Peter Frampton plays at UPAC on Saturday
KINGSTON, N.Y. » Famed rocker Peter Frampton, joins his son Julian Frampton and longtime collaborator Gordon Kennedy at the Ulster Performing Arts Center Saturday.
Frampton said this tour, titled “Raw: An Acoustic Tour,” is his fourth acoustic tour in the last two years stemming from his 2016 album “Acoustic Classics.”
The album features acoustic renditions of many of his favorite hits like “Baby, I Love Your Way,” “Lines on My Face,” “Do You Feel like I Do” and “Show Me the Way.”
Frampton briefly hinted at some of the material in Saturday’s set list.
“We do stuff from my first solo album, ‘Wind of Change,’ Frampton said. “We also do some covers.”
Among them are a Buddy Holly song Frampton said was the first song he ever learned to play.
The show also dives deeper into his catalogue.
“There’s something from the album just called “Peter Frampton,” “You Can be Sure” which I’ve never played live,” Frampton said.
Frampton said he sees no differences between playing his biggest hits and his deepest cuts.
“I enjoy them all,” Frampton said. “‘Lines on My Face’ I enjoy doing electric or acoustic.”
Written on Long Island, Frampton said he’s played this song as a “scene setter” on most of his tour dates throughout his career.
Frampton admitted he was a bit anxious at first about unplugging from electric and his band to go acoustic.
But, he said, those anxieties faded after the first night of his first tour.
“It was a different kind of connection with the audience,” Frampton said.
UPAC is just one of a series of historic theaters Frampton’s playing during this tour.
“We prefer the older smaller theaters, it feels like everyone is sitting out in the living room,” Frampton said, adding that he loves the acoustics.
“We try to keep them under 1,000-seaters, but some are quite a bit more,” Frampton said. “The most, in Thousand Oaks, Calif., was 2,400, in Nashville, the Schermerhorn is 1,800-1,900.”
Frampton said going acoustic forced him to “reverse engineer” his songs to give them that “living-room feel.”
“That took more work than I thought,” Frampton said.
During his first day in the studio for “Acoustic Classics,” Frampton said, he first tried to play his songs the same way he did with the band.
“I was trying to do the same kind of performance,” Frampton said.
A self-professed perfectionist, Frampton said he wasn’t happy with how they sounded.
“I went home that first night, and thought how would these of sounded had I just written them,” Frampton said, adding that he wanted the songs to sound like he was asking a friend over to breakfast to hear them for the first time.
“The performance you’d get would be totally different from 40 years later,” Frampton said.
Frampton, who lived in Mount Kisco and Crotonon-Hudson in Westchester County for 13 years and has played in Wappingers Falls and Poughkeepsie, will be joined by his son, Julian Frampton, a singer-songwriter and guitar player who will play a 30-minute opening show with Ben Sheridan.
Frampton said his son will also join him for one of his own songs.
Also along for the tour is songwriter Gordon Kennedy, who wrote “Change the World” for Eric Clapton and is in his 18th year collaborating with Frampton.
“It’s like a family bus,” Frampton said. “To have him there and my son, it’s like vacation.
“It’s very easy touring this way.”
No matter where the tour lands, Frampton said, the show is always on his mind.
“On show day, when I wake up, I’m thinking show from my first cup of coffee until I hit the stage,” Frampton said.
Frampton played alongside famous rockers throughout this career, including the late David Bowie and ex-Beatles George Harrison and Ringo Starr.
Frampton recalled how he met Harrison during his time with the supergroup Humble Pie in the early 1970s.
“I was introduced to a group of musicians that were session musicians for George Harrison, Nicky Hopkins and Billy Preston,” Frampton said.
Frampton added that he ended up playing with Harrison’s band and also played on stage with Starr and on four of his albums.
Frampton said he recently co-wrote a song with Starr, but he’s not certain it will make it onto Starr’s latest album.
As for Bowie (who had a home in Shokan), Frampton said he knew the late rocker since they went to school together.
“He was my school chum from many, many years ago,” Frampton said
Frampton said Bowie asked him to play on one his albums and invited him to go out on his “Glass Spider” tour.
“We’d known each other since I was 12, and he was 15,” Frampton said. “It was a phenomenal, phenomenal thing.”
While Frampton’s popularity peaked in the 1970s with chart-topping hits like “Show Me The Way” and “Baby I Love Your Way,” he said he never stopped recording in the decades that followed.
“I’m still doing it, I’ve had an incredibly long career,” Frampton said. “I thank the audience for sticking by me.
“It’s just so great to go out and play whenever I like.”
Frampton said he’s gone through several ups and downs during that time, including battling alcoholism.
“I’m a recovering alcoholic of 13 years,” Frampton said.
But this never kept him from putting out new material.
“I keep putting out new music,” Frampton said. “It’s not screaming to the top of the charts, but it’s something I’ll be doing to the day I die.”
He admitted the generation buying today’s chart toppers is far removed from his own.
“It’s only right they should have their own heroes,” Frampton said.
As he continues deep into
his fourth decade touring, Frampton credits his continued energy to lifestyle changes.
“It’s hitting the gym four days a week,” Frampton said. “It all started when I had children.
“You can’t sleep in, so you can’t party so much.”
Frampton said he’s happy to keep playing for his audience.
“I cannot complain about a thing,” Frampton said.
And he’s even been surprised a few times along the way. “A few years ago, I put out an instrumental album,’ “Fingerprints,’” Frampton said. “To my astonishment, I got a Grammy for the whole album.
“You never know what’s going to happen, that’s why I keep going.”
IF YOU GO:
What: Peter Frampton “Raw: an Acoustic Tour” When: 8 p.m. Saturday Where: Ulster Performing Arts Center, 601 Broadway, Kingston.
How much: Reserved seating $45-$85, $5 discount for members.
Contact: UPAC box office (845) 339-6088 http:// www.bardavon.org/show/ peter-frampton-raw-acoustic-tour/