"We auditioned for a bass player and Phil was the only person we tried out
because we knew immediately he was the guy."
- Jeff Chamberlain
Phil Rosenthal
bass, vocals, guitar, mandolin
Phil grew up in Silver Spring MD but moved to England in 1977 where he attended high school. It was there that he started playing and writing music after his childhood friends gave him a Yamaha acoustic guitar and a Led Zeppelin Complete book for a going away present.
After returning to the US, he joined NotEven after answering an ad to "...jam and form [a] band" in the DC City Paper. It was during his audition as a bass player that he met Jeff Chamberlain, John Greenberg and Dave Murphy, and was asked to join the band.
Since the break up of NotEven, Phil has continued to write and play music, first as a member of a band he formed with Paul Flynn, John Greenberg and the late James Graham, and eventually becoming a founding member of the successful LA band, Twenty Cent Crush (for more info: /twenty-cent-crush) with whom he still plays today.
Phil is an accomplished songwriter/composer for film & television and a self taught musician who plays guitar, bass, mandolin, and lap steel/slide. In his spare time, he plays and writes music in the styles and influences of his favorite musicians: Paul McCartney, John Entwhistle, Colin Moulding Graham Maby, and Pete Farndon on bass; and Jimmy Page, Stephen Stills, Pete Townsend, Andy Partridge, Peter Buck and Johnny Marr on guitar. He hopes to release a full -length record, or 5, in the near future.
As for the old NotEven days, Phil said he misses the comradery and organic musical chemistry of the group the most, along with Jeff's lyrics, John's jokes, Ted's smile and laugh, and the group's outlook on life as a working band. However, he thinks the annual shows they have now are too much fun and he hopes the band is remembered by fans old and new as their band...the band they discovered.