The Straits - Performing Their Hits "Money For Nothing," "Walk Of Life," "Sultans of Swing," and more!

The Straits are back! Dire Straits' Alan Clark and Chris White with five hand picked, world class musicians - Terence Reis, Steve Ferrone from Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, Mickey Féat, Adam Phillips and Jamie Squire - performing the music of Dire Straits.  Straits' keyboard player and former Dire Straits member and producer Alan Clark talks about how The Straits were formed.  "It all began two years ago in Rome. Dire Straits' sax player Chris and I were having breakfast beside a pool one beautiful, sunny morning when I declared we were going to form The Straits.  We'd been presented with the opportunity to put a band together to play at a charity show at the Albert Hall, and as I'd recently "discovered" Terence Reis and heard him performing some Dire Straits songs rather brilliantly, it seemed the logical thing to do to to form a band around him.  So, next we needed a band. My first thought was to call guitarist Phi Palmer* who'd played on Dire Straits' On Every Street world tour in '91/92, and that was easy because he lives in Rome. There was only ever going to be one drummer: Steve Ferrone, probably the best rock drummer in the world, a good mate - we'd played together for some years when we were in Eric Clapton's band - and godfather to my son and daughter. There was a slight catch insomuch that he's Tom Petty's drummer and has been for the past 20 years but I figured Tom wouldn't mind sharing him for a good cause! Then we needed a bass player. We'd briefly considered using a lineup of ex Dire Straits players - and believe me, there were plenty offers - but we decided to go our own way', to hand-pick the absolute best, so Mickey Feat was recruited on bass. As for the additional keyboard player role: I'd watch Jamie Squire grow up - his family were neighbours of mine in a village in Northumberland, as were Tim Healy and Denise Welch, Brendon Foster, and Rowan Atkinson - and develop into the amazing multi-instrumental singer/songwriter he is today. So, he was on board too.  The Albert Hall was an extraordinary, resounding success. We received prolonged standing ovations. People, including my hard-nosed music lawyer, were in tears. I'd been to see Eric Clapton perform there the night before and, by his own admission, we blew him off the stage (sorry Eric!). People who work at the hall said they hadn't seen such a reaction in a very long time. It was good, very good, so good, in fact, we couldn't just leave it there. So, we arranged to do some more shows, then some more, and now, two years later, we're planning a world tour and a record of our own material."