Thanks again for all your answers and patience.

I really know this about distirtion sound from allan . He is a very close friend of my teacher (vasilis podaras) but at his visit at athens we provided him with a carvin fet 400 (which i own) and he also used two tc delays and some eq too. He also gave the impression that a lot should be credited to his delap guitar. I am awaiting my delap guitar , and i also know that he used the bogner fish during 92-94. I also know that through modern guitar effects/preamps you only get a phony sound that never cuts through a live band and is very annoying after a few minutes of listening.

So if at any given time you have some time i would definitely appreciate if you could create a program with an eq (at your settings and thoughts of holdsworth's timbre) with the simple delays you said he is mixing into it ( and maybe a compressor and a noise gate in order to play it 100% wet as the lead poem so that i can use eventide noise gate in dry and wet signals). I will do the rest in terms of gear (i am prety close at summoning the stuff he really prefers).

I saw him in greece and believe me if he could carry his real stuff and if he did not care for endorsements he would play with the staff i described you in public (including a bogner and an eventide). He is too pressed but he said ispite of all these he could never do without the delap and that is what he does. the man endorses carvin and steinberger and he is on the cover of his cd with a delap….

So my gear and my playing will definitely save us from the digital copycats and imitations but i strongly believe it would be only accomplished through an eventide preset.

I am binded to provide you with sound samples and give my best to exploit the capabilties of any preset you could provide.

Dear italo i really dont try to immitate holdsworth overdriven sound and i certainly will never touch his musical geniousness but:

1. As americans say there is nothing that cant be accomplished through systematic practice, and there is nothing that can not be decoded and then be teached.

2. there is no guitar gear that could not be bought, it just needs some serious searching informating and help from friends. If something does your job as a tool i dont thing you should hesitate buying it. So i am fed up with hobbyists that really believe they will imitate the sound of legends that carry load tracks of gear with some digital preamp and a combo amp. I wish that allan could showcase his gear like vai did (by introducing us mortals to the world of eventide and multiple amps and preamps and mixers).

3. i can not play fusion whith any other sound that a holdsworth oriended in terms of playabilty, so till today if a cant do this i preffer playing the same stuff with a clean or a crunched sound like wayne krantz's one.

I am here to experiment with your help ofcourse and at your willingness and descreetive competence.

be well john