Ok, so Alan has updated his site today with what he says sre his final words on the Straits affair below. He even uses the word Tribute, so I guess he has heard or heard about the song...looks like he is distancing himself from the whole thing in a way...I do like his last sentence though at the end...
"When I put together The Straits, initially to play at a charity show at the Albert hall, it was always my intention not only to play our own versions, our own arrangements of the songs from the Dire Straits catalogue, but also and most importantly, once we decded to continue and do more gigs, to add some of our own songs with a view to eventually make a record of that original material. While the majority of the band were also of that mind, a couple of the guys were against the idea, prefering to stick to performing only Dire Straits' material and, for the rest of us, doing only that, ie being in a tribute band, was not something that myself and my illustrious colleagues Steve Ferrone, Phil Palmer etc ever wanted or intended The Straits to be and, unfortunately, that's pretty much what it became. So, a year or so ago, those who want to play only the Dire Straits back catalogue formed an out-and-out tribute band and the rest of us have formed a band to play and record our own original songs. And what a band! We'll be revealing its name shortly, we've got a bunch of great original songs, we're recording in April and we'll be playing gigs in the summer. We think you'll like it; no, we think you'll love it. Watch this space.
My last words on the subject:
Putting together a band to perform the music of Dire Straits was not something I ever envisaged myself doing. But, actually, after not having played that stuff for 20 or so years, it was, certainly for a while, a lot of fun largely because of the great line-up of musicians but also and most importantly, because it was apparent from the first gig at the Albert Hall that it made lots of people who'd been starved of the music of Dire Straits for decades, very happy indeed. And that made it all worthwhile."
