New York, NY (Top40 Charts) LEVERKUSEN '97, the latest release in the continuing series of classic live recordings by Allan Holdsworth, is due March 12 from Manifesto Records.
The double-disc CD/DVD set features the guitar great live in performance at the Leverkusen Jazztage Festival in Germany on October 16, 1997. The package offers audio and visual versions of the 11-song set recorded and filmed for German television. The already high-quality audio and video have been digitally remastered from the original tapes.
For the performance, Holdsworth was backed by acclaimed drummer and long-time collaborator Chad Wackerman and ace bassist Dave Carpenter. Wackerman also wrote liner notes for the set, based on his personal memories of Holdsworth and playing with Carpenter on the 1997 European tour.
"Allan wrote incredible music that defied categorization," Wackerman writes. "It is beautiful, powerful, harmonically rich, and rhythmically interesting with creative song forms. And yet very soulful." The drummer, whose musical relationship with Holdsworth dates back to 1982, is also interviewed in Also contributing liner notes and offering his take on Holdsworth's career and performance at Leverkusen in 1997 is Allan Holdsworth aficionado Manning Bartlett, who runs the influential Facebook group The Unreal Allan Holdsworth.
LEVERKUSEN '97 follows the previous three releases in the Allan Holdsworth Live CD/DVD series, LIVE IN JAPAN 1984, SUMMER JAZZ DAYS '98, and FRANKFURT '86, which were embraced by Holdsworth's hardcore fanbase.
A guitarist's guitarist, Holdsworth's music and legacy have been embraced by a who's who of axe-slingers over the years, ranging from Eddie
Van Halen and
Joe Satriani to Frank Zappa and Tom Morello. It was
Van Halen who brought the British-born Holdsworth to the attention of Warner Bros.Records, while Zappa once called him "one of the most interesting guys on guitar on the planet."
LEVERKUSEN '97 opens with "The Sixteen Men of Tain," the title track of Holdsworth's acclaimed 2000 album, and features three other tracks that would later turn up on that studio set, "0247," "Above and Below" and "Texas." Also included is "Water on the Brain Pt. II," originally featured on the 1983 EP Road Games, as well as the set-closer "Proto-Cosmos," the Alan Pasqua composition Holdsworth first recorded with legendary drummer Tony Williams' group, The New Tony Williams Lifetime, which went on to become a staple of Holdswoth's live set.
"The vibe on stage was joyous and I'm really glad it got captured," Wackerman writes. "I hope you enjoy watching [and listening to] the show as much as we did playing!"
Other Allan Holdsworth albums available through Manifesto Records include IOU, Road Games, Metal Fatigue, Atavachron, Sand, Secrets, Wardenclyffe Tower, Hard Hat Area, None Too Soon, The Sixteen Men of Tain, Flat Tire and Then!, as well as Eidolon: The Allan Holdsworth Collection.
LEVERKUSEN '97 TRACKLISTING
CD
1. The Sixteen Men Of Tain
2. Looking Glass
3. Above And Below
4. Water On The Brain-Pt.II
5. Zone
6. Material Real
7. Letters Of Marque
8. 0274
9. Texas
10. House Of Mirrors
11. Proto-Cosmos
DVD
1.The Sixteen Men Of Tain
2. Looking Glass
3. Above And Below
4. Water On The Brain-Pt.II
5. Zone
6. Material Real
7. Letters Of Marque
8. 0274
9. Texas
10. House Of Mirrors
11. Proto-Cosmos.
