Jesse Kornbluth on Mark Knopfler

"'I'm writing too many songs, and then I have to put them out — I'm sorry,' Mark Knopfler said at the start of what seems like our annual phone call. But if Knopfler is going to make CDs like Get Lucky, he can call me every few months — these eleven songs are completely original short stories and character sketches, set against music by one of the planet's greater guitarists. That the quality is uniformly high is no surprise. What did take me aback — and what will make fans of Dire Straits and Knopfler's previous solo releases shake their heads — is that Knopfler seems to have assembled this CD without regard for the commercial marketplace. Nothing that says 'automatic Top 10' jumps out at you like 'Punish the Monkey (Let the Organ Grinder Go)' from Kill to Get Crimson or 'Boom Like That' from Shangri-La. The likely result: The guy whose band sold 120 million records has made a CD that will be appreciated mostly by the smallest cohort of music lovers: smart, literate grownups who can read without moving their lips. … An unwillingness — or is it an inability? — to compromise. A curiosity, at 60, about songwriting that explores new personal territory" ("Mark Knopfler," Huffington Post, 9/14/09).