Peter Frampton’s 1954 Les Paul Found in the Caribbean – After 32 Years!

A 1954 Gibson Les Paul that Peter Frampton played during his Humble Pie and solo days has been found after investigation by two Frampton fans. The guitar had been presumed lost in a 1980 cargo plane crash.

The Curacao Tourist Board acquired the guitar and experts from Gibson Guitar confirmed it was, indeed, the missing guitar, long missing from Frampton’s collection.

Frampton was given the guitar in 1970 by a man named Mark Mariana at a Humble Pie gig at the Fillmore West. Frampton borrowed Mariana’s guitar for the show and afterward tried to buy it from him. “But to my surprise he said he couldn’t sell it to me – he wanted to give it to me!” he said.

Frampton played the guitar exclusively on Humble Pie’s Rock On and Rocking the Fillmore albums and his own seminal Frampton Comes Alive!, one of the top-selling live records of all time.

Frampton was recently reunited with the guitar in Nashville, Tennessee. He said: “I am still in a state of shock, first off, that the guitar even exists let alone, that it has been returned to me. I know I have my guitar back, but I will never forget the lives that were lost in this crash. I am so thankful for the efforts of those who made this possible… and now that it is back I am going insure it for 2 million dollars and it’s never going out of my sight again! It was always my #1 guitar and it will be reinstated there as soon as possible – some minor repairs are needed. And, I just can’t wait to get Mark Mariana on the phone.”

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‘Nearly 700’ Unreleased Thin Lizzy Recordings Found

Spinner reports that before his death in 1986, Thin Lizzy bassist/frontman and main writer Phil Lynott gave an unidentified caretaker 150 tapes of unreleased music. In 2012, some of the nearly 700 tracks included in the archive will see the light of day – Universal Music has acquired the tapes and the company is prepping a new Thin Lizzy box set which is due out later in 2012.

“This is an absolutely stunning find,” project manager Steve Hammonds told the Irish Independent. The collection will feature outtakes and alternate versions of Lizzy hits, as well as “material which was recorded but never released at the time,” Hammonds added. The recordings span from 1971 to 1981 and total approximately 150 hours.

The group’s surviving members – Scott Gorham, Brian Robertson, Brian Downey, Eric Bell and others – are reportedly helping with the mammoth project. 2012 marks the 26th anniversary of Lynott’s passing, but Hammonds insists this box set is no vulgar cash-in.

“Phil Lynott passed the material on to a third party for safekeeping,” he said. “They held on to it for decades because they were waiting for the right people to come along. They really didn’t trust anyone enough to release it properly,” he added. “No money has changed hands, this person is a Thin Lizzy fan.”

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<em>Australian Idol</em> Judge Found Dead

Jay Dee Springbett, a former judge on Australian Idol, was found dead Thursday in his Sydney home, according to The Sydney Morning Herald. He was 36 years old.

Police arrived on the scene after being contacted by “concerned acquaintances,” who reported that they were unable to contact him. Springbett was dead when the police arrived.

Springbett was a Sony Music A&R executive who joined the hit show in 2009, replacing the departing Kyle Sandilands. A spokesman for the show’s producers said, “The Australian Idol family is deeply saddened by the passing of Jay Dee. Our thoughts are with his family and all at Sony Music.”

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