On Sunday (July 23) night, Peter Frampton played the Treasure Island Resort and Casino in Welch, MN but the show didn’t go as planned.
At one point during his set, the cameraman for the facility and the director put up a picture of a fan holding up two vintage Frampton album covers on the big screen. The crowd let out huge cheers which were, unfortunately, in the middle of Peter’s song and it became a distraction for the musician.
Frampton got in front of the camera and uttered a two-word expletive and continued playing; however, at the end of the song, he and his band walked off the stage. Concertgoers said that they could see Frampton trying to grab the camera out of the camera operators hands. Soon after, he and the band returned to the stage to finish the show but Frampton had the video screens turned off.
On Tuesday (July 25), Frampton posted an explanation in social media:
I have been crafting my live show for decades. I am always working towards it being the best possible performance we can give to entertain you, the audience. Because I love what I do I care an incredible amount about the quality of the music I give to my fans every night.
My band and I follow a carefully written script every show with moments to go off musically and take it to a new, different place. I don’t ever play the same thing twice because I’m creating something new and fresh every time.
When something happens to change the script, like a distraction out of my control, then it messes with the build of the show. This happened in Welch, MN the other night. ”I’ll Give You Money,” is a song that we break down to almost nothing volume wise and it grabs the audience’s attention and pulls them in to hear what we are doing—its one of the most intimate parts of the set for my band and the audience together. At this very climactic moment, the director of the in-house video displayed the audience on the screens, which distracted from the connection that we had worked to achieve. The moment was lost.
From the stage, we aren’t able to see what’s being displayed on the screen so we had no idea they were showing a long-time fan holding up my album cover. I feel very bad for her and totally understand the perception from out front at this point in the show. The screens are there for you to see our playing and what we’re doing close-up on stage from wherever you are in the crowd. I love that this is possible at todays’ shows.
After the first interruption, I asked the director through my backstage team to please keep the cameras on the band during this important part of the song, but the monitors changed again. After the show, the director admitted this was a “very bad call.”
I was frustrated because I felt we had completely lost control of this special moment in the show. I overreacted and tried to take the camera from the cameraman and left the stage to talk to the director. I reacted passionately because I care very much about giving you the best show we can possibly give every night.
I could not take the chance of the screens affecting the show again so I had them turned off. This was not the right thing to do and I apologize to everyone there. The most disappointing thing to me and the band is that it was such a great evening with such an incredible audience—we were all having a great time.
Once again, I sincerely apologize for my overreaction and look forward to seeing you all out on the road some time again soon.
