Mark Knopfler Announces New Solo Album One Deep River

Listen to the first single “Ahead Of The Game” below

January 25, 2024January 25, 2024 Ron Hart 0 Comments 2024, Ahead Of The Game, Blue Note Records, British Grove, Dire Straits, Guy Fletcher, Mark Knopfler, One Deep River

Mark Knopfler returns in 2024 with his tenth solo studio album, One Deep River, set for release on April 12 on his own British Grove label via Blue Note/EMI.

The record will feature 12 new songs, the first of which, “Ahead Of The Game,” is out now. Give a listen below to the former Dire Straits frontman’s all-too-familiar tale about a struggling singer/songwriter set to a distinctively Knopfleresque riff.

The album’s title track, “One Deep River,” reflects Knopfler’s deep affection for the river that runs through his childhood home city of Newcastle.

“Crossing the Tyne is always on your mind,” he says in a press release announcing the new album. “It’s what you were doing when you were leaving as a youngster and that feeling is always the same every time you do it. You’re heading out or you’re coming back, and it just connects with your childhood. The power of it doesn’t go away.”

Indeed, One Deep River offers an unstoppable flow of vintage Knopfler, with lyrics and melodies that touch upon on a lifetime of cross-genre pollination and influences in blues, folk, rock and beyond.

One Deep River was produced by Knopfler and his longtime collaborator Guy Fletcher, who had joined Dire Straits in 1984 and stayed in the band until their demise, and was recorded at his state-of-the-art British Grove Studios in London.

Mark Knopfler One Deep River, British Grove/Blue Note 2024

The album will be available on CD, double gatefold vinyl, cassette and a special limited-edition box set that will include the album on both vinyl and CD with nine exclusive bonus tracks on LP and CD, a litho print of Knopfler, a guitar pick set and tin and an enamel badge.

The band featured on One Deep River features Mark Knopfler on guitars, Jim Cox and the aforementioned Mr. Fletcher on keyboards, Glenn Worf on bass, Ian Thomas on drums, Danny Cummings on percussion, Richard Bennett on guitar and newcomer Greg Leisz on pedal and lap steel; Mike McGoldrick provides whistle and uilleann pipes and John McCusker plays fiddle, while the Topolski sisters Emma and Tamsin add backing vocals. All songs are written by Knopfler.

In stores now, meanwhile, is a massive eight-disc box set chronicling the Dire Straits concert experience courtesy of Rhino Records. Entitled Live 1978-1992, the collection features remastered editions of the band’s two classic live albums Alchemy (1984) and On The Night (1993), the 1995 Live at the BBC collection, the Black Friday 2021 Encores EP and the previously unreleased Live from the Rainbow Theatre from 1979, mixed by Guy Fletcher with guest performances by Phil Lynott of Thin Lizzy and The Fabulous Poodles’ Tony de Meur in the final four tracks of the set.

ONE DEEP RIVER TRACKLIST