Dire Straits Album: “On the Night [Video]”

This is the video of the last Dire Straits' tour in the early 1990s. It was not, I read, as wildly successful as their tour of the mid 1980s and after the tour the Straits faded into history.

About one-half of the songs on the DVD are from the Straits last CD, "On Every Street." There is a country sound on many tracks, emphasized by Paul Franklin's steel guitar. I quickly tired of the opening rock numbers, "Calling Elvis," "Walk of Life," and "Heavy Fuel," but the mellow songs that followed made up for it. Mark Knopfler's moody and exquisite songs "Romeo and Juliet" and "Brothers in Arms" are here, as are superb versions of little known tunes such as "Your Latest Trick" "On Every Street" and "You and Your Friend." The bluesy, country solo of Knopfler in "You and Your Friend" is one of his best ever-- and that is saying something. "Money for Nothing" rocks and "Private Investigations" has the great guitar explosions at the end (although PI and "Local Hero" are both better in the other Straits live album "Alchemy").

Dire Straits was a tuneful high-quality group of musicians and Knopfler is a wonder on guitar. There's not a whole lot of flashy showmanship. They stand up Strait and play outstanding music.

Smallchief

Ok, i have to start by saying I really love Dire Straits and a few few of their songs are in my all time top 10 favourites.

I recently received a couple of Pink Floyd DVDs and wanted the same with Dire Straits...

What a disappointment! The sound quality is awful. It is not regular and volume changes several times in the same song, as if the sound was sometimes "muffled"... And this is with very very good video and sound equipment. I would say 5 stars for the music and between 0 and 1 star for the DVD.

My advice: Buy the CD instead. The DVD only brings frustration and anger about such fantastic music being wasted.

Oh, how much I wish we had something from them in Blu Ray...

Dire Straits (aka Mark Knopfler) at the height of their/his power and professional polish and brilliant performances. It's uncanny that live performances can be so polished (if you believe their 'no overdub rule' - which I do). It seems that whether in the studio or on stage they create magic and weave stories that draw you into them with an emotionalism that is uncanny. The upper songs make you happy and the sad songs can bring tears to your eyes. M.K. performs the songs with an intensity that belies the fact that he's done them 1000 times. I'm a new fan and I've bought all their videos (from Amazon) and I love them all.

A great music concert video, but what really stands out is the interchange between Paul Franklin on pedal steel guitar and Mark Knopfler.

I 'm sorry I waited so long to get this. I saw DS on the Brothers in Arms tour and was very dissappointed they did not come to florida for this one.

They were quite simply a stunning live band by this time in their career. The drummer on this tour is the best one they ever had; he had great feel and made a nice sound on the drums. He didn't overplay. Mark , of course, was brilliant. And he seemed to really enjoy the crowd response at this show. Well deserved indeed. I choked up a few times watching this , because this is really how music should be made.

Outstanding.