An incredible guitarist.

He's pretty new to me, but I shall most definitely dive deeper into his genius as time goes on. I've never really been a fan of fusion tunes, but the more I listen to this master of the guitar, the more I enjoy it. His work is quite complex. I believe the first first tune I heard from him was a cover done by sambob of a tune called Proto Cosmos. I didn't think much of it at first, but I began to understand and love it after a few listens.

I recently bought an album of his called "All Night Wrong" (it was the only Holdsworth music in the record store). Once again I didn't think much of it at first, but have learned to love it. Drummer Chad Wackerman puts on an amazing drum performance on this album that is certainly worthy of Holdsworth's playing. What other albums would you recommend?

I really like Metal Fatigue. Got some awesome tracks on it.

Well his music may seem incredibly complex, but in many ways its very very simple, simpler than most pop tunes. His songs are almost all in simple verse chorus verse chorus form, with him playing all the heads and solos, as well as the backing parts (clean guitar with an expression pedal used to control volume).

Proto-Cosmos is a good example of this, but its actually written by Alan Pasqua for the Tony Williams Lifetime album Believe It in 1975, still.. its a very simple song format, just the same pattern repeats over and over again.

Still I think Holdsworth is just the greatest guitar player out there, he has the most extraordinary tone and timbre with his guitar that I've ever heard from anyone, and he sounds 10x better live.

Albums to check out from his band are definitely:

The Sixteen Men Of Tain
Secrets
Road Games
Wardenclyffe Tower
IOU

Though I think they're all great. Also of note are the many albums he's recorded with other bands. Most recently if you like hard rock and metal, he's appeared on Derek Sherinian's recent solo album Black Utopia, as well as Planet X's upcoming album (which I have a copy of, and let me tell you its great!). He's also appeared on MANY classic albums from the 1970s UK progrock and fusion scene such as UK, The Soft Machine, Gong, Jean Luc Ponty, as well as the previously mentioned Tony Williams album. And another rocking album he was on was "Heavy Machinry" with the Johanson brothers.

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"Women and rhythm section first!" - sambob@gmail.com

One of my favortie musicans! I recommend these albums.

Solo albums:
Secrets
Then!
REH Video Live Studio 1992

With Others:
Jean-Luc Ponty-Enigmatic Ocean
Tony Williams-Believe It
Gongzilla-Suffer

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Yeah, he's really amazing. Here he is playing a style most people aren't used to hearing from him

http://nategauth.com/floppyhat.mp3

'Funnels' is an awesome tune

His guitar setup does sound great. Any idea what his exact rig is? I sent an email to http://guitargeek.com/ about Holdsworth's rig a while back (since they don't already have it), but I haven't heard from them. I've seen vids of him playing a red strat in his earlier days but now he plays that crazy and totally custom Steinberger with no headstock.

Well Allan has played a lot of different gear, which is really testament to the concept that tone comes more from your fingers than your equipment. I'll give you a rough breakdown though.

In the 1970s Allan played a variety of guitars. Gibson SGs, Fender Strats, and all sorts of exotic custom guitars. This was basically because he just wasnt happy with any of them. At this time he used anything from Marshall master gain type amps, to early Mesa Boogi Rectifiers.

During the 1980s Allan played custom guitars from Charvel, and even had a signature model made by Ibanez (which was way ahead of his time!!), and allegedly had dozens of signature models from various companies t hat wanted his endorsement. During this time he used Mesa Boogie amps mostly.

In the last 15 years, Allan began using Steinberger headless guitars.. he liked the headless feel (its very comfortable), the necks, and the Trans-Trem bridge. For a while in the 90s Yamaha was making an amp called the DG-80 for him, but as awesome as it was it sold poorly and was cancelled. They also made what is STILL the best digital delay for a guitar aclled the UD-Stomp, also cancelled. Though much of the circuitry from this hardware was later found in the Yamaha Magicstomp,, which of course just last year was also... cancelled. Steinberger went under in recent years, and so Allan began using headless guitars made by luthier Bill Delap. He still uses Delap guitars mostly live. But also in recent years, Allan was having problems with the Delaps because they took so long to be made, so he approached Carvin about making a guitar for him. The result was the HF2 and the HF2 Fatboy. These guitars are basially Allan's "ideal" guitar, he has told me this personally. The only problem with them is they don't have the TransTrem bridge he likes, and even though the headstock is VERY small, its still not headless. So as a result Allan apparently uses these guitars in the studio often, but still uses Delap guitars live. During the past few years Allan has used Yamaha amps, Johnson amps, Mesa Boogie, Carvin... and most recently he is using the new Hughes and Kettner model, which interestingly contains much of the technology from the Johnson amps he used briefly (same amps that I like!)). Interestingly in his rig he is using things such as a Carvin solid state keyboard amp as a power amp, custom compressors, multiple UD-Stomps... all sorts of cool stuff. But still, his trademark tone mostly comes from his fingers.

A little info I can give you on the Carvin made Holdsworth guitars (since I currently play one, and have owned two in my time). The original model has a chambered hollow body, two custom wound humbuckers, either a fixed Gotoh or Gotoh Wilkinson tremolo bridge, a BIG thick neck with ebony fingerboard and jumbo and fairly flat radiused frets. Graphite nut, and Sperzel locking tuners. The most recent version of the Carvin Holdsworth guitar is called the Fatboy. Its a bit thicker than the original, and is also COMPLETELY hollow. Sounds incredible, this is the one I currently play. I am even considering getting a new one and putting some higher output pickups, and a Wilkinson bridge on it, for use in more rock type settings, but the original still works great for rock music.

Also some behind the scenes information, the HF2 is STILL in development. In the works for the next version.. a completely headless model!! Also they're in talks with Gibson to buy the rights to make a copy of the TransTrem bridge. Booyaka!

__________________
"Women and rhythm section first!" - sambob@gmail.com

Heres mine, sort of a bad photo though:

www.jacolives.net/wittcarvin.jpg

__________________
"Women and rhythm section first!" - sambob@gmail.com

Wow, thanks. You've met him then. He sounds like he'd be a nice (not conceited) guy from what I've read.

That gear is a little beyond my budget at the moment, but I'd love to achieve that tone eventually. It really is beautiful. That type of electric guitar masters (Holdsworth, Vai, Satch, etc) all have such a wonderful sound setup. I'm not trying to classify them or anything. Just saying that I like their sounds. The get this satisfying creaking whine from their instruments unlike any setup I've ever played. It kind of reminds me of a door creaking shut. If you don't know what I mean, give a listen to Flying in a Blue Dream by Joe Satriani. That's a prime example of the tone I love.

Anyway, thanks for the album recommendations everyone. I'll be sure to pick up a few of them.