Glenn Phillips

Instrumental rock guitarist Glenn Phillips spent his childhood in New England before relocating with his family to Atlanta, Georgia, at the age of twelve in 1962. He first picked up the guitar at sixteen and, one year later, joined forces with singer Bruce Hampton and guitarist Harold Kelling to form the Hampton Grease Band. The group gradually cultivated a local audience in Atlanta, which secured a deal with Columbia Records and resulted in the 1971 double album Music to Eat. After the Hampton Grease Band dissolved in 1973, Phillips began his solo work by self-producing Lost at Sea, issued in 1975. British disc jockey John Peel took notice and aired the record repeatedly on his BBC program, prompting Virgin Records to release it in the United Kingdom; the label then put out Phillips’s follow-up, Swim in the Wind, in 1977. When Virgin’s U.S. operation folded, Phillips resumed independent production, most often issuing material on his own Snow Star imprint. Remaining in Atlanta, he sustained his career by renting out part of his home, scheduling occasional tours, and continuing to record. Dark Lights arrived in 1980, Razor Pocket followed in 1982, and St. Valentine’s Day appeared in 1984. Shanachie issued the live album Live in 1985, SST released Elevator in 1987, and ESD brought out Scratched by the Rabbit in 1990. Two years later ESD issued the double-CD retrospective Echoes 1975-85. Phillips returned with Walking Through Walls on Brendan O’Brien’s Shotput label in 1996, then waited until March 2003 to unveil Angel Sparks on Gaff; the same imprint simultaneously offered Guitar Party, a 1990 collaboration with Henry Kaiser.