Peter Frampton
B.B. King's Blues Club, New York
January 18, 2001
By C. Bottomley

Peter Frampton has the best upper teeth in the business, and the 
audience crowded into the posh Times Square club knows this because
the guitarist flashes them often. He smiles as he opens with 
"Somethin's Happening." He beams at longtime associate Bob Mayo as 
the guitarist uses several blistering arpeggios to finish a duel 
with his boss on "(I'll Give You) Money." And the choppers come out
once again when someone yells for "All I Want to Be (Is by Your Side)." 

Frampton doesn't play that tune, but for the next hour and a half he
gives this audience what they're paying a buck per onion ring for: the
chance to pretend they were there when he recorded Frampton Comes Alive!
25 years ago. Frampton isn't quite the chest-baring rock god anymore. 
His spectacles and cropped hair give him a professorial air, while the 
plastic trousers are just funny looking. Sure, he's played "Show Me the 
Way" far more times than anyone's ordered B.B.'s Cajun Meatloaf Sandwich 
in this newish joint. But in the last quarter-century he's pulled enough 
jabbering solos off the fingerboard to convince himself this is fun, and 
by the time he charges through Humble Pie's "I Don't Need No Doctor" you 
might want to ask him to undo a few buttons. 

He lets his guard down only twice. When he sings "Islands in the sun/ 
Wish I could buy one/ Out of season" on a beautiful rendition of "Baby I
Love Your Way," the sentiment is as plaintive as it is real. It happens 
again on a blues called "Can't Take That Away," from 1995's Peter 
Frampton. The groove is ordinary, but the prosaic lyrics indicate how 
Frampton's priorities have shifted since Comes Alive was the best-selling
record on the planet. In a warm growl he wonders about what he's lost in
this lifetime. Then he gets everyone - including the table in "Frampton's
Family of Friends" T-shirts - to sing along. 

Even the mammoth excursion of "Do You Feel Like We Do" has metamorphosed
into vaudeville, complete with hand-clapping routines, a silly walk across
the stage, band introductions, and a few bars of "Thank You (Falettinme 
Be Mice Elf Again)" passed through the talkbox. But the band is 
comfortable with that. Bassist John Regen flips his guitar over to show 
the audience the sign he has stuck on underneath. It reads: "Applause." 
We do so dutifully. Because sometimes the familiar can be fun, too.