OK...only a couple here know that I've been working on a book about guitar players for most of the last 8 months or so.

It is almost done (Volume 1 anyway) and the book focuses on the less-heralded names who have provided me and many here and around the world incredible joy through their playing.

This book feature a diverse collection of players from a variety of genres. Every one of them belongs. This book will not please everyone and I expect to hear gripes, but we all have opinions. I'm not saying this is a "best-of", it's just a list of fantastic guitar players.

This has been a crazy journey since I began, and I have had the chance to talk to some of my musical heroes in depth and have actually become friendly and even in some cases friends with some of them who I now chat with through email and may even visit sometime.

One of the trickier aspects has been acquiring photos of these guys if I wasn't able to connect with them personally.

I can't just Google a photo and copy it without getting sued. So, here's where this plea comes in.

There are a number of players in this book I have done bios on, but they either didn't get back to me, are deceased or they never sent me a photo even after an interview (busy, busy they are).

Although this isn't all the players I need photos of, this is a list of some players I was wondering if anyone had a decent photo of that I could put in the book and of course, give you full credit and 2 seconds of fame which is one less second than I will achieve.

Can anyone help me with these musicians:

Al McKay (Earth, Wind & Fire)
Elliot Easton (The Cars)
James Honeyman-Scott (Pretenders)
Billy Zoom (X)
Earl Slick (David Bowie, John Waite, etc.)
Paul Reynolds (A Flock of Seagulls)
Chris Hayes (Huey Lewis & the News)
Will Sergeant (Echo & the Bunnymen)
Robbie Blunt (Robert Plant)
Jon Butcher (Jon Butcher Axis)
George Kooymans (Golden Earring)
Ian Bairnson (Alan Parsons Project)
Frankie Sullivan (Survivor)
Neil Giraldo (Pat Benatar)
Jerry Reed

This list should give you an idea of the different types of players I am featuring.

Any help would be much appreciated.

I have been busting my ass on this book, while teaching, working for the Phillies and battling health issues and I really think you guys will like it.

I've kept it quiet because I don't want to promote myself but I'm reaching out for some help.

Rock on!

When can I pre-order Pete? This caught me by surprise, didn't know you were doing this.

I wish I had a way to get you pictures, everyone in mags and stuff must be copyrighted.

Hopefully you will get some responses. Now that you have told us about this you must keep us in the loop.

Congrats my friend!

Rick A.

Can't help with the images, but I'm in when it's published.

I'm oh-fer-these guys. I think Jon Butcher is the only one I've actually seen live.

I don't have anything from those artists also.

Thanks guys.

Rick, every photo I've gotten is from the artists themselves, but yes, otherwise I can't just copy things from websites or Google and such due to copyright and possible lawsuits.

I've done a ton of interviews, but the artists I can't reach I'd love to still be able to include photos.

In the case of some of the deceased I was able to reach out to some of the families who were very touched and pleased to help but tracking down people like that and the artists has been a maddening task!

And a shout out to Alan and Rich who had both already helped in the past with some photos.

Thankfully Alan kept the nude self portraits to himself.

Here's one of them for you - Billy Zoom from X's performance at NXNE in 2009. Hope if helps, and let us know when the book's ready

Jason

Nice shot Jason!

Someone else has volunteered some Billy Zoom shots, so I will take a look at them all.

Thank you so much.

Book should be out by year's end (I am finishing as we speak and will be turning it in in 7-10 days or so).

A few others I should mention I'm looking for:

Gary Sanford (Joe Jackson)
Geoff Whitehorn (Procol Harum)
Leo Kottke
Aldo Nova
Dean DeLeo (Stone Temple Pilots)
Noel Gallagher (Oasis)
Daniel Ash (Bauhaus)
John McGeogh (Magazine, Siouxie & Banshees)
Marshall Crenshaw
Joan Armatrading
Junior Brown
Vic Johnson (Sammy Hagar)
Kim Mitchell (Max Webster)
Rob Dean (Japan)
Kevin Eubanks
Steve Rothery (Marillion)
Ricky Medlocke (Blackfoot, Lynyrd Skynyrd)
Stanley Jordan
Nick Valensi (The Strokes)

Thanks for any help!!!!

Uh, no - I just didn't send them to you.

Right, Smiff?

I did say guitar not male organ you know.

I suppose you've already gone this route, but I'll throw it into the ring anyway. Is contacting the people who do own the rights to the images you can't copy, and seeing their permission to do so, an option?

In many cases they ask for a lot of $$$.

One guy wanted around $400 for each image which is beyond insane.

I am working on some other sources.

I have done about 40 interviews and have photos from all those players but optimally I'd like one for each player whether I interview them or not.

The rock photogs are usually all about $$$, at least so far, but I'm hoping I will find somebody.

And a special thank you to Charles-thanks so much, man!

I clearly don't believe much in self-promotion (and I doubt many here really care) seeing as it's been over a month since I posted about my book, but yesterday was awesome.

I interviewed Davey Johnstone of Elton John's band and he was a fantastic guy.

Even gave me exclusive details of Elton's new album!

And, I now have another cool friend who I hope to see when Elton comes to Philly next time.

A wonderful player-I tell ya, and going back to prepare for the interview and listening to all those amazing Elton albums from 1972-77 was a damn treat. Elton is a fricking genius.

So is Davey.

Anyway, with one arm I am typing this so I am done!

Book is almost finished.

Sounds great, Pete! Self promote away, we like that.

"Davey Johnstone."

Ha ha!

Nice! Very underrated player. Could be the poster child for underrated players, but if they made a poster of him, he wouldn't be underrated.

Can't wait to see it!

Sorry for the slow response. I've been busy going through the huge volume of pics Alan sent. The ones with Chris dressed in Kiss makeup were particularly troubling!

Pete, are you aware of Creative Commons? It's a system in which creative people share photos and other such content royalty-free with each other.

The easiest way to search and find these photos is through a Google image search. For example, you can search 'John Frusciante' in Google, click 'Images', click the 'Search Tools' button to the right, and select either 'Labeled for Reuse' or 'Labeled for Reuse' with modification. Here's the result of that search --

https://www.google.com/search?q=john+fr ... tbs=sur:fc

Sometimes the photographer asks for a photo credit or some other small condition. You can also search for droyalty free images on Flickr. Go to CreativeCommons.org to learn more.