MK on the new Johnny Winter album

[nababo]

And don't forget that Buddy Guy contribution and the 2 Jools Holland pieces. Great!

Oh, really, that Buddy Guy album is one of the best blues records ever released! But again, older collaborations, in my opinion, are far superior than more recente ones, with a bunch of exceptions already quoted.

P.S.: vgonis, is Greece coming to Brazil next year? 

[El Macho]

I also like very much MK on Brendan Croker's album The great indoors, mainly on There'll come a day !

[vgonis]

I also like very much MK on Brendan Croker's album The great indoors, mainly on There'll come a day !

All Crocker albums (3 plus EP)  with the MK touch are wonderful! It is really a shame he is not more well known.

And don't forget that Buddy Guy contribution and the 2 Jools Holland pieces. Great!

Oh, really, that Buddy Guy album is one of the best blues records ever released! But again, older collaborations, in my opinion, are far superior than more recente ones, with a bunch of exceptions already quoted.

P.S.: vgonis, is Greece coming to Brazil next year? 

I avoided going back more than 10-15 years,(bar Buddy Guy)  because until the mid 90ies everything MK touched seemed golden to me. Maybe my age, maybe his age. Who can tell...   

I think that even by selling everything, we will still not make enough to buy the airplane tickets for all the athletes. It is such a shame. Really now, the cut backs have seriously affected the athletes. You can't be a professional athlete in Greece, except for the lucky footballers and basketballers. All the other sports, are so under-paying that unless you have a sponsor, you are almost doomed. See where Greece has gone after the 2008 olympics... And another fact, I have stopped watching sports since 1997.

[El Macho]

I also like very much MK on Brendan Croker's album The great indoors, mainly on There'll come a day !

All Crocker albums (3 plus EP)  with the MK touch are wonderful! It is really a shame he is not more well known.

By 3 albums you mean : BC & the 5 o'clock shadows, The great indoors and The Kershaw sessions ?
I know there's an EP with No money at all that contains live tracks with MK, but I never found it, it must be very rare.
What songs are on the EP? Is there a youtube link where I could listen to them ?

[vgonis]

Spot on the albums. The EP i was refering is this :

http://www.oneverybootleg.nl/officially_owned_brendancroker_EP.htm

No money at all single contains an extra track from live at Leeds.

http://www.oneverybootleg.nl/officially_owned_brendancroker_nomoneyatall.htm

Brendan Croker has a wonderful site with all his work involvements!

http://www.brendancroker.com/BCA/Discographie%20Brendan%20Croker.html

[JF]

sorry to repeat it again, but the main guitar you hear on the Fogerty track is NOT Mark. It's John.

as mentioned on the booklet, John is on the left channel, Mark is on the right channel, and he's playing only few licks that you can barely hear.

So, I agree that the song riff is a "clin d'oeil" to Sultans, but I believe it's not because Mark is playing on the song. And IMHO, the song would have sounded almost exactly the same without Mark, like on many other collaborations.

On Steely dan's Time out of mind, Mark is on the right channel, and you can hear distinctly only from 00:50 and on the outro
the first guitar at the begining of the song, and on the center channel is NOT Mark, it's Hugh Mc Cracken or Walter Brecker

so when I read that some collaborations contains some typical MK sounds, I believe that some people make a mistake :
they believe they hear Mark as distinctive sound in the song, while he is just in the background

just my 2 cents

[vgonis]

JF, no argument man! ;-) You are the details guy! :-)
The only thing we said, as this topic has turn out, is that in the songs that Mark is playing are great. The mention of MK guitars was implied. OK about Fogerty we were totally off,  but read this again, I gave Steely Dan exactly as an example of what you say.

Anyway I am talking about good songs, and by the end that I talk about good guitar sound, I make the distinction and even mention the Aztec camera example. What I mean is that it is the MK name that made as focus on these artists and collaborations, even if MK does not sound as MK or even if he does not play! Somehow he had an affect on the songs.

I would really love to talk to you about music! You seem to know so many things. Maybe we should organise a convention, a get together of the AMITers!

And the John Fogerty  was not a throw away. Reminiscent of the SOS riff!
The B.B. King collaboration was above average.
And the ones in the Sonny Landreth South 10 CD are good.
And how about the  Thomas Dolby one?
We should always remember that a collaboration on somebody else's album is always subjected to the wishes of the artist, whose name is on the cover. Some really go for the MK sound, some just use him as a reliable guitarist to express their vision. From the older collaborations, Steely dan's is one that comes in mind. With so many fantastic guitar players, they used MK and although he sounds like MK, Fagen and Becker were in total control.
By the way, on Aztec camera LP that he produced, I could swear I hear his playing in a couple of tracks, but since I can't find him in the credits as a player, most probably he showed the moves to the band.  They are more MK than MK!!!
 

[JF]

well I said it before, but I don't see the point to ask Mister Mark Knopfer to play on my album, if I don't want a typical Knopfler sound, or if I ask him to play only few licks barely audible.
Why ask a legendary guitarist to play on a track if it's not to play "iconic", "recognizable" guitar sound ?

It's like if I asked Michel Pettrucciani (RIP) to play on my song, but saying to him ": Well Michel, just play few notes, my other keyboard player will do the rest of the job...."


the steely dan song is a typical example : imagine the brecker-fagen conversation :

- hey did you hear this fantastic new band ? dire straits ?
- ah yes great, I love the guitar player !
- hey why wouldn't we ask him to play on our next record ?
- ah yes good idea ! I want this crisp clean crunch chicken sound ! love it !
- ok ok, but keep 2 other guitarist in the foreground, and let him just on one channel, not too loud please !

 

I think that the "logical" approach would have been to mix Mark in the center, to have only one lead guitar on this song, and at least to let him play the intro lick. Otherwise, I don't understand the reason to ask him to play on a particular song. the other guitarist could have done the job, and the song wouldn't have been THAT different


the Dylan approach for slow train coming was more logical :
bob played the rhythm, and asked Mark to play typical licks instantly recognizable, to color his songs, and therefore you have a Bob Dylan album with Knopfler guitar on it, not an album with just his name on credits....


I'm not sure I know many things....I learned much from here ! and from you

[vgonis]

Steely Dan have produced at least 2 of my all time favourite albums, Pretzel Logic and Katy Lied, while The royal Scum, Countdown to ecstacy and Can't buy a thrill are bubbling just underneath. It is peculiar, but Groucho and Aja are not quite doing it for me. But I have bought and  read their authorized biography and I have to say that the dialogue you made up is more or less the way they worked!

They had become a studio band more or less, and the company was quite happy with their sales so they provided them with lots of money and studio time, while they tried to please their every request. One of them was to bring many musicians, and not just guitarists. They would book them, record their part, pay them  and dismiss them after the session, without even telling them if their part will be used!

 Then bring another one and another one till it clicked. It was common that when after 4-5 guitarists they couldn't get the "touch" they were after, Walter Becker, one of the two Dans, would pick up his guitar and record his contribution! They scrapped so many guitar parts from well known guitarists such as Larry Carlton and Jeff Baxter (which by the way were considered members of the band)   and other well known that never saw their name in the albums' credits!   I wonder if we will ever hear these contributions! So it is no surprise that they treated MK and his  contribution this way. They told him to record again and again and then told him that they are through. He was flambergusted, because he didn't know if they liked it. They never told him! It wasn't because they were already famous while MK was on the rise, or because his playing wasn't good (the biography has 1-2 insightful pages about knopfler) but because they were perfectionists (probably Knopfler was impressed and influenced by this attitude).
They were going for the best  final full outcome. They were trying to fit the sound into their vision about the song, not the other way around. They sure liked him, otherwise they wouldn't have even asked or even worse use his part.
And I guess this is what is going on with recent collaborations. He befriends with musicians and offers to play. Some write or have something ready that suits his iconic guitar sound, while others just take him for a hired gun, for a credit and a few thousand sales more (I'm just being cynic, I know) .   

I like the Slow train album very much for the reason you mention. I think this is a really full  contribution. Then again the Neck and Neck record or even the Notting Hillbillies one might give the answer to his part of the change in the collaborations and the style on guitar. The interviews from that period was to create a band and be in it, unrecognized. OK, he was too big a name to be left in obscurity and it was good for the other members in order to make some bob, so it got very big again!

[xxFordiexx]

I just wish to god that Mark would hurray up with his One Direction collaboration........ 

[Jules]

So, is Mk going to play in Winter's cd? As long as i recall he just said he would like to play with Mk...

[vgonis]

I just wish to god that Mark would hurray up with his One Direction collaboration........ 

Is stop writing going to do the trick or will you  wait for the actual release?

So, is Mk going to play in Winter's cd? As long as i recall he just said he would like to play with Mk...

No need to be on it. We have focused on it anyway, just by the mention of his name. 

[JF]

vgonis thanks very much for the info ! very enlightening 
I can confirm : you know much things than me (at least about steely dan)

I must admit I don't know steely dan music, I just have the gaucho album because of Mark of course, and the only things I know about them are the few lines on the Odlfied book, where it's said that they were talking about Mark at the third person, while he was in the same room ! I think it's suits very well with all you explained. 

[vgonis]

  Have a lovely weekend JF!

[Jules]

According to MKNEWS its true that MK will be in next Johny Winter cd, who will be released next february, looks like its a 4cd compilation, but I didnt find in which track MK plays