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Credit: Far Out \/ Aherrero<\/p>\n
Fri 21 August 2026 16:00, UK <\/p>\n
Mark Knopfler<\/a> is a musician who defies all expectations, and let me explain why.\u00a0<\/p>\n I can\u2019t speak on behalf of the rest of my writing cohort, both here at Far Out and within the wider musical world, but while I\u2019m quite happy to sit here and write about and critique music, by no means does that translate to me having any kind of musical ability. Give me an album, and I\u2019ll give you a fully comprehensive review, sure, but give me a guitar, and all I can provide is a racket.\u00a0<\/p>\n It\u2019s for that reason that Mark Knopfler defies expectations as he\u2019s a wonderful blend of both critic and creative. There are a few more out there; I\u2019ve got a few friends in journalism who are also in pretty great bands, but none have gone on to have the kind of career that Knopfler has.\u00a0<\/p>\n He started out as a journalist who used to write a great deal about music, and you can only assume that such a career path at first gave him an ear that has led to the creation of some of the greatest rock songs in recent times. His riffs, his ability to master tone, and his general excellence<\/a> when it comes to understanding what makes a great song are all something to be marvelled at.\u00a0<\/p>\n One of the things that stands out the most about the Dire Straits frontman is his commitment to the sound of his guitar. He\u2019s not complacent, merely using effect pedals and amps like a lot of different musicians, but he will switch guitars around, even during shows, in a bid to get the greatest tone out of his six-string, depending on what song he is playing. His obsession with the sound that people can get out of their guitars comes from an early age, as the first axe he ever got was inspired by the tone of Hank B Marvin<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cAll I wanted was a red electric guitar, and the only reason I wanted a red electric guitar was because of the sound made by one of my all-time favourite guitar players,\u201d said Knopfler when discussing the playing style of Marvin, \u201cand I still wish I could get a guitar to sound the way he gets it to sound. And he actually recorded this tune, so he knows it.\u201d<\/p>\n That devotion to the great sound that different guitars can make<\/a> is ever-present in his career to this day. He will switch around the guitar that he wants to use, even when performing, to make sure that songs sound right. This is predominantly a good thing, but it can also pose some great challenges for the guitarist.\u00a0<\/p>\n Further reading: From The Vault<\/p>\n One of these challenges presented itself in the 1982 song \u2018Telegraph Road\u2019, which has two major sections, both of which require different instruments. One is the electric component, for which Knopfler is happy to use a standard electric guitar, and the other is the acoustic portion, and this poses some other difficulties as he insists on playing a six-string from 1937<\/a> in order to get everything ringing right, specifically the National Style \u2018O\u2019 resonator. He admitted that playing the song is incredibly difficult, as the aged nature of the guitar means it\u2019s hard to nail the playing with it.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cPlaying the beginning of \u2018Telegraph Road\u2019 always seems hard when you\u2019re going from a spiffy electric to that old war horse,\u201d he revealed, \u201cYou\u2019ve just got to brace your hands for an old guitar from the 1930s. So that\u2019s all part of the challenge of that song, when the guitar itself doesn\u2019t want to play pretty.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
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<\/a> The Far Out Classic Rock Newsletter<\/p>\n