Dire Straits- Making Movies- Mark Knopfler

For their third album Making Movies in Fall 1980, Mark Knopfler and Dire Straits did what every 20th century Englishman raised on Roy Rogers and Elvis Presley secretly dreamed: went to New York City, borrowed Bruce Springsteen’s keyboard player and  Tom Petty’s drum sound, and broke into Making Movies (UK #4 album chart, US #19). Easily Dire Straits’ least melancholy, most upbeat batch of songs, Mark Knopfler joins me here In the Studio for the tales behind “Expresso Love”,”Skateaway”, “Solid Rock”, the epic “Tunnel of Love”, and “Romeo and Juliet”.

So was it simply coincidence when, after titling their third album Making Movies, Mark Knopfler tried his hand at scoring his first film soundtrack to Local Hero? “Probably not. I was experimenting at that stage,” Knopfler confided to me In the Studio, “bringing in piano and more keyboards, learning to be a half-baked arranger. It’s kid stuff, but that’s what I was doing. And then I thought I could fool people into trying to do some music for a film. And every time I do a film I feel like an imposter, because there are people, many people, who could do fine working in that area.”

“I love the cinema, and I’ve tremendous respect for acting, and the skills that go into making films,” Mark assured me. “I don’t really feel it (film scoring) is my best area. I’m all right thematically. Maybe I can rumble something up. But as a skill, it is not something that is my forte,” Knopfler chuckles modestly. -Redbeard