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Allan Holdsworth is a Genius

Doughboy

Doughboy

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Not only is he the greatest fusion player ever, but check out what he's come up with now:  :icon_thumright:

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Especially when they need tricky strings that you can't buy just anywhere.
 
I used to not think much of headless guitars untilI got my Steinberger ZT-3. Now, I'm a big fan.

It's sounds wierd, but playing a headless is kinda liberating & you don't miss the headstock at all.

As for strings, you can find D'Addario double ended strings everywhere. I just picked up 5 sets last week at my local music shop.

it's not everyone's cup o' tea, but varitey is nice, hence everyone should own a tele, a strat, a Les Paul etc.
 
Doughboy said:
I just ordered a Carvin H2 Holdsworth model, but I need one of these desperately, as I'm sure it will allow me to play exactly like Allan by just owning it.
Click to expand...

I've heard just being within a 30-yard radius of one lets you play chromatic runs 30% faster.
 
Ehh, he should stick to playing them instead of designing them. I converted my Les Paul Studio to a headless model.









Actually it fell off the stand and converted itself :dontknow:
 
Corey P. said:
Doughboy said:
I just ordered a Carvin H2 Holdsworth model, but I need one of these desperately, as I'm sure it will allow me to play exactly like Allan by just owning it.
Click to expand...

I've heard just being within a 30-yard radius of one lets you play chromatic runs 30% faster.
Click to expand...

I like your train of though, young sir!!!!!  :icon_thumright:
 
I like music with melodies. I spent quite a while with the information in Holdsworth's video and book. He deconstructed the scale into the 12 tones, the rebuilt it using mathematics, discarding scales that had more than four consecutive chromatics. He came up with ten scales, only one of which is the "regular" diatonic one. In his view - which I agree with - modes are just a part of a single scale, and fingerings should reflect that. But after he found his ten scales, and spent several years working out the chords that are built along the neck - after all that I don't find his music too compelling. Sing your favorite Holdsworth lick - whistle your favorite Holdsworth tune! Just because something is complicated doesn't make it great, a situation paralleled by many 20th century writers, composers, artists... how exactly do you kick Beethoven's (or Led Zeppelin's) ass? The reasons why one artist will appeal to your ears and not another aren't too complicated - early listening, emotional tone and range, execution - but to call Holdsworth the greatest kinda ignores the 800-pound elephant, John McLaughlin. He's written and recorded brilliantly in four or five different genres, and for whatever reasons I can listen to McLaughlin for weeks on end and Holdsworth for about 20 minutes.
 
StubHead said:
I like music with melodies. I spent quite a while with the information in Holdsworth's video and book. He deconstructed the scale into the 12 tones, the rebuilt it using mathematics, discarding scales that had more than four consecutive chromatics. He came up with ten scales, only one of which is the "regular" diatonic one. In his view - which I agree with - modes are just a part of a single scale, and fingerings should reflect that. But after he found his ten scales, and spent several years working out the chords that are built along the neck - after all that I don't find his music too compelling. Sing your favorite Holdsworth lick - whistle your favorite Holdsworth tune! Just because something is complicated doesn't make it great, a situation paralleled by many 20th century writers, composers, artists... how exactly do you kick Beethoven's (or Led Zeppelin's) ass? The reasons why one artist will appeal to your ears and not another aren't too complicated - early listening, emotional tone and range, execution - but to call Holdsworth the greatest kinda ignores the 800-pound elephant, John McLaughlin. He's written and recorded brilliantly in four or five different genres, and for whatever reasons I can listen to McLaughlin for weeks on end and Holdsworth for about 20 minutes.
Click to expand...

I agree that Holdsworth's appeal is kinda rarefied.  It's like sea urchin - the aficionados adore it, and the rest of us mortals kinda go, "Really?  If this is the good stuff, I'll stick with crap, thanks."  Although the metaphor falls down when we consider McLaughlin as the alternative to sea urchin...

My point is, I take your point.  I happen to like Holdsworth's "melodies," but like you, I don't find any of them to have much in the way of "hooks."  I did start listening to AH when I was a new guitar player, and at a time in my life when I thought Rush was the best thing in the whole wide world - my mindset then was that technical mastery of the instrument was one of the keys to the kingdom.  I still believe that technical mastery is a Good Thing, but as a goal in itself it's kind of a hollow victory.  See, e.g., the aesthetic dead end of Yngwie Malmsteen's approach.  I do get some nourishment from AH's intellectual approach to the instrument, but Jet's "Are You Gonna Be My Girl" also has a lot to say.

I'd bet most folks will like the second video better than the first.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FL6dy1J_dxU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tuK6n2Lkza0
 
I like Holdsworth's playing. I also like more direct melodic approaches, like, say, Jeff Beck.

It doesn't have to "one or the other".

The people who think there is only one right answer/approach in music are almost always wrong.
 
drewfx said:
The people who think there is only one right answer/approach in music are almost always wrong.
Click to expand...

As much as I encounter music I dislike, despite how open-minded I try to be, I think it's impossible to be "wrong" when it comes to music. It is totally subjective. There is no right nor wrong.

Yes, there is "commercially successful" and "technically proficient" etc., but whether one or the other is deemed to be right or wrong, worthwhile or worthless is dependent on the oft fickle opinions of the listener.
 
Whatever music puts a smile on your face & a spring in your steps is good. If you like McLaughlin over Holdsworth, cool. If you like BB King over Albery Collins, that's cool too. But I do agree that Holdsworth's tunes aren't catchy hook laden songs. However, he does what makes him happy & is probably the only guitarist to continously push the envelope HARD & develop year after year after year with no regard for all things monetary.

[youtube=425,350]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zMi2mCe7CKg&feature=related[/youtube]
 
Balls helps:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=15RwVF6eTS8&feature=related

As one reviewer said, Birds of Fire is maybe the only album you could sit and listen to just the drum tracks.... Cobham's terrifying. Wolfgang's Vault has a collection of concerts all from the "glory months" of late '72 to mid-'73. As Jeff Beck's said, no one's gotten better since. Of course the volatility in the music was a reflection of personality - a few of 'em still hate each other! :toothy12:

Listen free, pay to download...if you haven't figured out where else to get them -
http://www.wolfgangsvault.com/mahavishnu-orchestra/

 
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