alantig
Zombie Four, DFZ
- Joined
- Apr 28, 2012
- Messages
- 14,840
It's hard to know whether any artist who's not filling stadiums would find the expense worth it. Remember that a tour has lots of stuff to accommodate besides guitar amps. The idea is to reduce the burden.
Whatever Knopfler's motivation might be is a guess that I suppose anyone could make, based on the assumption that 'so-and-so is a perfectionist, and therefore....' Might be right, might not.
Sorry, I didn't read the other posts above about the travel costs. I have my own reliable sources of information as to the actual cost involved. They can make or break the profitability of a tour.
Not that Les needs my confirmation, but I also got the same kind of info from a touring artist. One of the last times I saw Nita Strauss, we did the Q&A VIP thing, and someone asked her what rig she was playing through. It's a Boss floor unit that she uses (I had seen her demo that at a GC clinic some time before). The person who asked either made a face or comment of disapproval, and she said words to the effect of, "Hey, I'd rather be playing through a Marshall stack like I do with Alice Cooper, but this is my tour, so I'm responsible for the cartage to get the gear and get it to each show, plus paying all the costs for the crew and the band. I can't do that and make money, and if I don't make money, I can't tour at all."
No doubt there are some people who can hear the difference, but I'd bet it's a small minority. The question is can it get close enough to satisfy the person making the decision. At Experience one year, David Grissom was demoing the DGT and popped into single coil mode. He said, "I can do this to get that Strat sound. Is it the same as a real Strat? Nope - but it's close enough to make me happy."