 Remembrance Day |
| Review Date: September 19, 2009 |
| Reviewer: Old Blue, New Hampshire, USA |
From the days of Dire Straits to the present I have long thought that Mark Knopfler is a genius.
As for "Get Lucky": A guy I knew and worked with for many years was killed last year in Afghanistan. The first time I heard "Remembrance Day" I instantly thought of him and cried like a baby for a couple of minutes, something I hadn't done before, even at the time of his death. Enough said. |
'I have become a bit of a veteran at this music thing' -- and it shows in every gorgeous note
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| Review Date: September 15, 2009 |
| Reviewer: Jesse Kornbluth, New York |
"I'm writing too many songs, and then I have to put them out --- I'm sorry," Mark Knopfler said at the start of what seems like our annual phone call.
But if Knopfler is going to make CDs like 'Get Lucky', he can call me every few months --- these eleven songs are completely original short stories and character sketches, set against music by one of the planet's greater guitarists. That the quality is uniformly high is no surprise.
What did take me aback --- and what will make fans of Dire Straits and Knopfler's previous solo releases shake their heads --- is that Knopfler seems to have assembled this CD without regard for the commercial marketplace. Nothing that says "automatic Top 10" jumps out at you like 'Punish the Monkey (Let the Organ Grinder Go)' from 'Kill to Get Crimson' or 'Boom Like That' from 'Shangri-La'.
The likely result: The guy whose band sold 120 million records has made a CD that will be appreciated mostly by hardcore fans --- and the smallest cohort of music lovers: smart, literate grownups.
An unwillingness --- or is it an inability? --- to compromise. A curiosity, at 60, about songwriting that explores new personal territory. A concern, in all things, for authenticity. You don't have to talk to Mark Knopfler long before you realize that these are bred in the bone. Listen:
Jesse Kornbluth: Three words: Dire Straits reunion.
Mark Knopfler (audible sigh): These days, it does seem to be the style. But putting the brakes on when I did [he disbanded Dire Straits in 1995] was right. I'm happy with the way things are.
JK: We're talking about the easiest $300 million you'll ever make!
MK: I'm looking to do more of what I do --- improve my recordings and playing the new music live, enjoying the variations that brings.
JK: At a conference, I heard Steve Jobs quote The Beatles: "You and I have memories longer than the road that stretches out ahead." I hear that idea running through your new CD. There's a lot of life experience --- people on the far side of young love, lost comrades, memories of a distant childhood.
MK: The road ahead --- yes, it's a different picture. I have become a bit of a veteran at this music thing, so there's some of what made me. One song, 'Cleaning My Gun', is from the vet's viewpoint, the survivor's viewpoint. I've made a couple of notes where it's possible to tell you the background of some of the songs. But I try not to interfere too much or explain. I don't want to spoil the songs for you; I'd prefer that it's going to be what you want it to be.
JK: In 'Remembrance Day', you sing the names of those --- war dead, it seems --- now under the "earthen roof". Are they men you knew?
MK: It's just a list of boys. It begins with a cricket team. In a lot of communities, cricket teams and football teams --- and in America, baseball teams --- were the kids who went to war.
JK: That's the closest you come to social criticism on this CD. There's no wry, angry song like "Punish the Monkey". Is Knopfler mellowing?
MK: The older I get, the more grouchy I become. I have some equally disagreeable friends who are walking partners with me in the morning. We get most of our bile out then. By the time I get home, I feel better.
JK: I think of a Bruce Springsteen CD that, according to his manager, had no obvious hit single. Bruce went home and dashed off 'Dancing in the Dark'. And the entire world bought 'Born in the USA'. In contrast, I fear that 'Get Lucky' will be under-appreciated because it's merely gorgeous.
MK: It does occur to me I need to have someone like that.
JK: I see you have one concert scheduled this month --- then your schedule looks blank until May of 2010. This can't be.
MK: I'm trying to work out a way to pop over to America and do Prairie Home Companion or Letterman, just by myself. And there will be a tour from April to July.
JK: Didn't Dire Straits once do 250 concerts in a year?
MK: When you're young and in a band, it's like you have a football under your arm ---- you're running. But some of that is running away.
JK: Fender has just launched the Mark Knopfler Stratocaster. Do you use it or just endorse it?
MK: I play it on stage instead of my old one. It works better. It has all the things I specified: a rosewood finger board, nice big smooth frets. Other owners seem to like it too.
JK: Michael Jordan wore a new pair of Nike shoes every night. Do you have more than one Knopfler Strat?
MK: I can make a lot of money for charity by playing one at an event and then selling it. So I'll generally be using a new one....
JK: I see your high standards as an affront to our rapidly deteriorating culture. They reassure those of us who care about these things that we're not alone, not crazy. In that sense, "Get Lucky" is a comfort. Can you relate?
MK: There's been an erosion, and not just in the United States. It becomes more important for people who regard themselves as having the ability to discern and feel to stand tall.
JK: So market-directed music....
MK: I'm sorry. Those words are meaningless to me.
'Get Lucky' is Exhibit A.
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Mark knopfler does it again
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| Review Date: September 16, 2009 |
| Reviewer: MLS, Olympia, Wa/ |
| I own virtually every piece of work this man has done clear back to Dire Straits. I've been blessed to see him twice in concert at a local winery, sitting out in the grass, sipping wine, making friends sitting in the immediate area and seeing firsthand the absolute genius Knopfler is blessed with. Get lucky did not let me down. I am thrilled that there's a bit of the "known" Knopfler and a bit of his "roots" in this work. A man who knows who he is, likes what he does and draws you in with every note and word whether it be traditional Knopfler or Knopfler ready to embrace his heritage. I love it! Buy it! A true "Piper To The End".....thumbs up for the sentiment and the song......beautifully done. |
ABSOLUTE GROWER, AND A MUST HAVE FOR SURE!
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| Review Date: December 1, 2009 |
| Reviewer: AURELIEN, LYON - FRANCE |
First only lending a ear and not paying close attention to the album, I said to myself : "well, not as inspired as prevouis ones". But how wrong I was, when I really started giving it the attention the album deserves.
MK's music is as classy, subtle, accurate as ever, and his words always inspiring and full of imagery. It can but touch your soul.
If one had to define GET LUCKY, one could say that it has quiet a strong Irish/Scottish Flavour. See for exemple the great up tempo 1st single "Border Reiver", the tasteful "Before Gas and TV" set in days of yore, the emotional and excellent piece of writing that's "So Far From The Clyde", and the closer "Piper to the End", an hommage to MK's oncle Freddie who died a piper in the British army in France, during WWI.
Then you have what I would call the great, great, great folk songs such as "Get Lucky" and its exquisite flute, or else the wondrous 2nd single "Remembrance Day", sung with a children choir made up of some of the musicians', studio techs and staff's children and wives, among which Isabella et Katya Knopfler, MK's daughters and their mother Kitty (Aldridge) Knopfler.
The rest is inspired by a kind of 60's rock, tainted with accents of blues and Honky Tonk : "You Can't Beat The House" (mu only skipper), "Cleaning My Gun" (reminding a bit of an old DIRE STRAITS' classic called HEAVY FUEL), "The Car was the One".
To finish, I'd like to comment upon 2 surprising titles which are just great too :
"Hard Shoulder", which sounds like a cruise ship song with French horns and strings.
"Monteleone", a Waltz Disney kind of waltz paying tribute to American guitar builder, John Monteleone, which is a perfect choice for wintery evenings at the light and heat of the mantelpiece.
Just one last very personal thing about the Get Lucky album :
Here I'm giving you my own perfect playlist, including one or two previously unreleased tracks, and removing others.
Do what you please of it...
1/ BORDER REIVER (1st single)
2/ HARD SHOULDER
3/ HOME BOY (I LOVE IT!!!! PREVIOUSLY UNRELEASED AND AVAILABLE IN THE GET LUCKY BOX SET)
4/ EARLY BIRD (edited) (I LOVE IT!!!!) - Could have been a fantastic single! YOU LUCKY AMERICANS CAN GET IT THROUGH AMAZON.COM
5/ BEFORE GAS AND TV
6/ MONTELEONE (WHAT A TREAT!!!)
7/ CLEANING MY GUN (Third possible single)
8/ REMEMBRANCE DAY (JUST PERFECT!!! - Second single)
9/ GET LUCKY (Fourth possible single - already used a lot on the radio)
10/ SO FAR FROM THE CLYDE (THIIISSSSS! IS A PIECE OF STORY TELLING!!!)
11/ PIPER TO THE END
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Mark Knopfler is home
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| Review Date: September 29, 2009 |
| Reviewer: Piperdoc, Maryland USA |
I was explaining to my 13 year old daughter why Mark Knopfler is my all time favorite musician and artist. My explanation was that his music embodies all of the things that music can bring and add to one's experience when one matures. Mark Knopfler is at a point where he does not need to wow all with raging guitar solos. That is for the young. His themes have changed to clearly represent who he truly is and what he holds dear. When one is young, it is the gaining or losing of love, infatuation, and the enjoyment of youth and the promise for what one can become and the fear of not becoming something of merit. Mark Knopfler's earlier songs with Dire Straits had a higher percentage of these types of themes. They were also higher in octane over all, representing the stage of life he was in when he was performing in Dire Straits. He has moved past this in a way that reflects intelligence and subtlety and maturity, a very interesting maturity at that.
My belief is that through writing the soundtracks for Cal, Local Hero, Last Exit to Brooklyn, Shot at Glory, Princess Bride, working in the Notting Hillbillies, and Chet Atkins, all of these things enabled him to weave the musical culture and heritage of Northern England and Scotland, with American blues and country influences. This is where he is today. He is home with a style that is all his own. His songs are the stories that represent nostalgia of his youthful experiences and his formative time in the North of England/Scotland (the Car Was the One/Get Lucky/So Far From the Clyde/Before Gas and TV/Cleaning My Gun), as well as the sacrifice that others make on our behalf (Remembrance Day), the acknowledgment of great skill (Monteleone), the blues tinged You Can't Beat the House. But my favorite one of all is A Piper to the End. Mostly because it uses images of a piper (his uncle in this case) as a representative of one's essence or your soul when we go off the great beyond, with his hoping that he can still meet the uncle he never did meet. But still this song is about hope, the hope for something better, ending up in a better place when it is all over, and faithful friends. This song is utterly gorgeous like this album. |
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