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Dire Straits


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Posted

Bleeeeeeech. I don't like Dire Straits. When they come on the satellite radio I immediately change it. Mark Knopfler is a great player. He has a killer tone, brilliant technique, and a unique guitar voice. You can tell it's him instantly. I respect that. How many of us can say the same? However, I hate the songs and the singing. Can I respect a player's ability and still hate his material? I hope so.

Posted

Bleeeeeeech. I don't like Dire Straits. When they come on the satellite radio I immediately change it. Mark Knopfler is a great player. He has a killer tone, brilliant technique, and a unique guitar voice. You can tell it's him instantly. I respect that. How many of us can say the same? However, I hate the songs and the singing. Can I respect a player's ability and still hate his material? I hope so.

 

I have tons of bands like that, I appreciate the idea of the band more than the band itself, and it usually revolves around mediocre song writing.

 

I don't care how good you are, if you can't write songs, gtfo. Songwriting is key.

Posted

I'm in agreement here I love Knopfler but Dire Straits doesn't do much for me. I Love Knopflers solo stuff - Sailing to Philidelphia - is a really cool different album. And his version of Romeo and Juliet is one of my favorite songs to play.

Posted

They're good enough to get their money for nothin' and their chicks for free...........Just sayin'........[smile] ...

Posted

They're good enough to get their money for nothin' and their chicks for free...........Just sayin'........[smile] ...

And how many actually relate to "Sultains of Swing?" I bet many who have not been there.

 

Putting you in a place you have never been to me is telling the story.

Posted

Bleeeeeeech. I don't like Dire Straits. When they come on the satellite radio I immediately change it. Mark Knopfler is a great player. He has a killer tone, brilliant technique, and a unique guitar voice. You can tell it's him instantly. I respect that. How many of us can say the same? However, I hate the songs and the singing. Can I respect a player's ability and still hate his material? I hope so.

 

you'll have to do better than that to take my "king troll" crown [biggrin]

Posted

There are only a couple of songs on their best of CD I have that I skip when I'm driving. I can really get into some of them and yes the guitar work is unique and awesome.

Posted
Can I respect a player's ability and still hate his material?

 

 

Of course you can dude, nothing wrong with that. I know lots of people that would say you can't but IMO it's completely possible, in fact I love some guitar player's tone, licks, and overall attitude, but I care very little for the bands they play with or the songs.

Posted

They're good enough to get their money for nothin' and their chicks for free...........Just sayin'........[smile] ...

:) :) :)

Posted

The early stuff is much better.

 

Craig

 

I have the first album. I also have the one with Emmylou Harris and that's pretty good. She definitely adds something.

Posted

I don't know. That first one sounds like a Strat to me.

 

I'm not sure if the first one was a Fender Stratocaster or one of the Schecter Stratocasters that Knopfler played for a while, but yeah they look like regular single coils. But the Pensa Suhr he uses in Brother's In Arms has EMGs.

Posted

They're good enough to get their money for nothin' and their chicks for free...........Just sayin'........[smile] ...

 

 

This gets a +1 from me. Best comment in the whole thread. [thumbup]

Posted

TG-

 

I think you nailed it with reference to Damian's comment. Kinda absorbs the criticism.

 

My understanding is that the band - and Knopfler's playing - were considered a bit too out of the ordinary sort of rock star material at first.

 

He's just a kid - almost four years younger to the day than I am - but he grew up in the era of a lotta experimenting with electric technique among kids switching from folkie stuff to playing electric that didn't require the physical picking power of an acoustic.

 

Note, for example, McGuinn tends to play with a flat pick and finger picks on middle and ring fingers. That's not just rock, I played country with a guy who did the same on a Jazzmaster and could make you swear it was a pedal steel.

 

But yeah, I think you can appreciate a musician's ability without caring to listen to his or her music. I could listen to Joe Pass until a metaphorically very warm place needs snow shovels, have mixed emotion about Charlie Byrd's Brazilian jazz, and didn't really care much for some of the big names of my earlier years or a lotta the guys playing today that I mostly ignore.

 

Maybe that latter is age - youth to the younger players, age to the ones of their own youth. I dunno. Again... figure that Knopfler was born before 1950... OTOH, Clapton is a cupla months older than I am. I kinda chuckled about one young guy's critique of Clapton in the 80s wearing a suit 'cuz that's just exactly what a lotta the really old blues guys tended to wear for gigs instead of variations of late 1960s hippy and yippie grunge apparel that seems to continue into today's world.

 

<grin> I can't point my finger too much at the "just wear what you wear" guys, though, 'cuz that's how I tend to play, but it depends on venue and circumstances. Heck, a lotta the time I'm even still wearing my hat. That's not necessarily "country," 'cuz John Lee Hooker wore his a lot on stage too, as I recall.

 

m

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