Narada Michael Walden

Narada Michael Walden played drums on Velvet Darkness (album).

Mike Pachelli Show (video transcript 1991)

MP: You did some things with CTI you mentioned, the Velvet Darkness album…

AH: Yeah that was a big rip off, a big disaster in my whole – and it haunts me to this day – the guy basically said I could record with whoever I wanted to and I got Alan Pasqua, Alphonso Johnson, Michael Walden and I thought wow, this going to be great, but we were rehearsing in this studio and they just recorded the rehearsing, we never actually got to record the tracks – they just recorded the rehearsals and that was it. When we said like, Isn't it time we did those tracks? Again, you know? No that was it. So it was a real disaster album then and it's an even bigger disaster now because the new album Secrets, the last album, was on Enigma, which was bought by Capitol, and now that album is no longer available, but- ! Of course you can find the old CTI album on Sony CBS which is, makes me want to give it, just quit on the spot. How do you deal with that?

The Innocent Abroad (Musician 1984)

A better clue to Holdsworth's ultimate intentions came when George Benson and Joe Farrell became goggle-eyed by him at a Manhattan club and dragged CTI president Creed Taylor down to hear. The resulting 1975 LP Velvet Darkness, felicitously matched Allan with the tasteful but ennervated Alphonso Johnson and Narada Michael Walden; though all too short, it is one of Holdsworth's best early dates, ablaze with Hendrixian fission, virtuoso precision and genuine emotion.