who think we can do a better job than a team of professionals. I mean, what the fuck?
Nearly every, even slightly controversial, statement sparks 20 pages of pointless back-and-forth with a blind person talking to a deaf person, at the end of which Ed and Chris announce their victory in defeating stupid fans. There are a million ways to stop these dreams in a more polite, fun and less dramatic way, but people prefer to choose violence. And I, for one, is not somebody willing to turn the other cheek.
While I truly respect having the chance to discuss matters with actual people involved in such matters, the aftertaste from these discussions honestly gives me a gag reflex. That’s, of course, only my opinion, and I can imagine another group of people who would destroy me for saying that, but I had to say it. It’s an opinion (noun, a view or judgement formed about something, not necessarily based on fact or knowledge).
Chill out, folks. As I said many times, it’s a humble discussion forum that exists solely for people to politely discuss all things MK. Personal attacks, calling people names, stating obvious facts, twisting and distorting someone's words, and all this shit only make people angry for no reason, clog up threads and give us utterly false impressions about each other. A laugh saves the day!
We're all grown ups here, for me a little bit of edge and as we say in the UK "taking the piss" makes everything more fund and interesting and I don't take any of this nonsense personally. If you feel something has crossed the line and broken rules, use the report function.
Where do you want to draw the line? Do you want Ed to stop "calling people names"? Should I be offended that Ed compared me to dead blonde legend and gay icon Dusty Springfield, even though most of those things apply to me also?
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Dear Ed, thank you for all the inputs and, of course, all your sense of humour that me laugh every time.
When I speak with my dear friend Brunno Ninny Nonny, I always said that what is speculation is only speculation. And, for some, these speculations turns a "possible" dream.
OK, there is a italian collector (now aka The Italian Collector) that have more secret material that we could imagine and, because of that, some of specific die-hard fans could dream about those things beeing as official releases.
However, for this kind of die-hard fans, there are tons and tons of bootlegs that fed all of their hungry. So, why make it official?
Beeing official wont bring anything new. It would be the same show, the same songs, played by the same people, bought by few, and now just... official.
There is no magic on this.
Once you have beeing caught by the Dire Straits desease, it's hard to beeing healthier again because it was a amazing band, with few songs and made great concerts. The hungry for something really new is understandable since Mark hasn't delivering, for us, ground-breaking new material since 2006.
I think that both DS or MK's Youtube channel, will release some "new" material over the time.
Answering rmarques821 about my poem (haha thx Ed): "looks like that he hates to be an artist"
The "looks like" is figurative.
His best 'on the ground' interview with him was with Kenny Brack. Mark was very relaxed and fun. As it should be. Not that behind BG desk talking about the songs.
Personal statement:
I joined this forum when my friend Brunno showed me some this forum messagens about The Italian Collector and a chance to hear some unpublished material plus a conversation with a "guy in the office" that could enter on the band's archive depot.
It was in 2018 and, until then, notthing happened.
I rarely listen to DS/MK since 2015 or something. I listen to Mark's new records once or twice and done. DS... years without put a song to play.
However, DS as a context, still moves me as a teenager seeking to be an artist. It refresh my thoughts to how be "romantic" on a pursuit for artistic identity. It still get me dreaming when i have my feet sticked on the ground.
I don't listen to DS/MK anymore to not beeing bored.
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And now Ed…. Please write that book!!!! ;D
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I just saw all the answers kindly provided by Ed (thank you for that), despite some painful kicks I received, I appreciate the flow of information provided. However, dear Ed, allow me to make a small addition regarding your considerations regarding my first posts in this specific topic:
At no time did I place myself as an important or relevant option to receive the material that I would like to see released in video form by the band's official channel (not that animation released on the official channel that any kid makes for fun, which gave rise to this topic), much less, qualified to take the artist's place, never, God forbid! With every post I've made I've made it clear (I know it won't happen), (in the utopia I conjectured (utopia, because of course they wouldn't do that)... even though it sounds like absolute nonsense to someone in your position, calm down, I've been conjecturing, I've made it clear in every comment I've made, here you've taken me too seriously, or I wasn't cautious enough in my conjecture and it sounded arrogant, I'm sorry for that, I didn't mean it that way. I'm aware of everything you've poured on me, I'm just a drop in the ocean, (IF) I had put myself in the position you've interpreted me in, I would immediately have ZERO relevance, that was my utopia, my DREAMLAND, (A daydream, if you prefer,I don't care). I know I'm a type of fan that belongs to an insignificant percentage of the general DS and MK audience, and here you pull me back to concrete reality, the overwhelming majority of people don't care about any of this that I would like to see released through official channels, I know that I belong to the wing of an insignificant minority to move any kind of effort towards this kind of release, but, thinking about it, the content of the live box would always be an object of desire for the wing that I belong to, the minority and it simply happened, and apparently, it sold well, in the end, I may have thought unconsciously, (who knows... unlikely things can happen, (you and Chris here are also an example.😅)
Being a fan can be a kind of delirium, especially a fan like I was until now (in certain aspects) and I don't intend to be anymore as a matter of honor. Thank you for your feedback on my conjecture about wanting almost desperately for this material to be released, based on the great feat that was the release of Box Live 78/92, which for me, was an achievement that really surprised me in recent years, in view of this release, I started to think too highly of seeing that all this material was all these years (decades) out of reach of the fans and I clearly see how foolish I have been in my DREAMLAND and even outside of it. The "preservation of the DS legacy" that I mentioned, believe me, was with the best intention of words, it is unnecessary to mention the redundancy that I have NOTHING to do with it, what I think about how it should be is my problem, it is only my point of view as a consumer. Don't think for a second that I disregard all the effort you and everyone around you have put into the DS material. I'm sure they couldn't be in better hands. The success of DS reveals the competence of all of you. The fact that there are some points of disagreement regarding the band's policy of official live releases is just the point of view of a fan who has just turned 40 and who, for more than half of his earthly existence, bought everything he could about DS (all the official records, CDs, DVDs) and who, after that, dove into the universe of bootlegs and discovered a new world, a counterpoint that led me to understand a little more about what Dire Straits really was, something that the official material never let me know. For this reason, I have been hungry for official releases like the aforementioned Box Live 78/92 for a long time.
Thank you again. It is impossible not to learn important things when interacting with someone like you.
Cheers!
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If so, why did he say in interviews that it was his favorite album. The only DS album he can listen to.
Because he was promoting and marketing it at the time?
Did you expect him to say: "You know what, this album we've just made is absolutely shit. I can't listen to it."
He spoke about it in interviews many years later after the publication of on every street.
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While I truly respect having the chance to discuss matters with actual people involved in such matters, the aftertaste from these discussions honestly gives me a gag reflex. That’s, of course, only my opinion, and I can imagine another group of people who would destroy me for saying that, but I had to say it. It’s an opinion (noun, a view or judgement formed about something, not necessarily based on fact or knowledge).
I think you're the only person that needs to chill out.
For my part, I just try to set the record straight sometimes, often in the face of people calling me 'annoying'. And now you saying our contributions give you a 'gag reflex'.
Seriously, is that meant to be funny, not taken too seriously?
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Mmmm ... Bucket of tits :wave
Anyway.
Great to read Ed's input again.
But regarding the OTHER forum; I knew they were running a tight ship over there, but what I'm reading here makes it sound like a fascist country. Like the US. (Ok, let's no go there.) But seriously, who decided the rules on that forum? Don't tell me Mark?!
-
I just saw all the answers kindly provided by Ed (thank you for that), despite some painful kicks I received, I appreciate the flow of information provided. However, dear Ed, allow me to make a small addition regarding your considerations regarding my first posts in this specific topic:
At no time did I place myself as an important or relevant option to receive the material that I would like to see released in video form by the band's official channel (not that animation released on the official channel that any kid makes for fun, which gave rise to this topic), much less, qualified to take the artist's place, never, God forbid! With every post I've made I've made it clear (I know it won't happen), (in the utopia I conjectured (utopia, because of course they wouldn't do that)... even though it sounds like absolute nonsense to someone in your position, calm down, I've been conjecturing, I've made it clear in every comment I've made, here you've taken me too seriously, or I wasn't cautious enough in my conjecture and it sounded arrogant, I'm sorry for that, I didn't mean it that way. I'm aware of everything you've poured on me, I'm just a drop in the ocean, (IF) I had put myself in the position you've interpreted me in, I would immediately have ZERO relevance, that was my utopia, my DREAMLAND, (A daydream, if you prefer,I don't care). I know I'm a type of fan that belongs to an insignificant percentage of the general DS and MK audience, and here you pull me back to concrete reality, the overwhelming majority of people don't care about any of this that I would like them to. released. Being a fan can be a kind of delirium, especially a fan like I was until now (in certain aspects) and I don't intend to be anymore as a matter of honor. Thank you for your feedback on my conjecture about wanting almost desperately for this material to be released, based on the great feat that was the release of Box Live 78/92, which for me, was an achievement that really surprised me in recent years, in view of this release, I started to think too highly of seeing that all this material was all these years (decades) out of reach of the fans and I clearly see how foolish I have been in my DREAMLAND and even outside of it. The "preservation of the DS legacy" that I mentioned, believe me, was with the best intention of words, it is unnecessary to mention the redundancy that I have NOTHING to do with it, what I think about how it should be is my problem, it is only my point of view as a consumer. Don't think for a second that I disregard all the effort you and everyone around you have put into the DS material. I'm sure they couldn't be in better hands. The success of DS reveals the competence of all of you. The fact that there are some points of disagreement regarding the band's policy of official live releases is just the point of view of a fan who has just turned 40 and who, for more than half of his earthly existence, bought everything he could about DS (all the official records, CDs, DVDs) and who, after that, dove into the universe of bootlegs and discovered a new world. A counterpoint that led me to understand a little more about what Dire Straits really was, something that the official material never let me know. For this reason, I have been hungry for official releases like the aforementioned Box Live 78/92 for a long time.
Thank you again. It is impossible not to learn important things when interacting with someone like you.
Cheers!
I understand you perfectly Brunno.
-
Example, there was a big disagreement about the CE video which I thought was mediocre but after spending £100,000 ( not the band ) we couldn’t change it and I lost that one!
Lesson…do not leave your artist alone in a bar at 2 am with a video director and a bottle of Chateau Rothschild Gnat’s Piss 1990
:D
-
Mmmm ... Bucket of tits :wave
Anyway.
Great to read Ed's input again.
But regarding the OTHER forum; I knew they were running a tight ship over there, but what I'm reading here makes it sound like fascist country. Like the US. (Ok, let's no go there.) But seriously, who decided the rules on that forum? Don't tell me Mark?!
It was Terry, to be fair to him it was semi official, moderating is never easy and making sure you don’t piss off the record company or management or whatever will make it even harder.
-
The main problem I have with this forum, and something I’m fed up with beyond belief and something that seriously makes me think of abandoning the place too often (I won’t announce it, of course), is too many people taking too many things too fucking seriously. I know you can’t buy a sense of humour and you can’t learn to laugh at yourself, but these are my observations from all recent discussions.
Take the entire "raw material" drama. Started as an innocent comment from a fan dreaming about an obviously impossible idea of having raw videos from On The Night, it quickly attracted an army led by Captain Obvious, thinking we took hostages and demanded to give us raw material or we’d start killing them one by one. And we’re a bunch of dorks who think we can do a better job than a team of professionals. I mean, what the fuck?
Nearly every, even slightly controversial, statement sparks 20 pages of pointless back-and-forth with a blind person talking to a deaf person, at the end of which Ed and Chris announce their victory in defeating stupid fans. There are a million ways to stop these dreams in a more polite, fun and less dramatic way, but people prefer to choose violence. And I, for one, is not somebody willing to turn the other cheek.
While I truly respect having the chance to discuss matters with actual people involved in such matters, the aftertaste from these discussions honestly gives me a gag reflex. That’s, of course, only my opinion, and I can imagine another group of people who would destroy me for saying that, but I had to say it. It’s an opinion (noun, a view or judgement formed about something, not necessarily based on fact or knowledge).
Chill out, folks. As I said many times, it’s a humble discussion forum that exists solely for people to politely discuss all things MK. Personal attacks, calling people names, stating obvious facts, twisting and distorting someone's words, and all this shit only make people angry for no reason, clog up threads and give us utterly false impressions about each other. A laugh saves the day!
We're all grown ups here, for me a little bit of edge and as we say in the UK "taking the piss" makes everything more fund and interesting and I don't take any of this nonsense personally. If you feel something has crossed the line and broken rules, use the report function.
Where do you want to draw the line? Do you want Ed to stop "calling people names"? Should I be offended that Ed compared me to dead blonde legend and gay icon Dusty Springfield, even though most of those things apply to me also?
hilarious....
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What the record company will try to cash in for BIA 40th aniversary release?
I think the only correct approach is about market and money.
Is there a way that releasing the full Live in Wembley Arena being worthly profitable for Universal ?
The record co works with what they are given, surely you get that?
Why does the 40th anniversary need celebrating at all, that album was beaten to death eons ago and I don’t need reminding of my age 👨🦳<<- old incontinent rock manager.
They don’t own the tapes so no, anyway, where are the tapes?
Dear uncle ED,
Big smile on my face reading you answer :wave
Isn't it funny that BIA 40th was announced a few hours after your post ?
Ok I was wrong about Wembley but the tapes from San Antone are in Guy's hands :clap :clap :clap
Your pessimistic view, despite being relevant, about the vaults can be proven wrong sometimes.
-
Mmmm ... Bucket of tits :wave
Anyway.
Great to read Ed's input again.
But regarding the OTHER forum; I knew they were running a tight ship over there, but what I'm reading here makes it sound like fascist country. Like the US. (Ok, let's no go there.) But seriously, who decided the rules on that forum? Don't tell me Mark?!
It was Terry, to be fair to him it was semi official, moderating is never easy and making sure you don’t piss off the record company or management or whatever will make it even harder.
Sure. That of course explains the limits on number of posts. But that you couldn't voice critical opinions is just too much and pointless. Good riddance, I'd say.
-
Is Terry still about? I met him at some Steve Phillips gigs - nice chap!
-
What the record company will try to cash in for BIA 40th aniversary release?
I think the only correct approach is about market and money.
Is there a way that releasing the full Live in Wembley Arena being worthly profitable for Universal ?
The record co works with what they are given, surely you get that?
Why does the 40th anniversary need celebrating at all, that album was beaten to death eons ago and I don’t need reminding of my age 👨🦳<<- old incontinent rock manager.
They don’t own the tapes so no, anyway, where are the tapes?
Dear uncle ED,
Big smile on my face reading you answer :wave
Isn't it funny that BIA 40th was announced a few hours after your post ?
Ok I was wrong about Wembley but the tapes from San Antone are in Guy's hands :clap :clap :clap
Your pessimistic view, despite being relevant, about the vaults can be proven wrong sometimes.
Funnily, some of fans guided Guy throught his forums to where search for the tapes...
-
BTW, it's an industry wide problem that old analog tapes have degraded over time, some have been mislaid, a massive amount were lost due to a big warehouse fire. Sometimes only a stereo master is available, sometimes only a digital copy.
-
What the record company will try to cash in for BIA 40th aniversary release?
I think the only correct approach is about market and money.
Is there a way that releasing the full Live in Wembley Arena being worthly profitable for Universal ?
The record co works with what they are given, surely you get that?
Why does the 40th anniversary need celebrating at all, that album was beaten to death eons ago and I don’t need reminding of my age 👨🦳<<- old incontinent rock manager.
They don’t own the tapes so no, anyway, where are the tapes?
Dear uncle ED,
Big smile on my face reading you answer :wave
Isn't it funny that BIA 40th was announced a few hours after your post ?
Ok I was wrong about Wembley but the tapes from San Antone are in Guy's hands :clap :clap :clap
Your pessimistic view, despite being relevant, about the vaults can be proven wrong sometimes.
Not sure how wrong Ed was here, we're getting a remastered version of something we have had for years. Welcome, but not as dramatic as the unheard Rainbow show.
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Not sure how wrong Ed was here, we're getting a remastered version of something we have had for years. Welcome, but not as dramatic as the unheard Rainbow show.
Just remastered?
Or newly mixed from a multitrack tape? :think
The point is that Ed was giving every reason why these shows are not to be released.
And all reasons were valid points.
But hopefully there are still some persons with the will to make it possible and spending time and money (they doesn't work for free do they?) to locate the stuff.
Regarding the 1992 september broadcast from Nimes.
I understantd that our beloved uncle ED is not remembering this, 30 years after the facts in a country that awarded him with a gold record by a disco band covering Dire Straits.
Again he gave thoeries about possible reasons for the tape to be lost.
First I remember watching the show again few years after on the public TV channel.
As everything aired by public TV in France is by law stored for archival pupose by INA I know that a backup copy exists.
And to my know they are serious with this.
Second although I have no proof, I would be surprised that Canal+ did not store the show in their own archive.
Third Canal+ and UMG are both subsidiaries of Vivendi, so despite being different entities they are owned by the same persons/companies.
So if UMG was willing to release or use part of this show these would be positive reasons to make it possible.
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Hopefully newly mixed. My understanding is that radio broadcasts from that time were usually stereo only but delighted if that’s not the case. Also AI can be used to make even mono sources multitrack these days.
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Hopefully newly mixed. My understanding is that radio broadcasts from that time were usually stereo only but delighted if that’s not the case. Also AI can be used to make even mono sources multitrack these days.
Well that really depends.
The KBFH show or even the BBC live recordings seems to be multitracks recordings.
I don't know if the german NDR or italian RAI are doing multitrack.
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I doubt BIA has been remixed.
Even if tv and radio recorded multi-track, it's doubtful they kept multi-tracks for 35-40 years and not just basic stereo tapes.
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I doubt BIA has been remixed.
Even if tv and radio recorded multi-track, it's doubtful they kept multi-tracks for 35-40 years and not just basic stereo tapes.
You are right but we thought the same regarding Rainbow 79 which was recorded to use some songs only on a documentary in 1980 and happened to be all songs in multitracks archived since then and now released in the DS live box.
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Guy said in his forum that he recently mixed the San Antonio recording.
LE
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I just saw all the answers kindly provided by Ed (thank you for that), despite some painful kicks I received, I appreciate the flow of information provided. However, dear Ed, allow me to make a small addition regarding your considerations regarding my first posts in this specific topic:
At no time did I place myself as an important or relevant option to receive the material that I would like to see released in video form by the band's official channel (not that animation released on the official channel that any kid makes for fun, which gave rise to this topic), much less, qualified to take the artist's place, never, God forbid! With every post I've made I've made it clear (I know it won't happen), (in the utopia I conjectured (utopia, because of course they wouldn't do that)... even though it sounds like absolute nonsense to someone in your position, calm down, I've been conjecturing, I've made it clear in every comment I've made, here you've taken me too seriously, or I wasn't cautious enough in my conjecture and it sounded arrogant, I'm sorry for that, I didn't mean it that way. I'm aware of everything you've poured on me, I'm just a drop in the ocean, (IF) I had put myself in the position you've interpreted me in, I would immediately have ZERO relevance, that was my utopia, my DREAMLAND, (A daydream, if you prefer,I don't care). I know I'm a type of fan that belongs to an insignificant percentage of the general DS and MK audience, and here you pull me back to concrete reality, the overwhelming majority of people don't care about any of this that I would like them to. released. Being a fan can be a kind of delirium, especially a fan like I was until now (in certain aspects) and I don't intend to be anymore as a matter of honor. Thank you for your feedback on my conjecture about wanting almost desperately for this material to be released, based on the great feat that was the release of Box Live 78/92, which for me, was an achievement that really surprised me in recent years, in view of this release, I started to think too highly of seeing that all this material was all these years (decades) out of reach of the fans and I clearly see how foolish I have been in my DREAMLAND and even outside of it. The "preservation of the DS legacy" that I mentioned, believe me, was with the best intention of words, it is unnecessary to mention the redundancy that I have NOTHING to do with it, what I think about how it should be is my problem, it is only my point of view as a consumer. Don't think for a second that I disregard all the effort you and everyone around you have put into the DS material. I'm sure they couldn't be in better hands. The success of DS reveals the competence of all of you. The fact that there are some points of disagreement regarding the band's policy of official live releases is just the point of view of a fan who has just turned 40 and who, for more than half of his earthly existence, bought everything he could about DS (all the official records, CDs, DVDs) and who, after that, dove into the universe of bootlegs and discovered a new world. A counterpoint that led me to understand a little more about what Dire Straits really was, something that the official material never let me know. For this reason, I have been hungry for official releases like the aforementioned Box Live 78/92 for a long time.
Thank you again. It is impossible not to learn important things when interacting with someone like you.
Cheers!
I understand you perfectly Brunno.
Thank you, my dear.🙌🏻🎸🔥
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ATTENTION! The below post is from Ed Bicknell, thanks again Ed!
All,
Following the exchanges prompted by my last contribution I have a few comments which I’m not going to make reply specific so as to save Dusty rerunning the posts endlessly ( sometimes to drop in just a few words ) .
Nor am I going to get into correspondence about the main points I was making ie about the bonkers idea of giving tapes ( in whatever format) to fans to mix or whatever and then distribute.
That has been beaten senseless I think and as we are all agreed will never happen anyway.
To those who responded in detail, thank you.
I get what your saying but it's a dead issue ..I was writing about the idea in principle and although I stand by what I said, my response was a good example of why writing in annoyance/irritation is never a good idea.
So just picking up from the TOWN CRIER image of Dusty’s uncle Elmer Buchanan somewhere in Scotland announcing Blue Nile gigs ( ie from reply 172 ) ..
When I stepped down as M’s manager I made a promise to myself that I would not get involved in, comment on or “interfere" with anything that PC or MK or JI did AFTER that date and I have stuck to that.
But because I agreed to the Q and A on this site it was inevitable that I would comment on various issues and scenarios that have occurred over the last 25 years and try as best as my memory would allow to correct some of the factually incorrect and frequently deluded information that pops up regularly on the AMIT site.
As a general point I cannot recall which shows were recorded, in what fashion or who by, let alone the location of multi tracks or whatever, a subject which has gripped my intellect unceasingly because I'd LOVE to know if any recording exists of the rewritten lyric to “ The Man’s Too Strong” from the BIA tour.
Now THAT would be worth finding…tabloid fodder of the first order!
ALL of the releases of compilations since 2001, assorted live material and the 78-92 Boxed live set, have taken place AFTER I quit, so have had nothing to do with me and other than any comments I may have made, I know nothing about them.
As must be clear by now, I make a distinction between the AMIT “fans” and the general music public, and I do understand that what you guys/ladies are interested in getting hold of is different to what the general listener is interested in or even cares/knows about.
If I had been involved I might have done things differently but I don't know what PC/MK/GF have to work with and where they’ve accessed stuff from.
The criticism I read about how all that’s been handled is uninformed …I can understand your frustration but I don't have enough information to accurately comment so I won’t.
I was however HUGELY amused to see that within a few hours of posting my comments, almost miraculously a BIA 40th anniversary album including the 85 San Antonio show is to be released ( replies 201/206 ), ironically from the dullest town in Texas.
You have read my constant references to “ where are the tapes?”
What I should have made clear is that I’m referring to the material that our contract partners ( Phonogram UK ) would..or should…have stored , logged and made sure were looked after in a manner which saved tapes etc from degrading, getting lost/stolen, being damaged and so on.
That did not happen as efficiently as it might hence all this muddle about where they might be and who owns eg the Canal Plus broadcast referenced in this thread which belongs to them .since they paid for it.
Phonogram ( or Warners ) were not involved AT ALL in the recording of that San Antonio show and for sure neither I nor DS organised it so it must have been a third party, Westwood One perhaps?
Whoever it was would have kept the tapes because “he who pays, owns” so I can only assume that’s where the source for the BIA release has come from, the one Guy has remixed, NOT from the “where are the tapes” scenario I have been referring to .
I have zero memory of any shows other than those you already know about that might have been recorded. I'd completely forgotten that the 1979 Rainbow shows were taped, I assume for the Arena documentary?
I’d forgotten Phil Lynott was there let alone played, those shows JUST scraped by, M wanted to cancel and all of us were exhausted, fed up, pissed off..the 79 near disaster I’ve alluded to.
So listen to them in that context.
I will say that “something new” coming from DS, especially if it’s 30 year old live stuff, is, I’m sure, of zero interest to the general public.
NO ONE cares as a few of you seem to accept ( the classic “silent fart” comment although that was applied to M …just hilarious ).
So the sales such as they are depend on the die hard fans ..you and a relatively few others, not the 36 million plus who bought BIA, 25 million + of which DIDN’T buy OES and the way, way fewer who haven’t bought his solo stuff ( I accept not everything can be measured in numbers).
Just one point I have to respond to ( reply 188 from Pavel ).
Please be assured that neither Chris W or I have any interest in “ defeating stupid fans”.
That’s just silly …..we are trying to HELP and the other AMITS get the facts and motivations correct, tell it like it WAS, not how you THINK it was.
I don't categorise anyone as being “stupid" when they don't have the information, only when their incorrect opinions are borne out of complete ignorance resulting in nonsensical speculation, the consequence of the “delirium” Brunno describes ( I completely get that ).
There’s a difference, or should I just not bother and let what is incorrect stand ( too late now)?
Which brings me to my last point and I’m going to state something blindingly obvious.
There are two issues with this site ( and sites like it ).
Language and geography.
Imagine that instead of writing back and forwards emails, someone organised a DS/MK Convention and invited Chris, myself, others and imagine they all turned up ( not MK ..I don't think that would float his boat) and you were able to ask questions DIRECTLY.
Do you think for one minute that the “violence” Pavel rather exaggeratedly describes would occur?
That the dialogue would become as confrontational as it seems to rather too often , usually when based on speculation not fact?
No. Of course not.
With a few exceptions you would find out all you want to know ( or at least think you want to know) , the good manners we all have would play their part and the Dire Straits Experience would come along for a modest fee and I could sit in and have a drum battle with young Chris which he’d win on “ MFN “ ( his favourite) and I’d win on “ Railroad Working” ( mine).
Barbados would be quite a good choice of venue, def not the US right now..
Over to you…...
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He really is reading all this!!!! :lol
Thank you, Ed, you are really great!
LE
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Great post from ED :clap
"Railroad Working” is in my top 2 NHB performed live song, the other one being "Feel like going home"
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Brilliant idea from Ed for a DS/MK convention!
If he is serious, then I would nominate London as the place.
Maybe Alan Clark can also be invited along to play some solo DS piano pieces from his Backstory album?
I notice AC has been left out of the people listed as being interviewed for the liner notes of the upcoming BIA set - would have thought he would have had a large input in the making of the album and would have been nice to get his memories of that period as well, but looks like he may still be in the "bad books" due to the all the Legacy stuff?
BTW I posted a message on Guy's forum in November asking if they had thought of checking with Westwood One if they had any tapes from their broadcasts and GF's reply was "I will forward this to the team" - would be interesting to know if that had anything to do with the new live set or if they were already on the case, but GF has recently posted " I can’t comment on how the tapes became available."
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Brilliant idea from Ed for a DS/MK convention!
If he is serious, then I would nominate London as the place.
I'd say the word "imagine" suggests more than a hint of hypotheticality, nay, unlikelihood.
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I doubt BIA has been remixed.
Even if tv and radio recorded multi-track, it's doubtful they kept multi-tracks for 35-40 years and not just basic stereo tapes.
Guy Fletcher has stated on his Instagram ""it was a privilege to revisist the wonderes of Neil Dorfsman´s beautiful recording to create the Atmos mixes, and the new Atmos instrumentals made with use of airsound spatial technology."
So yes we get a remix in Atmos :D
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Hopefully newly mixed. My understanding is that radio broadcasts from that time were usually stereo only but delighted if that’s not the case. Also AI can be used to make even mono sources multitrack these days.
That being the case, can't any or all radio or TV recordings be made and released by separating the audio like the Beatles did for Now and Then? please feel free to correct me, I know nothing about this.
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Hopefully newly mixed. My understanding is that radio broadcasts from that time were usually stereo only but delighted if that’s not the case. Also AI can be used to make even mono sources multitrack these days.
That being the case, can't any or all radio or TV recordings be made and released by separating the audio like the Beatles did for Now and Then? please feel free to correct me, I know nothing about this.
Not just Now and Then, they have been using it for lots of early tracks where the stereo versions used to sound really crappy, with drums and bass in one channel and vocals in the other.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EDtBq6FnlCY
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Guy said in his forum that he recently mixed the San Antonio recording.
LE
Could be ignorance of mine. However, I feel that these ATMOS mixes are like a 'shot to the moon'.
Sounds like MK management are trying to replicate the Brothers In Arms success during the CD fever. So, when Airsound Spatial and ATMOS will boomed (I don't know if it have already boomed), the only thing to proper listen to would be DS/MK remixes stuff.
I never listened music thru these technologies. So, I don't know how it feels like. I don't know if the new mixes have a different behaviour thru those new tech.
However, for my taste (or maybe because my ignorance), I kinda dislike the GF mixing style. The songs sounds too flat to my ears.
I listened a couple of songs from the Live At BBC and Alchemy and compared the old and the new mixes. (Again) To my ears, the old mix sounds more organic than the new one. The new one have more clarity than the old. However, I miss some dirt.
I listened to the Walk Of Life (San Antonio) and... I don't know. Something is missing.... Keys are too low. MK's guitar to high.... I dunno.
I still got my 1996 remixes and they sound best than ever.
Again, could be ignorance of mine.
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I listened to the Walk Of Life (San Antonio) and... I don't know. Something is missing.... Keys are too low. MK's guitar to high.... I dunno.
Totally agree, another disaster mix by GF, I hope the other songs are better ...
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I personally think the 1996 remixes sound noticeably worse than the original CDs…
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Saw this elsewhere and thought some might find it interesting in the context of the OES chat, 1991 UK total album sales figures.
(https://i.imgur.com/hTxWKTm_d.webp?maxwidth=1520&fidelity=grand)
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I listened to the Walk Of Life (San Antonio) and... I don't know. Something is missing.... Keys are too low. MK's guitar to high.... I dunno.
Totally agree, another disaster mix by GF, I hope the other songs are better ...
Again agree here and this should be one of the simplest songs, just your basic rock ’n roll track. I’ve lost my hope long time ago for enjoyable mixes.
The 1996 releases are not remixes but remasters, not too big of a difference to originals.
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I listened to the Walk Of Life (San Antonio) and... I don't know. Something is missing.... Keys are too low. MK's guitar to high.... I dunno.
Totally agree, another disaster mix by GF, I hope the other songs are better ...
I said that I dislike the new mixes "for my taste".
GF made crystal clear elegant mixes. It's possible to hear a pin drop. However, for my taste, needs punch.
Maybe on a correct equipment and played loud, it sound excelent.
About San Antonio, maybe some tracks could have some noise and it could affect the desirable mix. However, I doubt that GF would deal with noysy tracks.
I personally think the 1996 remixes sound noticeably worse than the original CDs…
My On Every Street CD (maybe Alchemy too) is the only original that I have. All the rest are the 1996 remasters.
Maybe, because of that, I like them so much ;D
The 1996 releases are not remixes but remasters, not too big of a difference to originals.
YES! correct.
Remasters.
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These multitracks come from a radio recording that might be less good than a studio recording, at least they are made with different purposes and different standards of quality, it's not the same if the final product would be a radio broadcast or a commercial release.
But that's the only thing they managed to find anyway.
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Saw this elsewhere and thought some might find it interesting in the context of the OES chat, 1991 UK total album sales figures.
(https://i.imgur.com/hTxWKTm_d.webp?maxwidth=1520&fidelity=grand)
? do not see sales numbers here?
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Star is platinum (300k)
Black circle gold (100k)
White circle silver (50k I think from memory)
According to this site OES stalled at 2 x platinum, compared with 15 x platinum for BiA...
https://www.bpi.co.uk/brit-certified
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Yes, when you check the figures at the Wikipedia entry for On Every Street, it states 600.000 sold copies in the UK and around 5.26 million copies worldwide.
About 5 million albums would be phantastic in most of the cases but with a predecessor that sold 26 million it is no surprise that it is viewed as a failure.
(5 Mio is more than sales of Love Over Gold or the first Album.)
LE
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This is nonsense to say that a double platinum stalled because the one before did way better.
How many double platinum awarded artist would think that way?
This is were bias are starting.
BIA is in the "out of competition" category, this is the exception, the abnormal.
OES should be compared to all other Dire Straits releases but BIA.
Of course OES suffers from comparaison with BIA but the norm in popular music is more to have a very big selling album once and then struggle to make it bigger each time, let alone staying close. Or sometime waiting for 10 or 20 years...
Dire Straits remains greatly successful.
Star is platinum (300k)
Black circle gold (100k)
White circle silver (50k I think from memory)
According to this site OES stalled at 2 x platinum, compared with 15 x platinum for BiA...
https://www.bpi.co.uk/brit-certified
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Well KBFH or Westwood were using a good mobile studio as some others radio
Maybe they do not spend extensive production work as a record company would do then to issue a live album but I would say that the raw tapes are probably close in recording quality.
I read critics about Guy work but I still think that the allowed budget for the 20's mixes are way lower that it used to be in 90's even if technology is helping and things can be released faster now.
Listen to Rick Beato on that take.
These multitracks come from a radio recording that might be less good than a studio recording, at least they are made with different purposes and different standards of quality, it's not the same if the final product would be a radio broadcast or a commercial release.
But that's the only thing they managed to find anyway.
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I listened to the Walk Of Life (San Antonio) and... I don't know. Something is missing.... Keys are too low. MK's guitar to high.... I dunno.
Totally agree, another disaster mix by GF, I hope the other songs are better ...
I thought so too, until I heard the previous Atmos releases on my Yamaha sorrund system that supports it. Loud and crystal clear the Atmos has more "room", depth and clarity.
It is like MK is sitting right in front of you and the musicians around you, best way to describe it.
Not just surround, it better than that.
OES should NEVER be compared to BIA. Its like comparing any other of the greats artists nr. 1 album of all time to a later of their albums. It is unfair comparison.
I said that I dislike the new mixes "for my taste".
GF made crystal clear elegant mixes. It's possible to hear a pin drop. However, for my taste, needs punch.
Maybe on a correct equipment and played loud, it sound excelent.
About San Antonio, maybe some tracks could have some noise and it could affect the desirable mix. However, I doubt that GF would deal with noysy tracks.
I personally think the 1996 remixes sound noticeably worse than the original CDs…
My On Every Street CD (maybe Alchemy too) is the only original that I have. All the rest are the 1996 remasters.
Maybe, because of that, I like them so much ;D
The 1996 releases are not remixes but remasters, not too big of a difference to originals.
YES! correct.
Remasters.
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not sure where else to drop this one, so just doing it here:
https://www.forbes.com/sites/hughmcintyre/2025/03/27/dire-straits-shoot-up-the-charts-decades-after-the-band-split/
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not sure where else to drop this one, so just doing it here:
https://www.forbes.com/sites/hughmcintyre/2025/03/27/dire-straits-shoot-up-the-charts-decades-after-the-band-split/
Too slow grandad
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This is nonsense to say that a double platinum stalled because the one before did way better.
How many double platinum awarded artist would think that way?
They ALL do.
You are supposed to continually build on your success, not go backwards.
Also, it hurts people's pride when friends and contemporaries are ahead of you in the charts - Tina Turner, Genesis, Eurythmics, Simply Red etc