"Phillips is a guitarist with flair and imagination and seemingly limitless technical ability. Scratched by the Rabbit is tough, it's uplifting, inventive, and highly recommended."- Relix Magazine

"Phillips is a supremely musical player who has something few musicians attain: a voice of his own. This is his eighth -- and best? -- album." - Guitar Player

Bio:

Rolling Stone writes, “If rock & roll guitarists were like Kamikaze pilots, Glenn Phillips would be in heaven right now.” Phillips has received two 4-star reviews in the magazine, one of them for Echoes, a double CD career retrospective. “To say that Glenn Phillips plays guitar is like saying Michael Jordan takes shots at the basket,” says Stereo Review, and The Atlanta Journal-Constitution describes his latest Gaff Music release, Angel Sparks, as “armchair travel to a place you didn’t even know existed.”

Phillips’ musical career began in 1967, as a founding member and songwriter of the legendary Hampton Grease Band. The group released a double LP on Columbia and played with countless classic bands of the era, including Jimi Hendrix, The Grateful Dead, Fleetwood Mac and The Allman Brothers. Frank Zappa was a fan of the band, and one of their many historic shows was at the Fillmore East with Zappa’s Mother of Invention. Phillips jammed with Zappa that evening, as did John Lennon and Yoko Ono. In 1996, Sony re-released the Hampton Grease Band, which included an extensive history of the group written by Phillips. It received a 9 out of 10, “near perfect” rating in Spin Magazine.

In 1973, Phillips began his solo career. Lowell George, the leader of Little Feat, called him “the most amazing guitarist I’ve ever seen, “ and Phillips frequently sat in with the band. In 1975, he released his first album, Lost at Sea. Recording at home and self-released, it predated, as well as influenced, the do-it-yourself movement that overtook rock music several years later. It was championed by influential British DJ John Peel, who played it regularly on the BBC, and London’s leading music magazine, Melody Maker, held a reader’s poll, where it came in 2nd. That was followed by a call from famed entrepreneur Richard Branson, who was then head of Virgin Records. They signed Phillips and brought him overseas to tour extensively, including a concert at London’s famed Rainbow Theatre.

In the years since, Phillips has toured and recorded regularly, releasing 11 albums under his own name. He has also collaborated with artists as diverse as Pete Buck of REM and Bob Weir of the Grateful Dead, who appears on Phillips’ and Henry Kaiser’s Gaff Music release, Guitar Party. That CD follows in the footsteps of Phillip’s 1988 recording with Kaiser, which received San Francisco’s coveted Bammy Award. Both Cds have been featured on the nationally syndicated Grateful Dead Hour, and NPR has played Phillips’ music regularly on All Things Considered for the past 12 years. Bringing things full circle, John Peel recently featured Phillip’s Angel Sparks on BBC.

The one constant throughout Phillip’s career is that his music has remained as unique as it is acclaimed. From Relix, “Phillips is a guitarist with flair and imagination and seemingly limitless technical ability. He comes up with a sound that defies categorization. His music is melodic, it’s tough, it’s uplifting, it’s inventive and highly recommended,” and from Guitar Player. “ A supremely musical player, Phillips has something few musicians attain: a voice of his own.”