We know what a monster hit this record was in the 1970s. I was working at the Record Bar when it came out and it was flying off the racks.

I sorta had mixed feelings about it at the time, though. Don't get me wrong, I still love this record. But I had been a Peter Frampton fan all the way back to the first Humble Pie records and had followed his solo career early on. When this came out suddenly the whole world was all over his music.

"Show Me the Way," "Baby, I Love Your Way," and "Penny for your Thoughts" from his 1974 release Frampton had been "Deaconlight Hits" since that record came out as well as other heavy-hitters from Wind of Change and Frampton's Camel. (He also released Somethin's Happening in 1974, but I never felt that stood up as well as the others.)

I met Peter Frampton during David Bowie's Glass Spider tour (that's the only time I met Bowie). We didn't really talk; just introduced ourselves and shook hands. I had a real cool conversation with Bowie's other guitarist, Carlos Alomar, I'll write about in detail sometime. Here is how Carlos compared his playing style with Peter's:

"The difference between me and him," said Carlos, "is that he plays notes, whereas I get more into the overall sound the guitar makes."

Well, notes or not, there's no getting around the fact that Peter Frampton is an awesome guitarist, first and foremost. And an underrated one. I think part of his downfall was after Frampton Comes Alive got so big, the record industry machine got too much control of him. Just my opinion. When my younger daughter was six I remember we watched Peter Frampton - Live in Detroit, which I think was recorded in 1999. His performance was great and it renewed my appreciation of this dude's talent. It's outrageous that Frampton was not included in Rolling Stone's Top 100 guitarists of all time (Brian Setzer and Alvin Lee were excluded, too! What's with that?). Frampton is definitely on my short list of great guitarists.

-- April 30, 2005 (DD)