Hampton Grease Band
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wish I knew when connection beside me, pinned but somehow, every time I months later sent me a live this article had down by pebbles from the came up against a brick wall tape with ya gotta hear this, started to take shore of some long-forgotten when it came to the real facts Phil! scrawled all over it. hold of me. Its holiday. surrounding the band. One of Colonel Bruce Hampton And like trying to pin the few pieces on the band was The Aquarium Rescue Unit, down the source Half-articles because until (interestinglly) penned by recorded live in Charlotte, Iof some dread very recently, not a great deal Peter Holsapple, later of the North Carolina in late 1990, antisocial had been written about the dBs (etc) in a fanzine called as bizarre a mess of disease, one which pervades Hampton Grease Band. They, Groove Associates, wherein Beefheartian wailing and your everyday life and ruins and their sole album, seemed he claims that because Music twisted jazz impromptus as what were once stable to be one of rocks best-kept To Eat had sold the most you could wish for and relationships. Instead of going secrets. Overlooked by the copies in Winston-Salem in evidence indeed that one of my off for the day with Heather collecting fraternity, forgotten North Carolina, they played a heros of old was indeed alive, and the kids, I sit here - if ever known - by the gig there which Mitch Easter and moreover still doing it. punching the keyboard with underground press and described as a bunch of Immediately going into a the sun pouring through the certainly ignored by the normal looking guys playing frenzy of letter-writing and window and the tortured mainstream, their mayfly-like Ventures songs at twice the attempted research, I was guitar screams of one of existence seemed perfect to normal speed.... Not much to beaten to the case, thankfully Phillips less tortured albums me; they were my secret love, go on, anyway. Until earlier because he made a better job slicing through the warm air an album I could wig-out even this year, that is, when the of it than I could ever manage, around my head. Yesterday, the most knowledgeable threads started pulling by another pal; Chris whilst tea was being taken on colleague with during one of together. My good pal and Stigliano who runs Black to the lawn, I could be found those record-playing sessions colleague Fred Mills Comm magazine in huddled under a cooling tree that we all indulge in from discovered their album - Pennsylvania. Like me, a man with my knees drawn up near time to time. I tried a dozen whether it was due to a tip-off who had been blown away all my chin and with a mountain times to start researching and from myself I cant remember those years ago by Music To of paperwork and half-articles writing something about them and its irrelevant anyway, but Eat by the Hampton Grease on the Phillips/Hampton (hence all those half-articles) discover it he did and a few Band, he interviewed the hell out of Bruce Hampton and Beefheart and similarly a my fathers wishes. Id storm hipper college types in the produced a piece on the band passing resemblance to fellow out of the house to play for South as well as the rednecks. in BTC Issue 18 (Spring, regional acts Red Crayola and 50 cents a night at the Stables They became so popular that 1991) which I freely admit to the Elevators. They gained a Bar and Lounge and get home they were the standard having drawn from for this large, devoted following in at three in the morning. My opening act for any big-time article. Chris article however Atlanta as a peoples band lifestyle confused my father touring acts that hit town, was written from the who played totally out of and we began to fight... despite the fact that their standtpoint that Harold control gigs consisting of wild increasingly weird stage act Kelling was the Hamptons onstage antics, lashings of Now, theres an apocryphal invariably left their audiences front-line guitarist; for me, freeform jazz and all topped off story about young Glenn in a totally confused state - Glenn Phillips was the one which Id heard repeated friends of the group would and since Chris hadnt often (and which is recounted share the stage watching T.V., spoken to Glenn and I felt by Stigliano) that he didnt marching around the stage as another angle was called for, have any idea about how to if in their own living rooms I set out to track Glenn down tune a guitar when the and oblivious to the music and pen the following piece Hampton Grease Band first around them; popcorn fights on both the Hamptons and formed and that the function would break out during the set, on Glenns subsequent solo merely consisted of turning people would sit reading a career. It doesnt really matter all the pegs so that they lined book, chaos ruled the stage which way you look at it: the up in the same direction. Its and not always was it Hampton Grease Band a good one and as always has organised. Phillips (this quote sported one of the most some foundation in fact, but doesnt really sit easily here, distinctive vocalists in rock in just to set the record straight: but I couldnt write it in the shape of Bruce Hampton anywhere else): and two (yes, two) of the most Its true, when I first picked exciting guitarists Ive ever up a guitar I wondered if you When we first started out, we heard in Harold Kelling and tuned it by lining up the pegs used to take our equipment to Glenn Phillips. They are quite with distinctly Beefheartian - but by the time the Grease a park downtown. Wed plug simply a MUST for any weirdness, and went on to Band started I realised that the into a live outlet and play all Terrascope edited by yours record that one double album best way to tune it was actually afternoon while a crowd truly, a band Ive been trying for Columbia entitled Music to throw it against a wall.... gathered. Eventually, the to do justice to since I set out to Eat which remains totally police put a stop to that, and on the rocky road to oblivion unique, and which is the Bruce Hampton, by the way, we went on to do everything as a self-styled writer and critic lynchpin for this article. But was the son of a fairly rich from small clubs to pop some ten or more years ago. as ever, Im getting ahead of family (connected in some way festivals. We played shows with myself here. Cut to Glenn to those responsible for Coca Jimi Hendrix, the Grateful All of which is a long and Phillips comments about the Cola) of solid miltary stock Dead, Peter Greens pretty pointless intro to what formation of the band, who rebelled in time-honoured Fleetwood Mac, N.R.B.Q., is actually quite a short piece, starting with an answer to a tradition and at one point the Allman Brothers, one which sits neatly in two question of mine about any actually set out to become a Mahavishnu Orchestra, parts viz the Hamptons pre-Hamptons musical professional wrestler; music Procul Harum, Country Jow history and Glenn Phillips involvement: was his forte however and he & The Fish and countless subsequent solo career. By way embarked on a career which others. of scene-setting, Id better first No, Im not on any was to spin off in increasingly put the Hampton Grease recordings prior to the HGB. strange directions. For all that, Nevertheless, the band Band into some sort of I started playing in 1966 at he stoutly refused to embrace werent always the raging historical perspective. Hailing the age of 16. In 1967 I the fashions of the day and success I might be intimating from Atlanta in the deep formed the Hampton Grease studiously avoided rock-star by the above. Phillips recalls, South of the USA in around Band with high-school friends status by wearing his hair 1967, their only similarities Bruce Hampton on vocals and close-cropped and wearing We opened a show for Three with the hippy scene of the Harold Kelling on guitar. We nondescript clothes - in itself Dog Night in Alabama and West Coast of that time were didnt have a bass player or a an act of rebellion, it could be were booed at and pelted with their extended jams, for they drummer, so we asked my argued. This fact, coupled with objects from the audience. I werent hippies by a long chalk brother Charlie and close the total strangeness of the ended up asking the audience and indeed had more in friend Mike Rogers to learn bands music, ensured an even to leave the auditorium until common with the likes of how to play. We began playing wider audience since they were wed finished our set! The Zappa and (especially) out on school nights against popular at once with the show that stands out even more in my mind though was The band got to know Zappa which is a distinctly when we opened for Alice pretty well. We played on the psychedelic painting by Cooper in New Jersey. At the Mothers show at the guitarist Harold Kelling, end of our set, half the Fillmore East that John backed with a woodcut of an audience was booing us and Lennon sat in on and which army tank crafted in turn-of- the other half was yelling out was later released as a live the-century newspaper style.