After the loaded Schecter-style pickguards, I am now proud to offer a second high-quality component to upgrade your guitar to make it look and sound more like a Van Nuys era Schecter Dream Machine: the MK-guitar.com Dream Machine Tremolo. Unlike the standard Fender Tremolo that is made of steel (or often even cheaper substitutes like zinc for the tremolo block), the Dream Machine Tremolo is made completely out of bell […]
Today’s blog article is just about some little detail you might have noticed on Mark Knopfler’s vintage Les Pauls. I wrote a blog post about the fading red dye on old Les Pauls some time ago, so it is something like common knowledge that the old Les Pauls from the late 50ies came in a colour called cherry sunburst and the red faded when exposed to sunlight, resulting in a […]
There will be some new products in the online shop soon, or already are. **Guitar Effect: Sex Drive by Durham Electronics The effect you could see in the Guitar Stories documentary when Mark demonstrates his Les Paul in his British Grove studio. Already available in the online shop. **Guitar Sound: The Dream Machine Tremolo by mk-guitar.com A tremolo system of finest solid bell brass, made in Germany by […]
Some time ago I had the opportunity to play on a real “Burst”, a 1960 Les Paul Standard. You will probably know that Les Paul Standards between 1958 and 1960 are something like the ‘Holy Grai’l for guitar players and collectors, with prices ranging over $ 200,000. (And yes, Mark Knopfler has even two of these!) As you might guess from the surrounding in the video, the guitar belongs to […]
In these videos I am a/b comparing two different guitars side by side: Mark Knopfler’s famous sunburst Schecter Dream Machine Strat and my pink part-o-caster, built from a Japanese Squier body in metallic pink with a nice bird’s eye maple neck I bought on ebay some time ago (actually a noname product), equipped with the loaded Schecter-style pickguard with the F500T pickup replicas, and with a prototype of the coming […]
When I had the opportunity to play on Mark Knopfler’s sunburst Schecter Strat some weeks ago, I could also try out some other great guitars over there. Here is a video of a 1961 Fender Stratocaster in all original sonic blue that really impressed me. Some slab board Stratocasters from the very early sixties can have a rather dark or even muddy sound, that’s why some players prefer Strats after […]
Brazilian rosewood is one of the greatest woods for fingerboards. Unfortunately this tropical tree – Dalbergia nigra – is on the CITES list of endangered species so that strict restriction were put on trading this wood in 1992, the reason why Brazilian rosewood was found on many vintage guitars but hardly on new guitars (which often use Indian rosewood as a substitute). Vintage Guitar Show cancelled Germany’s biggest vintage […]
******************* Update: Soon after Sky Arts aired Guitar Stories, the full video appeared on youtube: ******************* As most fans will already know, Sky Arts 1 will broadcast Guitar Stories on October 16 at 10pm (some more info on Guitar Stories’ facebook page). Presented by John Illsley, Mark talks about his most important guitars. In addition to the first trailer, a few more preview clips appeared recently which I put […]
It is always a nice surprise to see “historic” pictures or recordings appear from the very early Dire Straits era. This time no pictures but a recording from the Talking Heads tour in early 1978 – to be precise , from February 5 at the Greyhound Croydon. This was the last gig of the Talking Heads tour on which Dire Straits were the support band, 5 days after the gig […]
These pictures are nothing new neither secret, I saw them for the first time so many years ago in a J.J. Cale songbook. I stumbled upon them again today, and just thought that these are simply worth to have a look at (and I know that J.J. Cale ranks high among us Mark Knopfler fans). Just to make it clear: this is not what the guitar looks like from the […]