Over the last couple of weeks, we’ve rediscovered Lisa Loeb and Juliana Hatfield. But while Loeb and Hatfield enjoyed some measure of mainstream success, the same really isn’t true of Sam Phillips.

Sure, Phillips’ 1994 album, Martinis And Bikinis, earned critical accolades. But as I learned while preparing this post, standout tracks like “I Need Love” and “Baby I Can’t Please You” barely registered with the world at large. These perfect examples of Beatlesque pop are only hits in my head, cemented there by regular airplay from local radio station WXRT (though “I Need Love” did feature on a few movie soundtracks).

Her next disc, 1996’s Omnipop (It’s Only A Flesh Wound Lambchop), amped up the murky atmospherics. It flopped, but (perhaps not surprisingly) I was a fan. Who doesn’t enjoy the good use of a chamberlin? Jon Brion, who produced Fiona Apple’s debut that same year, played on the Phillips disc and was credited with, among other instrumentation, “interesting noises.” I fell particularly hard for one of the album’s “interesting noises,” closing track “Slapstick Heart,” which Phillips co-wrote with the members of R.E.M.

The disc sold somewhere around 25,000 copies (mine is admittedly a promo), sealing Phillips’ fate with her label. In a 2002 Salon interview, Phillips said of Omnipop, “I don’t know what to think of that record … I wouldn’t want to be remembered by it, let’s put it that way.”

Phillips subsequently worked as a composer on Gilmore Girls (2000-2007), a gig which offered regular exposure while providing her with little-to-no recognition (save for us eagle-eyed viewer-fans). But Phillips’ lovely “la-la-la” musical cues will forever remain as much a part of Stars Hollow as the rapid-fire banter between Lorelai and Rory.

She released two acoustic albums during that time, 2001’s Fan Dance and 2004’s A Boot And A Shoe. And now, four years after her last long-player, Phillips has plugged back in for Don’t Do Anything, her first self-produced disc.

Her experimental streak still runs strong all these years after Omnipop, as the sonic evidence of title track “Don’t Do Anything” and “Shake It Down” attest. The moody “Under The Night” is a particular favorite.  Phillips is currently on tour to promote Don’t Do Anything, stopping in Chicago for two shows this weekend at the Old Town School of Folk Music. Tickets are available here.

Purchase Sam Phillips’ Don’t Do Anything via iTunes, Amazon. A new comprehensive career overview, The Disappearing Act: 1987-1998, was also recently released, available as an import via Amazon.