Friends of Dan transcript

This is an edited version of the "Friends of Dan" raw transcript. Almost all the editing has been done by AI, and I have not checked every single quote, but done a quick readthrough that seems to be acceptable. It is still a work in progress.

Part 1

Welcome to the Friends of Dan Music Podcast. I'm Dan Miles.

My guest today, Allan Holdsworth, is one of the most influential guitarists in the history of the instrument. His name appears on a very short list of truly visionary players—like Django Reinhardt, Jimi Hendrix, and Eddie Van Halen—whose musical imaginations and unprecedented technical ability have led countless guitarists to completely rethink their approach to the instrument and forever expand its vocabulary and possibilities.

On April 7th, 2017, he'll be releasing a 12-CD box set featuring remastered versions of all 11 of his groundbreaking solo albums, from 1982's I.O.U. through 2001's Flat Tire, plus his 2003 live album, Then.

This epic career retrospective is called The Man Who Changed Guitar Forever: The Allan Holdsworth Album Collection. While that title is entirely appropriate, I can guarantee you that it was not Allan's idea to call it that, as he's always been quite modest about his achievements as a soloist and composer.

The set will also include a comprehensive 40-page booklet. Even though it's well worth the investment, understandably a 12-disc set is bound to be on the pricey side. So on the same day, he'll also be releasing a 2-CD set featuring 28 tracks he has hand-picked as examples of his finest moments.

Though we're recording this interview in March and neither product has been officially released, I'm happy to say I am in possession of an advance copy of the 2-CD set, which is called Eidolon: The Allan Holdsworth Collection.

So we're going to be able to listen to samples from the new remastered collection. I'm going to start things off with one of my personal favorite Holdsworth compositions, featuring one of my all-time favorite Holdsworth solos. For long-time fans of Allan's, this will serve as a nice reminder of his epic skill, and for the uninitiated who will be experiencing his artistry for the first time... well, prepare to have your mind blown.

As originally featured on his 1985 Metal Fatigue album, featuring Jimmy Johnson on bass and Chad Wackerman on drums, here is the newly remastered version of Allan's composition: "Devil Take the Hindmost."

[Music plays: "Devil Take the Hindmost"]

DM: Joining me on the phone from San Diego, California, is Allan Holdsworth. Welcome!

AH: Thank you.

DM: Well, through the courtesy of your co-producer, Dan Perloff, I have an advance copy of the two-disc set you'll be releasing next month. I recently drove from LA to Phoenix, and I took the opportunity to listen to all 28 tracks uninterrupted.

AH: Oh, great!

DM: It was exciting! So the first thing I want to do is compliment you on the sequencing of the album. I appreciate how the tracks flow together. It isn't purely chronological in either direction, but musically it's very logical. I was wondering about that at first, but as I listened to the tracks, it all made complete sense.

DM: The second thing I want to compliment you on is how good it sounds. I did side-by-side comparisons with the earlier versions, and there's a noticeable improvement. What were your specific goals for remastering this material?

AH: Well, I relied on Dan Perloff for that because he had a mastering company and a mastering engineer that he really liked to work with. So they sent samples of all the tracks, and I thought he did a wonderful job, actually—considering that the source material, the further back you go, wasn't as good as the newer ones, obviously. But I think he did a wonderful job on it.

DM: Yeah, all the instruments sound very present, but to me, it's the drums that really stand out. They have a depth and a rumble to them that wasn't there before. I was putting the actual CDs into my Bose system in the car and going, "Oh my, this sounds really great!"

DM: An exclusive feature of the set is a previously unreleased version of the song "Road Games" with Jack Bruce on lead vocals instead of Paul Williams. What was the story behind that?

AH: Well, the story behind that actually goes back to a big battle I had with Ted Templeman, who was a fantastic producer, as you know. One of the problems was when I signed with Warner Brothers, they didn't really tell me upfront what they wanted me to do. I thought I would do what I had done before—which was to do exactly what I wanted.

AH: But they decided that they wanted to change it. Ted didn't like Paul Williams for some reason—and I loved Paul, actually; I thought he was fabulous. But Ted wanted me to use different people and kind of forced the issue. In the end, I just kind of gave up on it, which is why the original EP just says "Produced by Circumstance." We were supposed to have at least eight to ten tracks on there, and we only ended up doing six. Then I was unceremoniously dropped by the label.

AH: Which was fine, because in the contract it said that they had to pay for me to do another demo. So I went back to the studio of my choice and recorded Metal Fatigue. It was just bureaucracy, you know—I had to send the tape to Ted Templeman, which they just declined (I don't think he even listened to it). But the fact is that they ended up paying for the majority of Metal Fatigue, and I gave that to my friend Bill Hein, who was the boss at Enigma Records.

AH: But coming back to your question: Jack was on the original recording. Actually, it was Paul on everything originally, but then we replaced him with Jack because it was part of the deal, and I couldn't get out of that.

AH: Eventually, what happened was we recorded it with Jack, but Ted Templeman never came to the studio once—he listened to all of the mixes over the phone in the end. I figured he knew that we weren't going to agree, so he said, "Okay, well, you just go finish it yourself."

AH: So I took the tape back—I snuck the tape out of Warner Brothers and took it back to the Music Grinder studio—and did a mix with Paul on it, which is why Paul was the only one on the original release. But we already had the Jack Bruce version, and I love Jack, obviously. So I thought it would be interesting for people to hear Jack sing that song, and I decided to use that version as opposed to the original.

DM: I know from your perspective Road Games was very problematic, but it's always going to be a sentimental favorite for me simply because it was my personal entry point to your solo work. Of course, Jack Bruce and Paul both sang vocals on the album, so it was interesting to see that resurface now. I like both performances, but the one that's been in my head all these years is Paul's.

DM: I don't have the 12-disc set yet, but I reviewed the track listing. For more exclusive content, people can look for three bonus tracks on Disc 7: "Tokyo Dream" and "The Un-Merry-Go-Round (Parts 4 & 5)," which I believe have been released before, but only in Japan. On Disc 12, there's a bonus version of "Funnels," and on Disc 10, there's a track called "Material Unreal," which is a title I don't recognize. What's the story behind that track?

AH: Basically, it was just an instrumental version of a track—there were no vocals on it from what I remember. I originally added that as a bonus track on The Sixteen Men of Tain, on a limited edition release that Eddie Jobson put out when he was distributing that record for a short time. I just used that version for this collection.

DM: Well, as I said, I haven't heard the 12-disc set yet, so I was only able to read the track listing. But the real point of it is just to hear the remastered collection, and I'm looking forward to that.

DM: What I want to know more generally: as you were developing your signature style—which is often characterized as being fluid or legato—was it a case of hearing a sound in your head and trying to develop a technique to capture what you heard, or was it more of an instinctive process of doing what felt natural?

AH: It was both. Originally, I wanted to play a horn—I really wanted to play saxophone, or any wind instrument, really. I did play clarinet for a while, and messed around with the saxophone many years later.

AH: But basically, it was instinctual for me to try to get the guitar to sound a little bit more liquid. As you know, the guitar is a percussive instrument, and I tried to get it to sound like a non-percussive instrument. I was always striving to find a way to make it more fluid. I guess it was just an unconscious desire to play the saxophone!

DM: Another thing that's frequently commented on—beyond the actual notes you play—is your tone. With very few exceptions, jazz guitarists tend to favor clean tones, avoiding any hint of distortion at all costs. But you've taken the best aspects of distortion—controlled feedback and warm sustain—to create a very rich and pleasant sound. Did you ever experiment with clean tones in your early days, or have you always been drawn to a more rock-oriented guitar sound?

AH: It's actually a blend, really. I needed to use some sort of distortion to assist with the sustain, because I knew that in order to make it sound more horn-like, I needed the notes to hold longer than they would with a clean tone.

AH: However, for the chordal stuff, I always used a very clean sound—at least, I thought it was clean! So it was a mixture. It wasn't easy in a way, because I wanted to make it sound fluid without sounding like heavy distortion—not quite as aggressive as a regular rock sound.

DM: Obviously your chord voicings are very clean—you really wouldn't be able to hear the details if those were distorted. I was really speaking of your lead guitar tone; I guess I should have been more specific.

AH: No, that's right! But that's basically what I did: I tried to control the distortion to a point where it didn't sound that distorted, at least later on. I kept pushing myself to find a way to get that sustain without having a nasty sound.

DM: You're right, it occupies a middle ground. To me, it sounds like a singing voice—it just sings, and it never sounds unpleasant. I appreciate that; thank you so much for the compliment!

Part 2

DM: Well, speaking of compliments, as listeners of the show can attest, I know quite a few elite guitar players who are big fans of yours. I reached out to some of them to solicit their input—some responded in writing, others in audio. Don't worry, I'm not going to force you to sit there uncomfortably while I heap a lot of random praise on you; that's not what this is about. What I want to do is take some of their observations and use them to springboard into some interesting discussion points.

DM: Let me start with Mark Bonilla, who, among other things, was the lead guitarist in the Keith Emerson Band for many years. I mentioned Road Games being my entry point into your solo work, but it wasn't my first exposure to your playing—I'd already heard some of the work you'd done with other artists. I mention that because it was also the case for Mark. Here's what Mark had to say:

DM: "When I first heard that final guitar phrase on Allan's second solo break in Jean-Luc Ponty's Enigmatic Ocean Part 2, I literally fell off my chair. It was like this nubile young temptress had entered through the beaded curtains and started massaging my neck, lulling me into this blissful altered state—only to have my neck snapped in one short stroke with a flick of five fingers. I was never the same after that. Allan's phrasing is so unorthodox: patient at times, feeding you a spoonful of sonic nourishment, letting you chew your food, taste it, and swallow it before handing you another... and then magically growing six more fingers in order to pave the fretboard in note choices and sensual tones heretofore undiscovered or expressed."

AH: That's what the right beer can do, apparently!

DM: No, that's pretty sweet! Those were very kind words indeed.

AH: So thank you Mark, for your typical blend of eloquent insight and down-to-earth humor.

DM: Enigmatic Ocean was also one of my first exposures to you, so I know exactly the passage he's referring to. His description of hearing you for the first time—I think we all had a pretty uniform reaction, which was, "Who is this guy?" It's like hearing Hendrix or Van Halen for the first time; it definitely commands your attention. Rather than getting your reaction to our reaction to your playing, I want to know: have you ever had a similar experience where you were blown away by an artist the first time you heard them?

AH: Yeah, I felt that way when I first heard John Coltrane, of course. I felt that way when I first heard Keith Jarrett, because of my upbringing—my dad was a fine pianist and he had lots and lots of records of the jazz guys from the eras before. I remember when I first heard Keith Jarrett, I played it to my dad and he was like, "Oh my god, that's insane," you know? So, yeah... and with guitar players too, obviously, like when I first heard John McLaughlin or any of the great guys. They all affect you in some way or another. I never had the desire to try to knock them off in any way, but I was certainly inspired by almost everybody that I've ever heard. There are so many great players out there now, it's insane.

DM: Yeah, I once bought a jazz guitar compilation and it was the first time I ever heard Wes Montgomery. His playing—particularly compared to all the others—was just so tasteful, so confident, and so elegant. He made it seem so effortless, like, "Well, of course you play jazz guitar like this, why wouldn't you?" That's the message I got from it, and I was going, "Oh my gosh," so I immediately got everything else he ever did.

AH: Yeah, yeah.

DM: I also appreciate what Mark said about your phrasing. While you do have the ability to play quite rapidly when you want to, if that's what you're feeling, you obviously mix it up. It's not just about velocity. That's why I'm so fond of your "Devil Take the Hindmost" solo: I enjoy the slow parts as much as the fast ones.

AH: For me, everything's about trying to make melodies, you know—not just to demonstrate how rapidly you can do something. It wasn't like, "How fast can I run a mile?" It wasn't like that for me. I mean, if that happened, then it was fine, but I just like trying to make melodies because, for me, that's what improvising is all about. It's about trying to solo over the chord sequence and make melodies out of it, you know?

DM: Now let's hear from another talented guitar player. Here's what Jesse Salomon had to say:

DM: "Allan's music was incredibly important to me in my development as a player. His chords and swells were inspiring, even though I had no idea what he was doing. The tone he drew from his guitar and electronics was extraordinary. I never felt like trying to recreate his music as much as I liked to emulate the emotions that it made me feel. In that sense, his influence on me wasn't as apparent to somebody listening to me. I like a lot of his sensibilities with layers, solos, overall arrangements, and his interplay with the musicians he plays with. The picture of Allan and Eddie Van Halen in the brochure for Musicians Institute was all it took for me to want to go there. Seeing Allan play back in '85 when I was at GIT was amazing, and also having Chad Wackerman come to the school was inspiring—of course, Jeff Berlin was a teacher there, too. A memory I have of Allan was a time I was at the NAMM Show looking at some guitars and he came over, said hi to me, and said, 'You're from Fort Collins.' He saw that on my badge! I said yes, but I was thinking, 'This is Allan Holdsworth—how come he's saying hi and how does he know Fort Collins?' He went on to tell me he had friends from Boulder and that he'd enjoyed some Coors beer and touring the brewery in Golden! So that was a cool little exchange. I'm happy to have been able to watch him play over the years and have more conversations with him, most recently when my friend Chris Van Tassel at Rockett Pedals designed a pedal for him."

DM: I like what Jesse said—and you said something similar a little bit ago—about trying to recreate the emotions you made him feel in his playing, and when he plays he wants to recreate those emotions as opposed to just copying licks. That seems very wise and insightful to me. I can also relate to what he said about there being a sense of mystery with certain aspects of your playing—that "How is he doing that?" factor. What's the pedal Jesse's referring to?

AH: Before that, for many years—and I still do, actually—I had been using a TC Booster pedal, because it's not a distortion pedal at all. I always liked the sound of Alnico pickups, like the old original PAFs from the Gibsons back in the day, which were pretty low output compared to modern pickups. So I liked to use the booster as another way to push the front end of the amplifier a little harder without adding any extra distortion. You're actually still using the amplifier to make the sound without adding any extra grunge to it. So what we tried to do with that pedal that I worked on with Chris was a combination: he had a clean boost section, but he also had a section which could develop some kind of distortion, because they wanted to do that for the guys that were more used to that kind of sound. It was kind of a hybrid pedal.

DM: I see, interesting! Well, we have one more written comment before we break out the soundbites. This is from Mike Jacobs, who says:

DM: "Along with Jaco Pastorius and Jimi Hendrix, I can't think of another musician that has been a bigger game changer on an instrument than Allan Holdsworth. From his astounding facility and technique and innovative use of technology and equipment, to his forging of a harmonic and compositional identity like no other, Allan has created his own sonic universe that is virtually unrivaled in depth and scope. From rockers to jazzers, he's inspired and influenced multiple generations of guitarists in countless ways. There are probably a hundred different things you could do on guitar that might elicit the response: 'He or she has listened to Holdsworth.' He's a wonder and a true musical treasure."

AH: Again, very, very, very kind chap.

DM: Yes, he is! And he knows his music—Mike knows his music. I know what he means about the transparency of your influence, because I've heard recordings of myself improvising and soloing, and they definitely include moments that would expose me as a "guy who's listened to Holdsworth." I'll be listening and saying, "Oh, that series of notes..." It comes into a person's subconscious and it just comes out, you know? So when you hear other guitar players play something that's clearly derived from your style, do you feel flattered, or do you feel proprietary?

AH: No, no, I've always thought it's nice, it's cool. If it's too blatant, then I don't like it so much, because it's like, "You could have spent just as much time trying to figure out how *you* want to do something as you did trying to figure out what that was," you know? But it's still a nice thing. I think, "Oh, that guy or gal actually listened to something and it affected them in a way that they wanted to employ it themselves in some way." The only ones that get offensive are really when it gets too deep into it—then I really don't like that, because I think that individual could have spent more time trying to develop their own voice rather than trying to figure out how somebody else developed theirs. Trying to emulate somebody to a point is okay, but after a certain point it becomes a little obnoxious. I've done it myself, but mostly I let the music inspire me rather than the specifics of it, if you know what I mean.

DM: I do! Like if somebody sees you playing, they should go, "I like what he did there, I'll find a way to incorporate it into my style and put an original twist on it," instead of just copying it note-for-note, because that's been done already. I have to tell you, I asked Dick Dale the same question about surf guitarists. I can tell you he definitely landed in the proprietary camp! My feeling was, all these bands like The Ventures and The Surfaris were having big hits that were blatantly derived from a style that he created. So what I was wondering was if he felt a sense of community—like, "we're the surf guitarists." If you create a style the way he did, and then a year or two later "Wipe Out" and "Walk, Don't Run" come out, are you going to think, "Great, people have done stuff with my style," or are you going to think, "They're ripping me off"? He never really answered it, but the impression I got was he didn't like it—I think he wanted to be the only surf guitar player in the world!

AH: Well, I got over that pretty quickly, really, because as soon as—particularly with the internet and everything—nothing's sacred anymore, it's all up to everybody. And it's good, because if somebody could take something that I did and move it forward and make it better... because I'm an old man now, you know, I'm 70 years old, so I don't have the same kind of outlook on life as I did when I was 25. I might have been more offended when I was younger than I am now, but I just think it's all okay, you know? It's okay.

DM: Remember, 70 is the new 65, or something like that, however they say it!

AH: No, in my case, I feel every minute of it, believe me!

DM: Well, now it's time for our first audio clip. Let's check this out:

DM: [Audio Clip - Joel Martin]: "Hi, my name is Joel Martin. I'd like to thank Allan for constant and extreme inspiration for 30 years, which is almost the entire length I've been a musician. I started playing guitar a month before I turned 12, and two years later in 1986, I joined my first two bands. One featured a nine-year-old Brooks Wackerman, and I'd heard that Brooks's brother played with this Allan Holdsworth guy and Frank Zappa, but those were only two names I'd heard in Guitar Player magazine. The other band had a young female lead singer, and she gave me a cassette tape of her songs that she'd recorded on a TDK or something. I listened to her songs to learn them, and then they ended and this music she'd taped over started. It was the most glorious guitar sound I'd ever heard in my entire life—I just did not know how a guitar could sound that good! So I went back to her and said, 'What was this?' She said, 'I have no idea, it's just a tape someone gave me and I taped my stuff on it.' I thought that was the end of that story. The following year, I was going to school at the Grove School of Music, and I saw a friend with some headphones on. I went up to him and was like, 'Hey, what are you listening to?' He said, 'I'm listening to Allan Holdsworth.' I said, 'Oh, I've never really got to check him out before.' He goes, 'What? You're a guitarist and you don't know Allan Holdsworth?' It was just like a movie—it was an incredible moment! He put the headphones on my head, pressed play, and the beginning of Metal Fatigue started. Every part of my brain must have lit up! I was a young, impressionable guitarist, and that was just perfect music. So I was hooked—I was a complete, devout Allan Holdsworth fanatic, and I went to every show that my fake ID could get me into in Southern California. I even got to see a special show because of my Brooks Wackerman connection: Chuck Wackerman's middle school and high school band concert in Seal Beach featuring the Allan Holdsworth Band! Loved it. Around the same time, I was getting into progressive rock, learning about King Crimson, and getting into Bill Bruford and John Wetton. So I found out that there was this U.K. record with everybody on it, and I went and found it. I was listening to it, and at the end of side one there's 'Nevermore'—and there was that guitar melody that I'd heard years before! I finally got to track it down and know that it was Allan, which completely made sense. So I just want to thank you, Allan, because all of your records have really affected me, from Lifetime all the way to your current work, and I just want you to know that. Thank you, cheers!"

AH: Well, thank you, Joel! Indeed.

DM: No, I can relate to what he said about hearing that U.K. track, filing it away in his head, and then somewhere down the line experiencing that moment of discovery like, "Oh, *that's* what that is!" I think we've all done that. One of the things about doing this show is I learn things about my friends—I mean, I didn't know he played with Chad Wackerman's brother and everything; it's pretty interesting to hear, too. But sometimes people hear something and they think they know what it is when they really don't. For example, there's a Rod Stewart video with Jeff Beck in it, so everyone assumes all the guitars on that track were played by Jeff when they weren't. Similarly, while the solo on Michael Jackson's "Beat It" is performed by Eddie Van Halen, all the rest of the guitar on that track—which is considerable—was done by Steve Lukather. Speaking of Jeff Beck and Michael Jackson, next we're going to hear a clip from a guitarist who has collaborated with both! So let's hear what Jennifer Batten has to say:

DM: [Audio Clip - Jennifer Batten]: "Allan is about 10 levels above a black belt on guitar, and it's a level that most guitar players don't even think of aspiring to because it's in a whole other dimension. I had a great conversation with Chad Wackerman once, and he told me Allan explained time like this: when you're having a conversation, it's not stiff and boxed in time; a spoken paragraph isn't necessarily going to fit into two or four bars rhythmically. So if you have a couple extra words beyond the bar line, that bar might become maybe 5/4 or 9/8. So he looks at music like a conversation, and that makes a lot of sense in theory—his approach would seem a lot more natural and human. In fact, all the blues guys that didn't play with a drummer did it that way: they made their bars fit their words! I spoke with another drummer that worked with Allan, and he agreed with me that we both had no idea where 'one' was for his entire shows until that guy actually learned the tunes, and then it made sense. Steve Lynch from the '80s band Autograph was a fellow student when I was at GIT, and I learned tapping from him—and he's the guy that turned me onto one of the Soft Machine records that Allan was on, and it was stunning how original and fluid his sound was, to the point where it actually sounded kind of like fretless. I think that's one of the inspirations for Steve to get into tapping, to make the guitar sound more fluid than picking each note. Years later, I had a student that spent a lot of time trying to cop Allan's style or his sound, and the guy's fingers were so strong he could pull the strings towards the nut to make them go flat! He told me Allan didn't use the tremolo bar as much as you would think because he used that technique. I tried briefly to give it a shot and realized I just didn't have the kind of strength to do that, so instead I used the snot out of the tremolo bar and the Whammy pedal set to a whole step down to get those bends. The last time I saw him was in Portland when he did kind of a free-for-all with Tony Levin and Terry Bozzio—only the cream of the crop would have the balls to attempt a show of total improv, having faith in their creativity at any given moment to make that work. I worked on one of my favorite songs of his, 'Tokyo Dream,' that was released in a songbook (and maybe one other in that book), and I think inside that book or in a Guitar Player article, it was explained that Allan would come up with scales that would work for the wacky chords he came up with, which just seems crazy for the rest of the world, including myself—using known scales is enough for a lifetime of work! He's definitely the cream of the crop, and I have the utmost respect for him."

DM: Well, thank you, Jennifer!

AH: Beautiful! Very kind again, because she's fantastic.

DM: Yeah, she is! She's amazing, she's been on the show twice. She mentions you being a black belt on the guitar, so do you want me to start calling you sensei for the rest of the interview?

AH: No, no, no, absolutely not! I'm a white belt, you know—I haven't even started!

DM: I don't know, do you need to pause and break a board or anything?

Part 3

DM: I like that analogy, which basically says, "Don't fight this guy on guitar because you're going to lose!" But it was interesting what she said about your approach to time being tied to normal speech patterns—you know, your playing doesn't have to fit a particular time signature, and if you want to add a beat or lose one, go ahead and don't confine yourself to established practices. That's an interesting thought to have, because how weird would it be if we all spoke in perfect measures, or if we said everything in haiku or something, you know?

DM: If you can speak with any rhythm you want, you should be able to play that way too. Did she get that right? Did Chad have that right?

AH: Yeah, but also Frank Zappa said that, also. He said, "You don't speak in 4/4."

DM: Tell me about your new album! Yeah, I guess it would be pretty much perfectly logical, actually. It is when you stop and think about it, but many people probably don't question it. In progressive rock, there are a lot of riffs that are built on odd time signatures, but in terms of soloing, I guess as long as the other players are really listening carefully... because Jennifer made that point about not knowing where the "one" is, as long as the guys on stage have a basic idea, I guess.

DM: She also mentioned that technique that sounds like a whammy bar, but it's done with the fingers. Do you know what she was referring to?

AH: I know exactly what she's referring to, yeah. It's just when you grab the string—if you pull the string from below the fret before you fret it and push towards the bridge, that will be very sharp. And likewise, if you grab... say, playing an A on the E string, and you grab it from above, when your finger lands on the note you want to play, if you pull it towards the nut, it will be really flat. So you can get it to move, like... actually, if you get good at it, you can actually stretch it a tone! I don't know that I've ever been able to do more than that, but usually a half step.

DM: That's interesting! Well, that's why I reached out to these other players, because they have stuff on the brain that's not on my brain. I'm glad she was able to contribute that.

DM: Well, I have a feeling you're going to enjoy this next clip. Let's spin it:

DM: [Audio Clip - Carl Jah]: "Hey Dan Miles, this is Carl Jah from Atlanta, Georgia. When you told me that Allan Holdsworth is going to have a 12-CD box set released, my first thought was: 'Man, that's a lot of notes! A lot of notes! If I had a penny for all the notes on that collection, I'd be a wealthy man!' But seriously folks, no, Allan Holdsworth's a master—master brewer! The man likes to make beer... What is this, a roast? That concludes the comedy portion of our show. I'm here Mondays and Thursdays, try the veal! The name Allan Holdsworth first blipped on my radar when a friend brought an album to my house. He says, 'You've got to hear this guitar player, I've never heard anything like it!' It was called Bundles by a band called Soft Machine. They were a progressive English band, and it was groundbreaking. The highest compliment you can pay any musician is that they're original, and this was very original. It sounded like a crazy saxophone, and the tone was amazing. We were like, 'How does he play like that? What is this?' So we followed Allan Holdsworth, you know—I got Velvet Darkness, I still have a vinyl copy of Velvet Darkness as well as having a vinyl copy of Metal Fatigue. Metal Fatigue was an album that I think a lot of people embraced. It had a lot of rock overtones, and he got on a lot of people's radar, I think, with that album. But I've pretty much heard everything, and it's all great, it's all original, and brings something different to the table every time. I got to see Allan Holdsworth play twice: early on, I saw I.O.U. play at the Roxy Theatre—Jeff Berlin on bass, Chad Wackerman on drums—and man, a lot of noise coming off that stage for three guys! It was pretty amazing. Years later, I saw him at the Coach House down in San Juan Capistrano. Gary Husband was on drums, I can't remember the rest of the band, but again, an equally amazing show! And I actually met Allan Holdsworth one time: around 1990 or '91, Dread Zeppelin was touring England, and we were at this rehearsal studio playing in the studio for like a press thing, recording it and interviewing the band. So I went to this little corner coffee clutch thing to get a cup of coffee on the floor we were at, and who's standing there but Allan Holdsworth! So I introduced myself to him, and we chatted a bit. He was there rehearsing with Level 42—he did a tour with them, I think maybe an album even—and very nice guy, very personable, always ready to talk about guitars. Just had a little brief chat, and he was off, but he was very friendly and seemed like a real nice guy. So those are a few of the bright Allan Holdsworth moments in my life. I just want to say: Allan, you've inspired many people, many guitar players, many musicians. 12 CDs is an amazing accomplishment. I wish you many more, and I hoist my glass in your direction. Cheers! The one and only Carl Jah."

AH: That's awesome! That was funny!

DM: When Carl sent me his audio clip, he also sent me a picture of you guys together. It must have been that Level 42 event he was talking about.

DM: Another aspect of your work that probably isn't mentioned enough is your sense of humor, which can often be found in your song titles and, more importantly, I often detect a sense of whimsy in your soloing. Humor is obviously an important tool just to get us through life in general, but in terms of musicianship, how important do you think it is to incorporate some humor now and then?

AH: I think it's very important, actually, because if you look at life... you have to try to find something fun in it to ease the pain, you know? Most of the musicians I've worked with have a fantastic sense of humor; they're all usually very, very funny guys, you know. Chad's got one of the driest wits of all—he's very funny.

DM: I think it relates to intelligence and playing the type of music you do. You're not going to have a lot of dummies playing bass and drums in your band, so it seems like it would go hand in hand that they would be smart, funny, and talented.

AH: Well, I've been extremely lucky in that department. Most everybody that I've played with—keyboards, bass, drummers—are actually some of the most amazing musicians around, and it's been my pleasure to work with all of them. Most everybody I've worked with had their own personality, and they all bring something really different to the table, you know? I really enjoy that; I like to incorporate that in the music where I'm not very strict in terms of interpretation. If they want to interpret it for themselves, I let them do that, because I think that's a good thing. It makes them find their way through the music, and then hopefully make it more enjoyable. Trying to tell somebody, "Well, you do this here, and you do that there"... I tend to let them make their own rules, as long as they're playing the music, which they all do. They can interpret it in different ways.

AH: One example is: I did a track with Gary Husband and Jimmy Johnson which was actually never released, and then I did the same song again with Joel Taylor and Ernest Tibbs, which is still unreleased. But I was going to put them both on the same record, because with the exception of being able to recognize the melody and the actual composition, the interpretation is completely different. It's just like two different universes! And I love that, I really like that—I like to let the guys find themselves. That inspires me, too, because it pushes me to evolve what I'm doing and fit into their interpretation, as opposed to trying to force a direction, if you know what I mean.

DM: I know exactly what you mean. A lot of the guests we've had on this show have been professional studio players, and they will show up for a job and it can go either of those two ways: they can be told, "All right, play what's on that sheet music and do not bring yourself to it at all," or they can be given the freedom to really contribute. You would think that's what you would want—if Lee Ritenour comes in, or Jay Graydon, or Elliott Randall, or some player who's in the studio all the time—let them contribute, like you just said. And they said, "Yeah, you'd think so, but you'd be surprised how often you get in there and they give you something that anybody could have played; they're not putting their personal stamp on it at all," which seems kind of crazy to me. It's like: take advantage of the talent, you're paying for it!

AH: Yeah, you would think so! I did a few session things, and sometimes I would go, "Well, why did you have me do this? Anybody could have done it!" If they don't want you to be yourself, then what's the point, you know?

DM: I hear you, man. One thing—I can't remember which guest mentioned this to me, but he said there was a time, probably in the '70s, when record companies wanted to have lots of names in the liner notes. So instead of just getting one rhythm section, they would have a different bass player and a different drummer—the biggest names they could get—so you'd have Russ Kunkel on this one, but you'd have Jeff Porcaro on that one. They just liked having lots of names, and then, of course, the album is less cohesive when you do that, obviously.

DM: Speaking of humor... from my own experiences, I found this kind of humorous and ironic back in the day, because I used to tell people that I suspected you were a time traveler, because whenever I watched you play, I felt like I was looking into the future! And then you came out with this album called *Atavachron*, where you're wearing a Star Trek uniform on the cover and standing in front of a time portal, and I thought, "Hey, maybe my theory's not so far-fetched after all!"

AH: I was going the wrong way! I was going back into the past!

DM: It was just funny, because I had been making that joke about watching you play and looking into the future before *Atavachron* came out, so after *Atavachron* came out, it was a little bit too eerie—I didn't want to make that joke anymore!

DM: As an example of your musical humor, I'm going to play a track that both Joel and Carl mentioned: the title track from *Metal Fatigue*, which appears to be a bit of a dig at metal guitarists. Were you trying to gently chide them for the repetitive nature?

AH: No, no, no! It was just a play on words, really—it didn't have anything to do with that at all. It was just that when I first was writing that song, it kind of reminded me of heavy metal... And when I worked with Paul Williams, I originally used to write some lyrics of my own, but then I decided that it seemed best to give the vocalist the freedom to make sense out of the lyrics for themselves. So I would let Paul come up with his own lyrics, and he just happened to put that in there, so it became "heavy metal fatigue." It wasn't a dig at all, not at all! I mean, there are so many great metal guitarists. I thought it was kind of fun experimenting with pitch-shifting and all that stuff, which I've experimented with a lot, so it was basically just me having fun.

DM: I'm glad you clarified that, because your playing on that track is really wild, and combining the lyrical thing... As a guy who was traveling in the circle of metal musicians when that came out, I can tell you no metal guitar players were offended.

AH: It wasn't intended to be that way at all. Like I said, it was just fun—we were just having fun, you know. I quite often will have an idea of what the piece of music is going to be, and the title often will be based around that; I'll write the piece of music based around the idea I have for that title. But in that case it wasn't, it was just something that grew out of it.

AH: Like when we did the album *Hard Hat Area* with Skúli Sverrisson on bass, Gary Husband, and Steve Hunt on keyboards: after a show, Skúli came up to me and goes, "Hey man, did you see all the people in the front row? They look like we needed to be handing out hard hats!" It was funny, because he's another very, very funny guy. And then I just came up with the title for the album, you know? But it was not a putdown in any way, it was just humor, really.

DM: That's a good example of it! No matter what the intention, I think we can all agree that the result was pretty badass. So let me go ahead and enjoy the remastered version of "Metal Fatigue."

[Music plays: "Metal Fatigue"]

Part 4

[00:00] Well, I have one last audio clip to play, and unlike the other contributors we've heard from so far, this is someone who's actually played on some of your recordings. When I mentioned this to him, we were both out of town. I was in California, though I live in Arizona. I don't even know where he was, but, you know, we were away from our usual gear, but he really wanted to contribute, so I suggested he just call my cell phone and leave a voicemail, and he promptly did that.

[00:23] Unfortunately, and unsurprisingly, you know, the sound quality is gonna be less pristine, than the other clips we've heard, but I'm sure we can all just adjust our ears and focus on the content. So let's hear what our friend Jeff Berlin has to say. Hi, Dan, here I am, and I'll go and offer some thoughts.

[00:42] My thoughts are these. Alan is imbued with an inner voice, a voice that some have organically. That some are born to, to have. Uh, Alan's vision of guitar goes beyond the instrument. It's actually more of a vision of music itself. And this is the sign of true genius to me, that the guitar is a tool.

[01:10] I mean, he could have done it on a, on a, on a saxophone or a piano had he decided to play those instruments. Um, I always felt a kinship with Alan. Alan and I as people always were in love with each other as friends. We got along famously. Uh, our humor was the same. Our, our vision of, of life was the same.

[01:36] And quite frankly, playing with him was always, uh, a remarkable experience because I had the daily opportunity to watch an individual voice in music play and be a part of that experience.

[01:51] Alan is unique, and uniqueness is not something that comes to everybody. He's as unique as Coltrane was, actually as Eddie Van Halen is as well, in that unique view of guitar playing in the rock sense. Alan is in his stylistic view of music. He's unique. He is imbued with something special that simply was a part, is a part of his, his very life force, uh, that which makes him so special that everybody who first heard him were instantly impacted by his uniqueness, that unique thing that made him utterly different, uh, an original voice in music.

[02:34] Well, thanks for that, Jeff. Uh, another very funny guy, we should add. Jeff's also been on the show a couple times. Jeff's amazing. He's absolutely amazing. What a tremendous musician, man. And again, you know, sentiment plays a role, but, you know, you've worked with a lot of great, great bass players, and maybe it's because Road Games was my introduction, but I, I always kind of have a special fondness for his bass work, the two of you together.

[02:57] Um, you know, many people probably don't realize it, but apart from sharing a sense of humor, another thing you and Jeff have in common is you're both violinists. Um, how did your experience on that instrument inform your guitar style? Uh, well, I didn't start playing the violin for many, many years after I'd played guitar.

[03:16] Some people thought I started with the violin, but I did not. Um, I started with guitar, and then maybe 10 or 15 years later, I stumbled into a— fell out of the pub and stumbled into a pawn shop, and I saw this old violin. And I just thought, oh, and it had no strings and it looked pretty beat up.

[03:37] And, uh, I bought it. It was really cheap. It was like $10 or something. It turned out that it was a very, very good violin. Later on, a couple of years later, I tried to buy another one which was very— an expensive violin. And I was playing it in the violin shop and then I said, oh, wait a minute.

[03:57] And I pulled out my violin and it completely torched this very expensive violin. I mean, not Stradivarius, you know, but, um, even the guy in the store was going, oh my God, what the hell is that? It turned out it was just a factory-built, an old factory-built German violin. It was very old. Of course, all the violins say Stradivarius inside, but they're not, you know.

[04:22] Yeah, but, uh, And I only had a brief relationship with that thing. I think I only played the violin for maybe a couple of years and then I quit playing it, you know, I just stopped. I wanted to focus on the guitar because of the chordal aspect, because I was really into like chords. Otherwise, at a different time, I might have stuck with the violin, or if I'd have started with the violin, that might have been even better.

[04:45] But I just got so into, uh, being able to play harmony, you know, multiple notes, which is— you can't really do on a violin. In the same manner as you can on an instrument where you can play chords. I asked the wrong question. Instead of saying, how did your, you know, experience on the violin inform the guitar, really, how did your guitar playing inform your, your playing on the violin would have been the right question.

[05:08] You know, I only brought it up because you, you were credited on an early solo album. You played some violin on it. And of course, Jeff was a violin virtuoso before he became a bass virtuoso, so that's the only reason I brought it up. All right. Yeah, I mean, he never, he never really went into that very much, you know.

[05:23] Um, We never played violin together. We never, you know, I never saw him with a violin actually. But, uh, yeah, so it wasn't— we didn't often talk about that, right? And most people wouldn't associate you or Jeff with violins, but, you know, it sounded like you flirted with it. But I think it was his original instrument, and that's why I asked him the question, because, you know, classical violinists will play, you know, fast, complex runs when they play classical music.

[05:48] And then, you know, he translated that to the bass, and that was why I asked. But, uh, you know, to Jeff's point about your uniqueness, he hit that word several times unique. Whenever I listen to music just in general, I, I always like coming across things I've never heard before on any instrument. So one thing I've always enjoyed about your recordings over the years is there's just an abundance of those totally unique moments, you know, mostly on guitar but the other instruments as well, you know.

[06:13] And to his point about your overall musicality and his suggestion that you could have achieved innovative results on any instrument, when I think of guitar synthesizers, the 3 players who always come to mind first are Andy Summers, Pat Metheny, and yourself. Uh, some of your work on the Syntaxx could easily be misidentified as keyboards, even though it's, it's all guitar-generated.

[06:34] You know, earlier we heard from Jennifer Batten. When Jeff Beck invited her to tour with him, you know, she quickly discovered that in addition to the role of second guitarist, he was also expecting her to cover a lot of parts that were originally done on keyboards. She had to find, you know, a way to trigger all those non-guitar-sounding parts.

[06:51] And from my own experience with early guitar synthesizers, the biggest concern was the lag time between playing a note and hearing it back. So given how you play, did you initially have any delay issues with the Syntax, or was it, you know, always able to keep up with you right out of the gate? To me, it was, uh, light years ahead of any of the other guitar synth controllers that were around, like the Roland or the ones in the beginning, the They're much, much better now, but in the beginning they were pretty bad.

[07:21] Um, but syntax was great, and, uh, especially if you use the keys, it was instantaneous. I mean, if you could play things using the key section of it, it was, you know, when you hit that key, the note came out right then. There was no lag at all. Yeah, there was some— there was a small lag from the trigger strings, but you kind of get used to it.

[07:42] And what the instrument was giving back to me more than made up for the effort I had to put in to try to figure out how to manipulate it. I mean, I got better at it the longer I played it, obviously. But, uh, oh, one guy you forgot there was John McLaughlin. John McLaughlin is unbelievably amazing with guitar synthesizers.

[08:04] I mean, I think you forgot him. Yeah, I officially apologize to him, but in fairness to me, I said the first 3 and not the only 3. I said the first 3 that occurred to me. All right, okay, I got you. Well, I want to play another track from your upcoming collection which spotlights the Synthax.

[08:21] Now everyone will be able to see, you know, how this could be mistaken for keyboards, but they can also see how that instrument expanded your sound palette as a guitarist. The name of this track, which features only Alan and no one else, is Distance vs. Desire.

[08:38] Well, I want to acknowledge one last listener, my friend Robbie Bickford. When I mentioned your name, he sent me a very succinct one-sentence response that I found, you know, quite apropos. What he said was, I can't hear as well as he can play. And, um, I understand what he means, you know. You know, as you're making all these split-second decisions during your improvisations, you know, that are, you know, par for the course for you, and some listeners might be feeling a bit left in the dust.

[09:06] Now, even though he's a smart guy and a great player, I think he's just acknowledging, you know, he his inability to grasp the entirety of your playing and, you know, to appreciate every nuance and subtle intricacy simply because he can't keep up with you mentally. But, you know, Charlie Parker, even Keith Jarrett, some other people we've mentioned, it's not totally unique.

[09:25] Um, but this does bring me to my last question for you, uh, in terms of your own self-assessment, you know, as you look back on the evolution of your playing throughout this comprehensive collection, in what areas do you feel that you've improved the most by your own internal standards? It's always kind of stayed the same, really, in as much as I always prefer the newer recordings to the older ones.

[09:48] Yeah, because it's closer to where it actually is in my head at the moment, you know, as opposed to some of the older tracks where I go, oh, I shouldn't have done that. Oh, if only I'd have done this, you know. But you can't change it, you know. It's done. What's done is done, you know. It's like looking at an old photograph or something, you know.

[10:07] Oh, I used to be young, you know. It's all like, well, But then at the same time, it works in reverse with the music to me. I like the newer stuff better, not the photographs, just the music. Well, yeah, well, Donald Fagan said he can't stand to listen to Do It Again or Ricky Don't Lose That Number, all the early songs that Steely Dan did for the same reason.

[10:27] It's not complex enough. And, you know, but yeah, this is the thing, some of the people who've, who've commented have mentioned, you know, they— we all started with you early and everybody just sort of stayed with you. And so they kind of grow with you. And that's the case for a lot of artists. And that's why it's good that you do try different things.

[10:44] Flat Tire is a good example of that. And None Too Soon is a good example of that. And, you know, we mentioned Pat Metheny. He does the same thing. If you just, you know, do Metal Fatigue Volume 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, you know, is there any growth there? But yeah, Robbie's funny because he— I didn't know this about him.

[11:00] You know, he started out as a jazz musician. When I met him, were in high school and he was playing, you know, UFO and Blue Oyster Cult. Yeah, I had no idea he had any jazz history or chops, but that was probably my favorite response because it was just one sentence. I, I can't hear as well as he can play.

[11:15] You can, you can take that 2 ways, but I'll, I'll take it in the pleasant way. I think that's the way we all mean it.

Part 5

AH: I just want to thank everybody for being so kind to me, and all those great musicians who've said those nice things about me. It's very moving, and I appreciate it. I was very happy that Dan and Evan Cohen from Manifesto Records asked about doing a compilation, as an old guy and everything, and just kind of reissuing this stuff—because of the fact that they were mostly either discontinued, bootlegs, or remastered who knows where.

AH: They wanted to do a nice job, and I think they did a great job, actually. Obviously, depending on how old the material was, some of it was on two-inch, some of it was half-inch, and some of it was digital tape machines. Overall, I think they did a great job, and it was kind of like looking back over my shoulder—which I don't really like to do—but as an old man now, I feel that it was okay to do that.

AH: I was not happy with the title of the compilation box, because it's outside the realm of my normal way of thinking to self-promote in that way. But they'd already spent time and money doing the cover, and I was only concerned with the music—I just wanted to make sure that the music was okay.

AH: I think they did a wonderful job. Really, what I'm trying to focus on now is the new album—the newest one I'm working on with Virgil Donati and Jimmy Johnson. I don't know how long this will take, but we'll see!

DM: I'm glad you summarized the project the way you did, because as I said, I have an advance copy of *Eidolon*, which is the two-disc set, and then the 12-CD set. I had forgotten that *Road Games* had been out of print for a while and there had been problems getting some of these things. It's very nice to be able to have *I.O.U.* through *Flat Tire*—*Flat Tire: Music for a Non-Existent Movie*—and there's also the live album at the end (*Then*). As you've also stated, you're not finished making music—you have more music you're going to continue to make. But it's really nice to have this set; there's a lot of music for people to chew on while they're waiting for the next one. I want to stress the point that when the next one is done, please come back so we can talk about it! I'm very curious to hear it.

AH: You bet, you bet! Thank you so much.

DM: So everybody, if you're new to Allan's music or if you're a long-time fan, now is the perfect time to discover or rediscover his solo recordings, because they've literally never sounded better. It sounds really great; the remastering was a roaring success. Again, the release date for both the expanded and abridged collections is April 7th, but both are available right now for pre-order on Amazon.com, so reserve yours today!

DM: For our exit music, we're going to treat everyone to that Jack Bruce version of "Road Games" we mentioned earlier, and then after that, we're going to hear Allan's rendition of the Irving Berlin standard, "How Deep Is the Ocean?"

DM: Well, Allan, I want to thank you for joining me today. You've been a musical hero of mine for many years now, so I really appreciate this opportunity to speak with you.

AH: Well, it's been my pleasure. Thank you so very much for giving me the opportunity! And just like I said to all the people that have stuck with me over the years: I really, truly appreciate it. Thank you all so very much.

DM: I want to thank everyone who sent in a comment or an audio clip. I also want to thank Allan's collaborator, Dan Perloff. Extra special thanks to Anne Leighton for her assistance arranging this interview. Thanks to Tom Bowers for engineering and editing the podcast, and thanks once again to the one and only Allan Holdsworth.

DM: Now, as promised, here are a couple more tastes from his upcoming remastered collection. First, we have the title track from *Road Games*, featuring Chad Wackerman on drums, our friend Jeff Berlin on bass, and Jack Bruce with a previously unreleased alternate lead vocal. And then we have Allan's Irving Berlin cover, "How Deep Is the Ocean?", featuring Gary Willis on bass, Kirk Covington on drums, and Gordon Beck on keyboards. Basically, a whole lot of top-level musical content coming your way!

DM: Don't forget to pre-order your Allan Holdsworth collection today, or if you're hearing this podcast after April 7th, 2017, don't forget to rush right out and pick it up! Thanks very much for listening, and we'll see you next time. So long, everybody!

[Music plays: "Road Games" (feat. Jack Bruce)]

[Music plays: "How Deep Is the Ocean?"]