That's certainly one of the things he was trying to do in Dire Straits. This Glasgow-born guitarist comes by the Celtic influence honestly, of course, but he seems to be trying to create his own pseudo-traditional repertoire of what often sound like old folk songs.
The tunes support Knopfler's story-songs and musical character studies, as he describes or embodies truck drivers ("Border Reiver"), itinerant workers ("Get Lucky"), guitar makers ("Monteleone"), and sailors ("So Far from the Clyde"), among others, painting a portrait of pastoral and blue-collar life in the British Isles some time in the past. More typical is "Hard Shoulder," a ballad that employs a twangy guitar sound and comes across as a number that Glen Campbell could have had a hit with back in his late-'60s "Wichita Lineman" heyday. Cale, on "Cleaning My Gun." But that's as close as he comes to really rocking out. He even works up to a smoldering swamp rock shuffle, à la J.J. Soon enough, Knopfler's distinctive conversational baritone begins calmly intoning lyrics, and eventually there are examples of his melodic fingerpicked guitar style on both acoustic and electric. "Border Reiver," the first song here, begins with a pennywhistle and a piano, then strings join in. Of course, since Knopfler was the lead singer, chief instrumentalist, and songwriter for Dire Straits, there are obvious similarities, even if he has taken a deliberately different path as a solo artist. With the release of Get Lucky, Mark Knopfler has made as many solo studio albums as he made group studio albums with Dire Straits, which may be a signal that it's time to stop comparing his two careers and simply accept them as separate entities.
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