Acting

Frank Infante

Frank Infante (born November 15, 1951) is an American guitarist and bassist best known as a former member of the new wave band Blondie. Infante began his music career playing guitar in hard rock and electric blues groups such as The Elegant End and World War III. He joined Sniper in 1975 and then Blondie in 1977 as a session player, replacing bassist Gary Valentine. Blondie released their second album Plastic Letters in 1978. Infante played bass and guitar on the album but was not pictured on its cover. Later in 1978, Blondie recruited bassist Nigel Harrison, which allowed Infante to switch to guitar full-time. Record producer Mike Chapman has said that he considered Infante to be an "amazing guitarist" and the most technically proficient member of Blondie when he began producing Parallel Lines in 1978. Though the group was already a commercial force in the UK and Australia, Parallel Lines and its follow-up Eat To The Beat (1979) proved to be Blondie's commercial breakthroughs in the US. After sessions for the band's 1980 album Autoamerican, Infante sued the group for his alleged minimal involvement in the recording (which would affect his royalties), but the matter was settled out of court. Infante stayed on as an official member of Blondie for the 1982 album The Hunter, but Deborah Harry has claimed in interviews that despite receiving credit, Infante's participation in the sessions was essentially non-existent. Infante was no longer a member of the group during their tour in July and August 1982, and Blondie officially broke up by the end of the year.