The Hampton Grease Band

While compiling information for these early 70s Atlanta venues and events, a common link recurred throughout: The Hampton Grease Band. Formed in 1967, they were on the Atlanta scene before the Allman Brothers, before Lynyrd Skynyrd, before the pop festivals, before record companies came sniffing around for "Southern Rock." Various incarnations of the Hampton Grease Band [HGB] morphed over time, but its central figure remained the "Colonel," Bruce Hampton.

The Hampton Grease Band
Bruce Hampton, Glenn Phillips, Jerry Fields, Mike Holbrook, Harold Kelling

Founding member, guitarist/composer Glenn Phillips documented the eclectic history of HGB online. It's a great read. You can't make this stuff up. The band's stage performances were unpredictable, at times chaotic, always artistic (albeit Dada and surreal), ultimately entertaining, and they cultivated a dedicated following in Atlanta and beyond. Live performances were the keystone of their fanbase.

According to Phillips:

The stage was frequently filled with friends doing anything from watching TV, doing a duet with the guitar on a chain saw, or sitting at a table eating cereal. Hampton, who at one point sported a crew cut with an H shaved in the back of his head, would tape himself to the microphone stand while talking to the audience about the supposed Portuguese invasion of the U.S. through Canada. At an outdoor show, Bruce slept through our set under a truck, while at another show, he turned around in the middle of a song, jumped in the air, and kicked Mike [Holbrook, bassist] in the chest. Mike flew back into his amp, which he knocked over and short-circuited. Holbrook recalls another time when "we got the idea that we wanted to put mayonnaise all over our friend Eric Hubbler. We got a gallon of mayonnaise and Hubbler came out and sat down in a chair while the band was playing. I stuck my hand down in it and glopped it all over his head."

The Hampton Grease Band adapted to any venue, from the tiny room of the 12th Gate to fields full of hundreds of thousands at the Atlanta International Pop Festivals. They were already playing free concerts in Piedmont Park on Sundays before the Allman Brothers Band started doing the same in May 1969. Columbia Records got wind of HGB's unique act and contacted Capricorn Records chief Phil Walden to try to track them down. Long story short, Walden brokered a record deal for HGB with Columbia (CBS). Music To Eat, a double LP, was released in 1971. It notably became Columbia's 2nd worst-selling record ever. (The very worst was a yoga instructional record. Unsurprisingly, Music To Eat is now a collectors item.)

Decades later, Julian Cope's headheritage.com declares:

[W]hile the temptation is there to view the Hampton Grease Band as a possible answer to the trivia question "what is the silliest hippy-shit record ever released on a major record label?" in truth it's actually damn near a masterpiece that almost exists outside of history.

Despite their calamitous vinyl debut, HGB maintained a fiercely loyal fanbase, one of whom, Duane Allman, recommended to his friend Bill Graham that he book HGB for the Fillmore in NYC. Graham did exactly that. He perfectly paired the band with Frank Zappa & The Mothers of Invention the weekend of June 5-6, 1971. HGB performed brilliantly, and Fillmore East manager Kip Cohen sang the band's praises to then-CBS head Clive Davis:

Dear Clive:
As you know, this is the first time I've ever written a letter like this one to you--but even though John Lennon and Yoko Ono guested on our stage last night, my memories of the past weekend will reside exclusively with the Hampton Grease Band.
Aside from their totally delightful, unique brand of humor, and the obvious fact of their being good people, there is a musical intelligence within that band that truly excites me.
I can only hope that they enjoy the total success they deserve. They were one of the most pleasant surprises we have had on our stage in many, many months.

That was likely the high point for the Hampton Grease Band. Unfortunately, the label relationship did not survive, nor did the band. For whatever reason, CBS/Columbia dropped them. Frank Zappa's Bizarre/Straight label stepped in and signed them, but the band crumbled before a record could be completed. It all fell apart in 1973 when Bruce Hampton left for California to audition for a spot in Zappa's band. The audition was unsuccessful, and the rest of the band had gone their separate ways by his return. Years following, various configurations would resurface. Glenn Phillips tells this story best, and I'll refer you back to his site for the rest of the story.