‘Guitar God’ Randy Holden: ‘They tell me I’m famous’
His nickname is “Guitar God” and has been ever since his major rock guitar shredding.
And he has one golden rule when it comes to playing music: Play loud.
Randy Holden, Guitar God to his fans, is sitting in the Dana Point home he shares with his wife of 20 years, artist Ruth Mayer, and he’s eyeing his collection of electric guitars, which are propped up on stands.
“That thing is just magic,” he says pointing to a black-lacquered Fender Classic Series ‘60s collector’s guitar. “It’s a fun one to use.”
Holden, 70, opened for the Rolling Stones at the first show they performed at the Long Beach Sports Arena, was guitarist for rowdy rock groups Sons of Adam and Blue Cheer and almost joined the Yardbirds when they needed a new lead guitar after the departure of Jeff Beck — but the band broke up before he could join.
To fans, he’s considered the great lost guitar hero of the 1960s, a performer who never got the wide recognition he deserved though his discography boasts the high-volume singles, albums and group and solo projects that have always been the core of Holden’s work and his heart.
“They tell me I’m famous, but I thought you’re supposed to be rich if you’re famous,” he says of his fans. “Maybe that part just hasn’t arrived yet.”
On a recent Friday morning, the rendition Holden chose to blast from his kitchen’s CD player is Jimi Hendrix’s “All Along the Watchtower,” off his album “Randy Holden: Psychedelic Blue.” An oscillating fan in the family room gently disturbs Holden’s snowy mane. Next to him is a credenza that holds dozens of framed photographs of the nine children and 29 grandchildren he shares with Mayer.
A corner in the large family room is Holden’s studio, where he recorded his latest album. He’s currently finishing up an album with Bobby Rondinelli, a rock drummer best known for his work with Black Sabbath and Blue Oyster Cult.
Mayer is in the next room, putting finishing touches on a canvas depicting the Beatles.
“Music comes from within,” Holden says. “I’ll pick up the guitar and it’s a strange experience. I’ll start creating, and I’ll get into a realm and I’m all consumed. I love it. If that’s what heaven would be, then that’s my closest experience.”
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Holden set forth in the music world over 50 years ago.
After hearing Dick Dale play surf music on the radio, Holden, who was 17 at the time, and three friends traded in their cars for a Volkswagen van and left Baltimore for California. He had little to eat for two weeks, the van broke down and he was arrested for hitchhiking to Hollywood, he recalls.
“It was a very rugged start,” he says.
He and his friends formed the Fender IV, played surf singles in the mid-1960s and eventually met Dale, whom Holden called “really great.” He tells a story about dating a fan and finding out she was Dale’s girlfriend.
After the Fender IV, the members renamed themselves the Sons of Adam, which became an almost-famous rock band on the Los Angeles Sunset Strip scene. Deejay and voice actor Casey Kasem would promote them every week at Hawthorne Memorial Park. They opened for Bo Diddley, served as a backup band for Glen Campbell and met their new manager through Bobby Sherman. Director Sydney Pollack saw the group one night and decided to cast them as the club band in “The Slender Thread,” starring Anne Bancroft and Sidney Poitier.
The band was powerful and energetic onstage, Holden says, in part because of their collective rule: Never ever turn down the sound.
But that changed one night in 1966 in San Francisco when the Sons of Adam played at Longshoremen’s Hall. The acoustics in the hall were horrible, since the building was a cement and steel dome. The band told Holden to dial down the sound, but Holden declined. When the bandmates argued against him, he walked away and never turned back.
“I knew what the audience wanted and they loved it loud,” he says. “I left them because they broke the rule.”
Soon after, he joined The Other Half and later Blue Cheer, appearing on the band’s third album, “New! Improved! Blue Cheer.” He toured with Blue Cheer for a year before parting ways.
They were the only band that played loud like he did, Holden says, but drugs were a problem.
“I wasn’t into that,” he says. “That didn’t get along with me. We had the potential to be huge, but the wrong stuff stopped it.”
At the end of the tour, he left the band and was presented with an envelope.
In it was $500 — a sparse amount, he says, since he was told he had to reimburse the band for expenses.
Holden became a soloist, working 10-hour days most of each week on an album. But the distributors dropped the album, and he has no clear reason why, but he thinks the recording agent angered the distributors.
Holden quit playing for 25 years.
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For the next two decades, Guitar God replaced the guitar with a fishing rod.
He moved to Hawaii, fished every day, became a painter, married and divorced and raised his son. To support his family, he moved back east, got interested in Wall Street and started trading gold and silver.
He did well for some time but had a bad streak.
Once he returned to California, he heard from a fan who asked him to play music.
“He gave me a guitar, and I thought, ‘Not again,’” Holden says, with a laugh. “But I’ve been playing ever since.”
Since 1991, Holden has devoted most of his time recording songs rather than touring, but he has been invited to play in Garden Grove’s Surf Guitar 101 Convention in August and in the Netherlands for Roadburn Festival in Europe 2017. The concert is Europe’s underground festival for psychedelic music.
Holden, who now owns a music publishing company and record label, Guitar God Music, says he might do more live performances, but he’ll see. Right now, he’s focusing on producing new songs and spending time with his son and grandson.
A few minutes later, his version of “Johnny B Goode” comes on the stereo. The lyrics, “Oh my that little country boy could play,” sound throughout the home.
“With all the negative things, I would always follow my heart because its return is so much more,” Holden says. “It might lead you to unexpected places that you might not like, but you’ll get over it. You’ll have done things you will have experienced that you could not buy.”
For more information, visit guitargod.com.
