He’s worked with everyone from Thin Lizzy to Pink Floyd. These are the five cuts Snowy White considers his best.
BY JOE MATERA
TERENCE “SNOWY” WHITE is one of those unassuming quiet achievers whose passion for playing blues-infused guitar music has never wavered. Having started out working on sessions, he served as a touring member for artists such as Joan Armatrading, Steve Harley & Cockney Rebel, and Pink Floyd before joining Thin Lizzy in 1980. But he soon found the gig a mixed blessing.
“There were many good things about Thin Lizzy, as they were a great band, but working with Phil Lynott was difficult,” White recalls over the phone from his home in Petersfield, England. “He’d say, ‘I’ll be there at 11 a.m. to start recording,’ but he wouldn’t turn up until 10 p.m. and expect us to work all night. I’d be thinking, They’re wasting so much money, which they probably didn’t realize, since the record company was paying for it initially but would be taking it back out of royalties.
“So by the time they started working, I was tired, and I’d say, ‘I’m going home now, as it’s midnight.’ Because I knew what I had signed up for, I worked really hard at being positive, but sometimes it was quite difficult. For example, when Phil turned up to put vocals on, he hadn’t done any work on them at all, and we’d be sitting there for hours while he worked on them. Yet all he had to do was spend a couple hours getting some of the lyrics down beforehand.”
After two studio albums with the group, White exited Thin Lizzy in 1982 and began forging a successful and prolific solo career. Since his 1983 debut outing, White Flames, he’s released more than 20 solo albums. He also spent more than two decades playing guitar as part of Roger Waters’ touring band, with whom he performed around the world.
For the duration of his playing career, White’s weapon of choice has been his goldtop 1957 Gibson Les Paul, which he purchased in 1969 while in Sweden. He eventually sold it at auction in 2015 and has since played a custom copy.
“I didn’t know the copy existed until a friend called me when I was staying at the Savoy in London during Roger’s shows at the London 02 Arena,” White explains. “He told me a Japanese guy wanted to give me a guitar that was a copy of my old one, which I was still playing at the time. So he came down to the hotel and showed it to me, and it looked rather nice — had all the scratches in the right places, et cetera. So
