Peter Frampton – ‘Show Me The Way’
  • Writer: Peter Frampton
  • Producers: Peter Frampton and Chris Kimsey
  • Recorded: Winter 1974-75 at Clearwell Castle, Gloucestershire, England
  • Released: Spring 1975
  • Players:
    Peter Frampton — vocals, guitar
    Andrew Brown — bass
    John Siomos — drums
  • Album: Frampton (A&M, 1975)
  • Also on:
    Frampton Comes Alive! (A&M, 1976)
    Greatest Hits (A&M, 1996)
    Frampton Comes Alive: 25th Anniversary Deluxe Edition (A&M, 2001)
  • “Show Me The Way” was the first single released from former Humble Pie guitarist Peter Frampton‘s fourth solo album, but it had little success.
  • As the lead single from the subsequent Frampton Comes Alive!, however, it hit Number Six on the Billboard Hot 100.
  • The song features Frampton using a voicebox, a device that blends the voice and guitar sounds for an altered, electronic-sounding effect.
  • Frampton recorded the Frampton album at Clearwell Castle in Gloucestershire, England, rather than in a standard recording studio. In the liner notes to the Shine On retrospective, he explained, “The natural, ambient sounds of the different rooms were not as restricting as the studio and made for a myriad of different sounds for each instrument. The drums were either in the kitchen, the entrance hall, or the huge living room area. The guitars were wherever they sounded best for each track.”
  • The Frampton album did reach Number 32 on the Billboard 200 chart, the best showing of any Frampton album to that point.
  • Frampton Comes Alive!, recorded on the tour to promote Frampton, was considerably more successful, hitting Number One and selling more than 20 million copies worldwide.

FAST FORWARD:

  • Frampton continues to tour and record.

Two members of the Frampton Comes Alive! band died in the space of a month. Drummer John Siomos was found dead in his apartment in Brooklyn, New York, in January 2004, and keyboardist-guitarist Bob Mayo died in February 2004 from a sudden heart attack while on tour with Frampton in Europe.