False Alarm: Difference between revisions

From Allan Holdsworth Information Center
Created page with " ==Allan Holdsworth (Guitar Player 1980)== When did you form the group with which you are currently playing? Early this year. It’s called False Alarm, and it’s a tri..."
 
No edit summary
Line 4: Line 4:
When did you form the group with which you are currently playing?
When did you form the group with which you are currently playing?


Early this year. It’s called False Alarm, and it’s a trio that we’re now trying to get management for. We have Gary Husband on drums - he’s also very good on piano - and Paul Carmichael on bass. Besides playing guitar, I also sing a little. We had a terrible time finding a bass player because so many of them are interested in sounding like Jaco [Pastorius]. We wanted someone who sounded like they were doing something of their own. Our music has some elements of jazz and rock, but we try not be overly tricky.
Early this year. It’s called '''False Alarm''', and it’s a trio that we’re now trying to get management for. We have Gary Husband on drums - he’s also very good on piano - and Paul Carmichael on bass. Besides playing guitar, I also sing a little. We had a terrible time finding a bass player because so many of them are interested in sounding like Jaco [Pastorius]. We wanted someone who sounded like they were doing something of their own. Our music has some elements of jazz and rock, but we try not be overly tricky.


==[[The Reluctant Virtuoso (Guitar World 1981)]]==
==[[The Reluctant Virtuoso (Guitar World 1981)]]==


Allan Holdsworth - cult shaman to contemporary flash guitar idols like Eddie Van Halen, principal (and most interesting) soloist for U.K. Gong, Bruford, Soft Machine Tony Williams Lifetime (second edition) and Jean-Luc Ponty, and the only player to successfully fuse the ‘big guitar" timbre of seventies heavy rock with the melodic continuity and harmonic imagination of jazz - is not amused. He is sitting in his London flat with a bad cold doing yet another interview about his prodigious instrumental technique with an overawed American writer while his newish three-piece band, False Alarm goes absolutely nowhere slowly.
Allan Holdsworth - cult shaman to contemporary flash guitar idols like Eddie Van Halen, principal (and most interesting) soloist for U.K. Gong, Bruford, Soft Machine Tony Williams Lifetime (second edition) and Jean-Luc Ponty, and the only player to successfully fuse the ‘big guitar" timbre of seventies heavy rock with the melodic continuity and harmonic imagination of jazz - is not amused. He is sitting in his London flat with a bad cold doing yet another interview about his prodigious instrumental technique with an overawed American writer while his newish three-piece band, '''False Alarm''' goes absolutely nowhere slowly.


The transatlantic telephone conversation is punctuated with temporary pauses for some deep, basso-profundo coughing as Holdsworth relates the grinding frustration of his current situation. "Yeah, it’s still called False Alarm, that’s the name we’re using in the U.K. It’s my band but I don’t like using my own name. Same band members, Paul Carmichael on bass and Gary Husband on drums. We’re looking for management and a record label. It’s hard [getting signed] everywhere, but it’s really dreadful here. We can’t get anybody interested."
The transatlantic telephone conversation is punctuated with temporary pauses for some deep, basso-profundo coughing as Holdsworth relates the grinding frustration of his current situation. "Yeah, it’s still called '''False Alarm''', that’s the name we’re using in the U.K. It’s my band but I don’t like using my own name. Same band members, Paul Carmichael on bass and Gary Husband on drums. We’re looking for management and a record label. It’s hard [getting signed] everywhere, but it’s really dreadful here. We can’t get anybody interested."


For example, he says, there’s the tape of False Alarm that is making the rounds among a small group of friends and supporters in the U.S.
For example, he says, there’s the tape of False Alarm that is making the rounds among a small group of friends and supporters in the U.S.
Line 24: Line 24:
==[[Mike Pachelli Show (video transcript 1991)]]==
==[[Mike Pachelli Show (video transcript 1991)]]==


MP: In 1980 you started a trio called False Alarm, with Gary Husband and Paul Carmichael – was it time for you to become a leader?
MP: In 1980 you started a trio called '''False Alarm''', with Gary Husband and Paul Carmichael – was it time for you to become a leader?


AH: Well I – during the time that I – most of my life worked – well after I moved to London I been just another guy in someone else’s band, I just decided myself – I had a backlog of material I’d been working on and I wanted to try and play with different people and I met Gary Husband, cause I met all these musicians who had been saying Hey you should listen to this drummer friend I mean it he’s like unbelievable and I had an opportunity to play with Gary and it was like really special, the guys really an unbelievable musician. And I really liked working with him, he really understood – probably understood more where I wanted than I could understand what he was really wanted but it was the beginning of a really great kind of relationship and we just tried to get this band off to the road and we couldn’t – we had a friend worked for Virgin Records and he gave us some free studio time – a guy called Nicholas Powell, and we did some tracks -in fact we finished doing the whole album on this little boat on a canal in London.
AH: Well I – during the time that I – most of my life worked – well after I moved to London I been just another guy in someone else’s band, I just decided myself – I had a backlog of material I’d been working on and I wanted to try and play with different people and I met Gary Husband, cause I met all these musicians who had been saying Hey you should listen to this drummer friend I mean it he’s like unbelievable and I had an opportunity to play with Gary and it was like really special, the guys really an unbelievable musician. And I really liked working with him, he really understood – probably understood more where I wanted than I could understand what he was really wanted but it was the beginning of a really great kind of relationship and we just tried to get this band off to the road and we couldn’t – we had a friend worked for Virgin Records and he gave us some free studio time – a guy called Nicholas Powell, and we did some tracks -in fact we finished doing the whole album on this little boat on a canal in London.