I’d like to start of the “music” section of my blog with just a little bit of my background, and why music is so important to me.
First off, where did I start?
- I started out playing the guitar when I was just 10. Before that though, I had been exposed to music, and really was born into a pretty musical family. I mean, everyone either played or sung something (except my mom, but she enjoyed it), and all of my dad’s side going back as far as anyone could remember, at least did a little “pickin’ and grinnin’”. Me though? I guess with that sort of musical influence around me from birth, you could say I got kind of a late start, but better late than never, right? The truth is, that’s the way my dad wanted it. He never discouraged me from picking up an instrument, but he also never really made the option available, until I verbally expressed interest around age 10 – and by that time, I was thinking, “why am I not playing something yet?!” 
Needless to say though, it was a great day when, following in my dad’s footsteps, I picked up my first guitar, and started learning to play. All I wanted to do then was learn, and thus, I began my musical journey.
What then?
- My dad has always had bands in and out through phases of his life. He played professionally until he was about 30 (just before I was born), but he quit after he became a Christian, and began playing off and on in the church through various capacities. (his life before he quit is the main reason he’s never wanted me to pursue music, and go down that same path… more on that later) When I began playing at age 10, he was in the church, and was actually doing a prison ministry with a bunch of other reformed musicians, but that faded after a few years, and soon a new band started to emerge: the family band. By the time I was 14, I was good enough (not good, but good enough) to start filling in with the last formation of that former ministry band, who was now playing mostly coffee shop gigs, and some outdoor church events. That was fun, but not long later we started a Phillips family band, consisting of myself, my dad, my dad’s brother (my uncle, who was also a very good musician and played professionally most of his life), and his son (my cousin, Rocky) who is 2 months younger than me, and was learning to play drums at the time. Rocky and I obviously had quite a bit of chops and material to learn, before we were good enough as a band to go out and do anything, but we worked very hard, and made the most of our opportunity to learn and grow as players. Pretty soon, we did have a pretty tight little band going, and we’d play parties, local events, and anything we could get that wasn’t a bar, and I’d say Rocky and I got some invaluable experience playing live on stage at an early age – an opportunity most young players don’t get to have! It was a lot of fun, and we kept that up for a couple of years.
And that’ll do it for the first half of this blog post! I’d love to continue here, but I’ve decided instead of posting my whole life’s musical journey in one, tediously long post, I’ll just split it up, and post the rest of my story later. Don’t worry, I’ll have it up soon, but keep an eye out – you wouldn’t wanna miss it, right? That’s what I thought. Look for the next part of my musical journey here in the next day or two – Stay tuned…
