Allan Holdsworth. RIP. One of a Kind.

Ahhhh RIP Allan. A true original; nobody played like him and his style was all is own. I always admired his vision and absolute commitment of advancing guitar playing, exploring his personal style, and pushing for new creative heights. Unique in so many ways...he will be missed. My thoughts go out to your family and friends...

I'd not listened to him for some time and did a deep dive into his material on YouTube just a few days ago to revisit his playing...definitely was unsettling to read this today.

He also got huge props by me when he released the album "Atavachron"; I loved the Star Trek connection...:cool:
 
my introduction to Mr Holdsworth was the metal fatigue album that came out around the time I picked up the electric guitar.
He has been an inspiration to many.
sad to hear of his passing.
r.i.p.
 
Ahhhh RIP Allan. A true original; nobody played like him and his style was all is own. I always admired his vision and absolute commitment of advancing guitar playing, exploring his personal style, and pushing for new creative heights. Unique in so many ways...he will be missed. My thoughts go out to your family and friends...

I'd not listened to him for some time and did a deep dive into his material on YouTube just a few days ago to revisit his playing...definitely was unsettling to read this today.

He also got huge props by me when he released the album "Atavachron"; I loved the Star Trek connection...:cool:

He also had a song called "Zarabeth" on Wardenclyff Tower. She was a character in the TOS espisode "All Our Yesterdays", which is a song from Atavachron. She's the girl trapped in the prison that gets Spock to fall in love with her.
 
Gutted another member told me and it just wrecked my night.
Ive been listening to AH since 78 or so long as EJ and electromagnets.

What a bright star for everyone to stand in awe of.

I cant believe hes gone but I am so grateful to have seen and met him several times
the first with chad whackerman and jeff berlin and last time with chad and Jimmy Johnson and
AH handed me his delap after the show and Jimmy Johnson showed me his alembic also
let me hold it so neat...

When I looked at the Delap I said out loud well its FLAT looking at the neck from heel end to end of neck.
I dare not play a note on it nor bend one so I felt the action with left hand and eyeballed it real well and handed it right back.
I was also allowed on stage after show so eyeballed his rack gear and stuff on board.

He had 1210 spacial expander by TC and that was all set the way he wanted it he had some
switching ABY boxes and different delays.. but I remember his pedal board was just pedals on tray
and then he brought all that in bag and set that up at gig... So He knew the signal path and Jimmy Johnson
played through the rack he did..... So I think direct and all that went to the board or house mains.

Lots of old TC gear at least for 1210 think he had chorus and or delay and 1210
and then pedals on that tray. He seemed to be the one that knew how it all fell together.

The last show I see posted shows him using 2 UD stomp pedals.
It would be most important to preserve those and the amp and guitar he was playing
to know oh this is what the master was playing before he left us.

I know he had an axe fx....
I think it would be great to really show support and setup several fund me sites to help
support his family and keep his music alive.

I think every major artist should also step forward and help in anyway they can financially.
This man just left a Giant Step of his own and he should really be praised and shown respect as should his family.

I think they should be flooded with help and praise of course its too late for AH but his family should get some help and support..
There should be tribute pages setup to help them directly.

Does anyone here know anything about the UD stomp delays ?
He sure was fond of them. Im curious about what amps he was playing
Keisel was the guitar company so will find more about his latest model.

I was checking out the harmonizer on metal fatigue tonight and telling someone
and they told me he had passed away.



I need to revisit the Holdsworth patches available here can we consolidate some of the better patches
here ?
 
No!!!! Another great is gone. They seem to be dropping like flies lately. :(

Sad thing is Cliff they're all getting old. Most of my favs turn 60 over the course of this year. Holdsworth was in his 70's, the working musician's life is hard no matter how old you are

Holdsworth was such a huge influence on so many people I've learnt from.

He really did push the envelope of what can be done on the guitar.

RIP, and I can say with some authority he wont ever be forgotten
 
just posted on facebook by his daughter louise. passed away today.

sad news. a true innovator and musical genius.

Allan-Holdsworth02_H.Vielz_depth1.jpg

Saw and made it a point to have a beer or 5 with this man.
Im gutted and stunned he is not around a giant void fills me.
The best we do is love those around us and support the family.
 
Here's my picture with Allan and me at NAMM17. What a kind man he was: he asked me about Fractal Audio products and G66 activity in the EU. Even if there was a crowd waiting for him he didn't stop talking about guitar, FX and technology.
Holdsworth_zpsftvldl0j.jpg
 
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the first time i saw him was in the mid 90's at a little venue in Kew. with gary, skuli and steve. absolutely mindblowing. i couldn't speak for about an hour afterwards. my arms ached from gripping my chair. didn't even realise i'd been doing it, but the tension was palpable, mostly due to gary hurling himself at every tune like a complete madman. you could see skuli counting beats, just trying to keep up. allan's tone was out of this world...as was his playing.

when i started playing guitar at 15, i subscribed to guitarist magazine and i collected them for years and years (until only a couple of years ago). i had hundreds of them...all stored in boxes. i moved those stupidly heavy boxes from house to house as i moved around, still collecting more of them until a few years ago i finally decided i had to get rid of them...they were taking up so much room and were a bit of a pain in the ass...but it was a hard decision, because they kind of connected me back to a time when i was young and those magazines taught me so much about music and musicians i would have never come into contact otherwise. so anyway, on the day i took them down to the recycling centre, i was carrying them all downstairs, when one of the boxes broke and spilled it's contents all over the landing and down the stairs. as i was picking up about 70 magazines, one caught my eye. and i kept it. it's the only one i still have from the hundreds in my collection...
 

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i had a chat with allan once over the phone - i was so nervous! this was when he was being distributed by chris hoard's Alternity Records. i was on that label too and chris wanted to try and set it up so allan would play a solo on a new tune i would record specially for the alternity release of my album. so i had a chat with allan all about aiff files and how i could deliver the tune to him and how he would then send the solo back to me. he was using some weird recording setup using hard drives, which meant he would have to go to a recording studio to transfer the music over onto his system. it was all a bit of a mismash, to be honest. anyway, it never happened in the end, but he liked my album, apparently.
when he played at the globe in cardiff a few years ago, i wanted to go over and say hello and see if he remembered me, but he looked really pissed off (it was stupidly hot in the venue that night), so i left him alone. he did like my album though, so that was nice.
 
What a great loss. Incredible talent and nice guy. I was lucky to meet him several times in the 80's, at the Synth Axe room at NAMM shows and when he played in Vegas after Metal Fatigue had just come out. My first exposure to a teenage Allan Holdsworth was when the UK album came out. Here's my fave track off that album, written by Allan. My all time fave guitar and keyboard tradeoff solo with Eddie Jobson starts just before the three minute mark. The whole song is epic and moving to me.

 
No!! :( Another legend has stepped out of time...
RIP Allan. You are the the definition of a unique musical voice and a great personality.
 
He also got huge props by me when he released the album "Atavachron"; I loved the Star Trek connection...:cool:

We talked to him after a show in Atlanta many many moons ago. A buddy who is the biggest Treky you can imagine asked him when he was going to do the soundtrack for a Star Trek movie. In Allan's dry direct humor he instantly fired back "When they ask me.".
 
This has really shook me, to have been so deeply touched by his music and inspired to delve into musical theory and harmony in order to try to get a grip on what he was doing has made the loss more tangible than other musical heros that have passed. No other musician has made me as obsessed to try and crack the code code which only seemed to become more impossible the deeper you go. His music was so deep, beautiful, inspiring, innovative. So tragic he passed broke. His legend will live on andgrow, nobody has got close to what he was doing 30 years ago. RIP Knarly Geezer.
 
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