Lots of Road Games outtakes in these downloads. Allan goes into some detail in the liner notes about what a horrible experience those sessions were for him. I know Road Games was originally supposed to be an album rather than EP. I wonder if there were any other songs that reached the recording stage that he could have released. All the songs included here are alternates to songs that actually made it to the EP.
The two new songs didn't do a lot for me, though it's interesting that he's now experimenting with the Starr Guitar--a much more advanced guitar synth controller than the Synthaxe he was using before. The problem I've had with his guitar synth explorations is that it always seems to rob him of his very distinctive soloing "voice". A lot of the little phrasing bits he puts in just don't translate to guitar synth controllers, and this also seems true of the Starr based on what he included here.
Yep. All in all, I find the whole thing to be disappointing, though I love Allan and I'm too aware of his personality quirks to actually be mad at him. But as it turns out, that first track from months ago with Virgil Donati and Jimmy Johnson was the only real new band track. The two new ones are just Allan overdubbing himself (and/or playing unaccompanied) on synth controlling instruments. Everything else is alternate versions of songs that have been around for decades, and most of it from his second album, Road Games. There's an interesting version of "The Abingdon Chasp" from Bruford's "One of a Kind." Of course, there's some great previously unheard guitar solos, but they're all from many years ago and knowing how he feels about anything he's done more than "x" amount of years ago, he must've begrudgingly dredged these up just to give us pledgers something.
I know he has stuff that he had been working on over the past 16 years since "The 16 Men of Tain" came out. I just hope they see the light of day... and preferably while he's still around to mix, produce it himself.
I bought Atavachron when it first came out and was disappointed in the songs featuring the Synthaxe. He just didn't use it in an interesting way. If those songs had featured him on guitar, it would have been a different story.
I think the next one I got was IOU, which I liked pretty well. That was in 1986, and that was it until I saw him at NEARfest and bought a couple of his CDs and got them signed. I like him, but I haven't ever gotten THAT into him. I think his best albums maybe are, or were, OOP for a while. I need to do a bit of research.
Speaking of which, if people would like to list their top 5 Holdsworth albums (or 3 or whatever), I'm all ears.
1. IOU
2. IOU Live
3. Road Games
4. Metal Fatigue
5. Velvet Darkness (likely not a common one in fans' top 5's)
Note: I've never heard Blues for Tony, or Flat Tire for that matter.
1. IOU
2. Metal Fatigue
3. Road Games
4. Secrets
5. Sand
"Why is it when these great Prog guys get together, they always want to make a Journey album?"
- fiberman, 7/5/2015
1. IOU
2. Road games
3. Metal Fatique
then everything else
no tunes, no dynamics, no nosebone
Favorite albums - Road Games, Metal Fatigue, Velvet Darkness (I know, I know...I love the rawness of this even if AH supposedly hates it.
Fave songs- Non-Brewed Condiment off Atavachron & City Nights from Secrets.
Great work on these albums- Anders Johansson, Jens Johansson And Allan Holdsworth - Heavy Machinery, Chad Wackerman's Forty Reasons, Soft Machine's Bundles & Floating World Live, Soft Works' Abracadabra, 1st 2 Bruford albums, UK/UK, Gong's Espresso, Gongzilla's Suffer, Jean-Luc Ponty's Enigmatic Ocean.
"Henry Cow always wanted to push itself, so sometimes we would write music that we couldn't actually play – I found that very encouraging." - Lindsay Cooper, 1998
"I have nothing to do with Endless River. Phew! This is not rocket science people, get a grip." - Roger Waters, 2014
"I'm a collector. And I've always just seemed to collect personalities." - David Bowie, 1973
Not in any order:
Soft Machine - Bundles
Tony Williams Lifetime
Pierre Moerlen's Gong - Gazeuse! & Expresso II
Jean-Luc Ponty - Enigmatic Ocean
Bruford - Feels Good To Me & One Of A Kind
Chad Wackerman - Forty Reasons & The View
U.K.
Mark Varney Project - Truth In Shredding
NEVER UNDERESTIMATE THE POWER OF STUPID PEOPLE IN LARGE GROUPS!
Measured by how often they are spinned:
1. IOU
2. Atavachron
3. Wardenclyffe Tower
4. Road Games
5. Secrets
(6. Metal Fatigue)
With others:
Tony Williams Lifetime - Believe it
The Bruford Albums
Gong Gazeuse + Expresso 2
UK
Soft Machine: Bundles
1. Velvet Darkness
2. Hard Hat Area
3. Metal Fatigue
4. Secrets
5. None Too Soon
Why is it whenever someone mentions an artist that was clearly progressive (yet not the Symph weenie definition of Prog) do certain people feel compelled to snort "thats not Prog" like a whiny 5th grader?
I think of Allan as a composer, and as a guitarist.....or perhaps as an instrumentalist who mainly plays guitar.
As compositions, I think Funnels, Non Brewed Condiment, Devil Take the Hindmost, the 4:15 Bradford Executive, The Things You See.....and many of his others are unique and have a certain voice that is unique. His music has a certain sense of pathos, and certain English nostalgia, I dunno how exactly to describe it.....but I love his solo albums because they are expressions of this unique "Allan-ness."
I love the work he did as a sideman or band member with Soft Machine, Gong, Tony Williams, Bruford, of course...he's a unique soloist and brings something original to anything he works on, usually becoming an integral part of the whole. But I suppose I'm in the minority in preferring his solo albums. I can't decide on how to rank them.....None Too Soon is his take on a "Jazz Standards" album. Sixteen Men of Tain has a different feel, for me, than Atavachron/Sand/Secrets/Wardyncliffe.....all of which I love. I love Velvet Darkness, too, though I do think it's not a "fully formed" Allan-as-Composer statement like his more recent stuff. Metal Fatigue and Road Games probably have the greatest commercial potential, and I think he was doing interesting things with the guitar that I haven't heard him do since---playing with rhythmic and tonal colors that he seems to have abandoned.
I wish him well and wish him good health. He's a treasure, to me.
"And this is the chorus.....or perhaps it's a bridge...."
Glad to be in that club with you, Cone!
Of course he sounds great on all of the albums he played on; he's just a fantastic soloist! But his solo albums are Allan doing exactly what he wants to do... and that's what he's best at. I know a lot of people don't like his tunes that much, but I think he's a great composer! And maybe folks don't like his solo albums because they're more about jazz than rock, with very interactive bandmates and lots of chords. I don't know; I stopped trying to guess why people don't like his own albums.
It's really hard to pick favorites. I love "Blues For Tony," mainly because (keyboardist) Alan Pasqua is an equally amazing soloist. Steve Hunt is great too, but his playing is a little too similar to Allan's sometimes. Still, those albums he's on (Hard Hat Area, Secrets, Wardenclyffe Tower and Then!) are all great... and Steve contributed some excellent tunes of his own.
As for Allan as a sideman, Bruford's "One of a Kind" is one of my top 5 favorite albums of all time.
Nice to see you again, Ernie!
My preference is also for Allan as the "frontman". Albums like Hard Hat Area and Sand have some of my favorite compositions by anyone.
Bruford's One of a Kind is absolutely killer though, and Allan was great on that one. His musical voice is so distinctive, I like hearing it "undiluted" if that makes sense.
I cherish Holdsworth's solo rekkids, although at this point I can't claim as much familiarity with Tain and None Too Soon and Flat Tire as I can the others. He's an exemplary musical artist with a unique voice.
I get why some people burn out on his sound, and I get why some prefer his sideman work to his solo work, but if I felt the need to state a preference, it would simply be that I prefer ALL of it because for the most part it's ALL good.
Hired on to work for Mr. Bill Cox, a-fixin' lawn mowers and what-not, since 1964.
"Arguing with an idiot is like playing chess with a pigeon. It'll just knock over all the pieces, shit on the board, and strut about like it's won anyway." Anonymous
“Never argue with an idiot. They will only bring you down to their level and beat you with experience.” George Carlin
not seeing this posted...
https://www.facebook.com/notes/allan...54025754224024
NOTES FROM ALLAN HOLDSWORTH “TALES FROM THE VAULT PART II”
Allan Holdsworth·Thursday, August 4, 2016
This is from Allan Holdswoth directly, regarding his delayed TALES FROM THE VAULT files delivery. All Pledgers will be contacted by early next week with further information what will happen next.
Greetings everyone. So very sorry for the huge delay.
I had to change plans, what I wanted to do and what I ended
up doing were/are two very different things. I hope you won’t
be disappointed by this.
What I wanted to do was give you guys some old tracks with
new solos. At the same time, I was trying to work on our new
recordings and trying to balance them both was very difficult
for me.
I do not work well at all under pressure. In fact, the harder I
am pushed the more I put my foot on the brakes. If I get
pushed really hard I tend to just Stop.
I do not think that I have ever delivered (solo records) a single
record on time. But it didn't matter then because no one
(besides the record company, if there was one) payed for
anything before it was delivered so therefore it wasn't so much
pressure. When the record came out then the fans could buy it
and there it was in their hands…. Done Deal. But the Pledge
thing became awkward for me because people payed in
advance for something that may take a long time, a pressure I
am not used to at all.
So I changed gears and decided to research really old tapes
that were in my possession. My good friend and engineer
Robert Fiest came to my house and I gave him a collection of 2-
inch and 1/2 inch masters. He kindly took them and had to
bake them, a long, expensive process, and then transfer them
to his computer. Which he did successfully. Then he sent me
the files to review what we had.
These are some of the tracks we found. There are also 2 new
tracks, New Dawn and Poochini.
New Dawn was written by my old friend Pat Smythe. We used
to play it with Pat's quartet in the early 70s. This version I
played the chords on the Synthaxe. The solo I played on the
Starr Z board. A very interesting machine. I used the same
instrument on Chad Wackerman's last record "Dreams
Nightmares and Improvisations “ (A New Day and The
Billows). I haven't quite got the hang of it yet but it pushes me
in different directions which I like.
Water on the Brain with Paul Williams was supposed to be on
the old IOU record… but the tape was stolen and was
recovered AFTER the original album was done. So here that
one is! Gary Husband, dms, Paul Carmichael, bs, Paul
Williams voc. AH gtr.
The Abingdon Chasp with Bill Bruford drs Francis Mose bs-
(Gong) Jeff Young kbrds Ray Warliegh alto sax and me. I don't
like listening to my old stuff. It sounds so lame to me but the
other guys sound great! Ray Warliegh was a dear friend of
mine. He was an amazing super melodic player…. Miss him.
The Road Games Cluster*&^%$%^&*
When I was on the road with UK I met Edward Van Halen. A
wonderful generous soul to say nothing of his amazing
talent!!!!! He was instrumental in getting me hooked up with
Warner Brothers. The issues I had with WB had nothing to do
with Edward. He is a jewel.
After I was signed by WB under the wings of Ted Templeman
(a fabulous producer) however, I realized that’s when my
troubles began. In fact, they signed me but had no real
intention of letting me do what I wanted to do. They had
another agenda.
First they wanted to change my band personnel. I was in hell,
my band mates were also my close friends and WB wanted to
mess with it. Anyway, we started recording at "The Music
Grinder" which was run by Gary Skardina and Ron Felicia,
very cool people but then Ted (TT) decided that he didn't want
me to use that studio and told me we had to move to a WB
studio called "Amigo". Then the shit hit the fan. Ted told me I
couldn't use my engineer and that I had to use an engineer he
liked, directly working with Ted not me!
We were starting to mix and then we had to stop because Ted
said there was another "FAMOUS" band in one of the other
rooms that was having problems with the 2-inch tape machine
they were using. THIS IS WB so rather than rent another 2-
inch they decided to steal our machine. %^&*()(*&^%$%^&*
Then transfer all our 2-inch tapes to a 3M Digital
machine. Quite possibly a pioneering digital machine but it
sounded horrendous. (In my opinion.) That’s when I threw up
my hands and basically gave up.
All the tracks labelled Outtakes are in fact all outtakes from
the "Music Grinder" featuring Joe Turano, a fabulous singer in
my opinion. TT would usually listen to mixes over the phone
and make decisions as to approval or disapproval… usually the
latter.
These 2-track rough mixes were sent to Ted for his decision as
to yes or no. It was NO.
Note: Jeff Berlin's amazing solo is well evident here.
I had forgotten about these tracks but once I heard Joe again I
thought you guys should check him out. (Certain things, like
bits of guitar solos were either muted at the time or not done
yet, as they were 2 track mixes, I obviously couldn’t put them
back.)
Although these were rough mixes it just goes to show how
much sonic destruction happened as a direct result of TT’s
decision to transfer to the 3M machine.
The Mark Pinski mixes: (Mastered by Robert Fiest for Pledge)
During this time, I met Frank Zappa, who was very kind to
me. I told him my story about the WB problems (I don't think
he was a fan of WB either) and he very generously offered to
let me use his amazing studio. He said go get a couple of 24
track tapes from WB which I did. I had to sneak them out as
they were vaulted but I managed to get a couple of reels out.
I took them over to Frank's house and he introduced me to his
engineer Mark Pinski. He mixed 3 tracks in one evening. His
mixes also showed the destruction that the transfer to the 3M
machine at Amigo caused. However, we ended up not using
them as Ted Templeman would not allow it.
Anyway, Mark’s mixes were excellent but very bright, so when
I heard them again from the 2-track masters we knocked off
some of the high end. That’s what you have!
Poochini. (Nickname) is a little short dedication to my
Daughter Louise's hound, Daisy. She was the most beautiful
sweetest hound. She was a Pit Bull mix, part Dalmatian. We
miss her.
Once again I apologize for the huge delay and thank you all so
VERY much for your patience and incredible support. It has
truly meant a lot to me!!
Yours Sincerely, Allan.
-=Will you stand by me against the cold night, or are you afraid of the ice?=-
nice...
AH is a class act in the greatest way
love or hate his solo albums, the dude is cool!
Why is it whenever someone mentions an artist that was clearly progressive (yet not the Symph weenie definition of Prog) do certain people feel compelled to snort "thats not Prog" like a whiny 5th grader?
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