Being the author of an acclaimed two-volume biography of Elvis Presley, its no surprise that music journalist Peter Guralnick has researched SAM PHILLIPS: THE MAN WHO INVENTED ROCK ‘N’ ROLL. Phillips discovered and first recorded Presley. But Presley was not the only formative rock star to record for Phillips, so Guralnick’s latest work is fully devoted to this fascinating individual and his record label, Sun Records.

The son of a poor Alabama farmer, Phillips loved and was highly influenced by the blues and spiritual music he heard the farm hands sing and play. As a young adult Phillips entered the burgeoning field of radio and specialized in producing live big band broadcasts; earning a reputation for his unorthodox microphone placements that highlighted the rhythm section.

Later moving to Memphis, a city he loved for many years, Phillips set up his own recording studio, offering to record special events (including funeral services) and musical performances by local professional and amateur musicians. Phillips was hesitant to start his own record label at first, but was eventually convinced and gave the enterprise the easily remember name Sun Records.

Then one afternoon in 1953, a young Tennessee truck driver entered the studio asking to record a song as a birthday gift for his grandmother. The man was Elvis Presley, and what Phillips captured in his studio eventually went on to change the music industry as well as the entire world.

Guralnick details every nuance of those early Presley recording sessions, as well as the other artists who came before and after Presley, including blues great Howlin’ Wolf (a personal favorite of Phillips) and early rock architects Ike Turner, Carl Perkins, Johnny Cash, Roy Orbison, and Jerry Lee Lewis. Throughout it all Phillips remained true to his quest for the kind of music rooted in the sounds he loved all his life and was convinced others would love as well. He strongly preferred authenticity rather than technical prowess in his recordings and strove for he often called “perfect imperfection.”

Guralnick’s research is meticulous and at times exasperating as he recalls every transaction of Phillips’ business, both significant and inconsequential. The conflicts of Phillips’ personal life are also presented, such as his tenuous partnership with his older brother, his distant relationship with his wife and two sons, and how his devotion to an artist he was particularly fond of resulted in dissentions within his other label stars – most notably when both Roy Orbison and Johnny Cash left for other record companies because they felt Phillips was far more dedicated to Jerry Lee Lewis.

Guralnick switches his perspective to first person in the last quarter of the biography when he finally meets Phillips in 1979. By then Phillips had long since sold Sun Records and Guralnick traces the unmistakable changes in Phillips’s appearance and behavior. He spent almost no time in the recording studio anymore, let his previously well-combed hair and beard grow long, switched his natty suites for more casual attire, and discovered alcohol.

In these later years Phillips would sometimes feel compelled to crusade for his professional legacy and rage to the local press – or anyone else who would listen –against the historical inaccuracies occurring around him – such as Jerry Hopkins’s biography of Elvis or Great Balls of Fire, the movie adaptation of Jerry Lee Lewis’s career starring Dennis Quaid as Lewis. While never shy in his admiration for Phillips Guralnick remains impartial in his retelling of these several episodes – including Phillips’s notorious and confounding appearance on Late Night with David Letterman in 1986.

Did Phillips really “invent” rock and roll, as the title of his biography insists? Phillips was always evasive about his contribution, seeing himself more as an explorer than an innovator. Or, as he once commented to Guralnick about himself, “You can say he had the light coming on, and it spotted the possum. Right there.”

What is undeniable is that we’d all be in a far different world were it not for Sam Phillips and Sun Records. And Guralnick’s essential biography is a must-read for anyone interested in rock music or popular culture.

Note: A two-disc music compilation, bearing the same name as the book, is now available on the Yep Roc label. Guralnick contributed to the booklet notes and guided the song selection as well. It includes most of the recordings discussed in the biography – by both the celebrated Sun Records artists and lesser-known ones. For those readers born too late, or older ones whose nostalgia is rekindled, it is the perfect “companion” to the book. —Alan Cranis

Get it at Amazon.