{"id":699394,"date":"2026-01-16T07:24:12","date_gmt":"2026-01-16T07:24:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/699394\/"},"modified":"2026-01-16T07:24:12","modified_gmt":"2026-01-16T07:24:12","slug":"the-greatest-guitar-solo-of-mark-knopflers-entire-career","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/699394\/","title":{"rendered":"The greatest guitar solo of Mark Knopfler’s entire career"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Mark<\/p>\n

(Credits: Apple Music)<\/p>\n

Fri 16 January 2026 6:00, UK <\/p>\n

Lots of guitarists make the mistake of thinking that exerting lots of effort and energy is what\u2019s needed to produce the finest guitar solos, but Mark Knopfler<\/a> will tell you that this often isn\u2019t the case.<\/p>\n

Rarely ever going into gut-busting territory, Knopfler\u2019s lead guitar work has frequently been complex and knotty, but never overdone in a way that feels like he\u2019s needlessly showing off his chops for the world to see. If ever there was a master of making things feel understated, it\u2019s him.<\/p>\n

The sort of player who preferred to be calculated rather than chaotic when it came to performing these more intricate parts, Knopfler\u2019s playing style was a perfect fit for the overall sound of his band, Dire Straits<\/a>, who established themselves in the 1970s and \u201880s as one of the most formidable roots rock acts, but also injected a little bit of an artsy flair into their output.<\/p>\n

However, having wowed with his extraordinary fretwork on some of their earlier releases, shortly before their penultimate album, the universally adored classic Brothers in Arms<\/a>, Knopfler contributed a soundtrack for the film, Local Hero, which had one moment where Knopfler went a little further with his showmanship, almost pushing it into territory where it collapsed under the weight of its ambitiousness.<\/p>\n

Speaking to Spanish newspaper El Pa\u00eds in 2025, he reflected on \u2018Going Home\u2019, the film\u2019s theme song, and its legacy, hailing the track for rearing its head as one of the defining moments of his career. Despite it being a song he and many fans adore, he would go on to admit that it seemingly came about by accident, and that it almost didn\u2019t work out as he\u2019d imagined.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s something about \u2018Going Home\u2019 that seems to work,\u201d he told the publication. \u201cIt\u2019s [recorded on] a cheap guitar, it sounds very direct. I did everything wrong, but I think they\u2019re perfect notes.\u201d<\/p>\n

While the quality of the gear being used shouldn\u2019t have had too much of an adverse effect on the song, the fact that he messed up the solo could have been catastrophic, potentially ruining a song that became an iconic moment on their most acclaimed release. Knopfler further delved into how this beastly solo ended up working in the context of the song, and how his understated guitar style is ultimately what helped it.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it turned out well because I didn\u2019t take it to the extreme of getting into trouble,\u201d he remarked. \u201cI just said what I had to say. I didn\u2019t go too far. I tried to portray the place, the people, the rocks, and the water. For me, it was a portrait of a place, an idea, a local hero.\u201d<\/p>\n

When given the context, the guitar work on \u2018Going Home\u2019 stands out against large portions of the rest of his work for how it manages to capture an environment rather than just a mood within a song. There\u2019s a filmic quality to the track that simply highlights just how delicate Knopfler could be, but the lead break is what tips it over into being such a brave piece of work, helping it reach the point where the song bursts into life.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Related Topics<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"(Credits: Apple Music) Fri 16 January 2026 6:00, UK Lots of guitarists make the mistake of thinking that…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":699395,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[3936],"tags":[77,129168,269,16,15],"class_list":["post-699394","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-music","tag-entertainment","tag-mark-knopfler","tag-music","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115903585561606643","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/699394","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=699394"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/699394\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/699395"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=699394"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=699394"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=699394"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}