He was in the room when “That’s All Right,” “Blue Suede Shoes,” “I Walk The Line,” and “Great Balls of Fire” were recorded. Rock ‘n’ roll would have happened without him, but it would have been very different without producer Sam Phillips. Let’s look at five fascinating facts about Phillips before he even discovered Elvis Presley.
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A Deaf Aunt Inspired Phillips to Hear Sound Differently
Born in 1923 in the Muscle Shoals area of Alabama, Phillips was exposed to music through radio and church. His mother’s sister Emma was blind in one eye and lost her hearing and speech from Rocky Mountain spotted fever. Phillips learned to communicate with her using sign language at about the same time he learned to read. He became fascinated with speech patterns. He would notice how people could communicate with different cadences and how words weren’t always necessary to get your point across.
Phillips also studied people and felt he could read them. He was drawn to black people and how they communicated differently.
In the mid-1940s, an offer came from Memphis to work at radio station WREC in the Peabody Hotel, announcing, engineering, and supervising the nightly big band broadcast from the ballroom. Beale Street became a magnet to Phillips as he watched the blues singers and the people they attracted.
Phillips acquired an empty storefront in a cluster of auto shops at 706 Union Avenue and opened the Memphis Recording Service in January 1950. “We Record Anything Anywhere Anytime” became the company slogan, and they did. Phillips recorded a young singing disc jockey at station WDIA named Riley King. He would use his on-air name of Blues Boy, or B.B. King. The recordings were licensed to the RPM Recording Label on the West Coast.
In March 1951, Ike Turner and The Kings of Rhythm from Clarksdale, Mississippi, came north to record “Rocket 88.” On the way to Memphis, the guitar amp became damaged, leading to a uniquely distorted guitar sound. The musicians were worried about it, but Phillips assured them it would be even better. He was right. The record was credited to Jackie Brenston and his Delta Cats because Phillips wanted to release a different record under Turner’s name. The record was licensed to Chess Records out of Chicago and became a huge R&B hit.
Phillips Suffered a Nervous Breakdown
The Memphis Recording Service was one of the few places in the South that would record black talent. Turner became a talent scout for Phillips, scouring the Mississippi Delta for acts. He would visit pool halls and churches. He brought back a singer named Chester Arthur Burnett, who the world would come to know as Howlin’ Wolf. Phillips called Burnett “the world’s most distinctive voice.”
Marion Keisker assisted Phillips at the studio. He referred to her as his secretary, but they were more like business partners. Joe Hill Louis, Walter Horton, Junior Parker, and Rosco Gordon also recorded in the little room on Union Avenue. Between working at the radio station and the recording studio, Phillips had a nervous breakdown in September 1951, and was treated with eight electric shock treatments.
“Booted” Led to a Record Label Called Sun
Phillips had licensed records to RPM and Modern Records. After the success of “Rocket 88,” he sold most of his recordings to Chess Records. Rosco Gordon’s “Booted” was a big hit for the Chicago label. Unknown to Phillips, the singer also had recorded a version of the same song for RPM Records. A settlement was agreed to where RPM would have exclusive rights to Gordon’s recordings, and Chess would own the rights to Howlin’ Wolf’s. The headaches this conflict brought to Phillips inspired him to begin a label of his own. Sun Records was started in February 1952.
“Bear Cat” Led to a Lawsuit
Phillips struggled to find a hit for a year and a half. In the middle of 1953, Rufus Thomas, Jr. was the answer. His novelty recording of “Bear Cat” was a response song to Big Mama Thornton’s “Hound Dog.” It reached No. 3 on the R&B charts and led to a lawsuit because of the similarity to the Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller song it was answering.
The Prisonaires
Disk Jockey Dewey Phillips (no relation) hosted a radio show on WDIA called Red Hot and Blue. His show unified Memphis every night through the music. White radio shows played music for white people. Black radio shows played music for black people. Dewey Phillips made it a point to address his audience as “good people,” not white or black.
In 1953, Sun Records crossed racial lines and social barriers. Johnny Bragg was serving a 99-year sentence at the Tennessee State Penitentiary on six counts of rape. He had served 10 years. One day, he looked at the rain and started singing “Just Walkin’ in The Rain.” Bragg began singing with four other prisoners and worked up arrangements. As Bragg was not able to read or write, he asked Robert Riley to write the words in return for half of the composer’s credit. Warden James Edwards heard the group and allowed them to sing at a few private events.
With the consent of Tennessee Gov. Frank Clement, Phillips was allowed to record The Prisonaires. On June 1, 1953, they were driven under armed guard to Memphis. The song was a big hit, but it became an even bigger success when crooner Johnnie Ray recorded it in 1956.
Business never got so good that Phillips could give up the Memphis Recording Service, where customers could pay to make a single record of their own voice. One of those customers was a recent high school graduate named Elvis Presley. He walked through the front door in the summer of 1953, claiming he wanted to make a record for his mother’s birthday. The world would never be the same.
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