| August 8th, 2005 07:48 AM |
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| Ten Thousand Motels |
GEARHEAD-GUITARIST BILLY F. GIBBONS and his ZZ TOP MATES HAVE DONE SOME OF THEIR BEST WORK SINCE THE HIGH-OCTANE 'ELIMINATOR' ALBUM
Buffalo News
By JEFF SIMON
Arts Editor
8/7/2005
"Early on, our songwriting efforts indicated we might not be as crafty as Bob Dylan."—Billy F. Gibbons
It's 1983, just before one of the pivotal moments in rock and roll history.
ZZ Top - whose members are Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductees and unquestionably the greatest redneck blues-rockers of all time - has already been doing what it does for more than a decade. They're 34 years old - guitarist Billy F. Gibbons, bassist Dusty Hill and drummer Frank Beard.
The usually estimable Dave Marsh writes this in "The Rolling Stone Record Guide": "On record, ZZ Top was never more than a Poor Man's Lynyrd Skynyrd - some rural feeling but just numbing guitar drive. Rock and roll can be mindless fun, but it never deserved to be this empty-headed."
And then came one of the great rock and roll moments: "Eliminator," a record from the Texas thunder trio that was as bedrock an American vision as they come, a vision of hot-rodded '30s Fords and, says guitarist Gibbons, "the hot rod sounds that go right along with them." If the Beach Boys gave us an American vision of paradise, California division, ZZ Top gave us the speedway vision of paradise.
Here was blues-rock as perfectly tuned as the most lovingly cared-for engine, with all cylinders firing and the smoothest transmission this side of heaven. (A book called "Billy F. Gibbons: Rock and Roll Gearhead" will be published in October.)
The cliched cant about ZZ Top is to prefer their up-from-the-bars white boy Texas blues rock to their massive synthesizer-and-tape-sweetened Wagnerian redneck party blues, but it seems to me the true authentic ZZ Top is "Eliminator" and after. Two great American worlds came together - to angelic perfection. Concert tickets and records sold accordingly.
Here was music that:
• Didn't care where you went to school or what you did for a living.
• Wasn't interested in your favorite movie.
• Didn't really give a frig about your feelings - or its own, for that matter.
It seemed to ask only one question, but it does so with unsurpassed eloquence: Do you like to boogie ("tube snake" or otherwise)?
Nevermind worries you have that the lyrics were, as always, about the four H's of the Road Raunch life: horniness, hanging out, hooking up and hangovers. What was always true of ZZ Top after it burst into glory was that the sonic sophistication of what it did was in, uh, notable contrast to the Cro-Magnon lyrics.
Archimedes said, "Give me a lever large enough and a place to stand, and I'll move the earth." The message of ZZ Top is, "Give me three chords loud enough and a place to stand and I'll do the same thing."
Nevermind the hillbilly deadpan of the videos, just listen. And catch their act in concert. (They come to the grandstand at the Erie County Fair at 8:30 p.m. Thursday.)
In preparation for their visit, I talked on the phone for almost an hour to Gibbons, a man who, in the band's 3 1/2 decades, has made it a habit not to be interviewed often.
He is a pleasure to talk to. His Texas drawl is stately and impressive. So are his vocabulary and references. He's as apt to refer to surrealism and dadaism as he is to Jeff Beck. He'd be great to spend an afternoon shooting the breeze with on a back porch somewhere. (Refreshments, liquid or herbal, optional.)
Some words, mostly personal, from one of the cornerstone guitar players in rock and roll:
On the influence of his father, who was a society band leader and sometime conductor of the Houston Symphony Orchestra.
"He was such a well-rounded entertainer. And, of course, growing up in a household with a Dad that preferred to read and perform sheet music over newspaper and magazines provided a constant background of musical input.
"When I was 5 years old, my younger sister and I would sneak in and crawl up underneath the grand piano in the living room while he has playing. And, laying on our backs, we'd stare up at the soundboard with our eyes closed. And we used to see planets! It was that dramatic.
"Granted, what I play is hugely different from what we grew up listening to, but I knew I was leaning toward the bluesier side of things when my Dad would honor us with a good boogie-woogie performance on the keys. That's when I knew what I wanted to hear. I just had to wait to get my hands on a guitar - "Bring the guitar, the hands will follow.'"
On opening in the very early days for Jimi Hendrix.
"I found him to be genteel and yet intense. The one overlooked aspect of his contribution was to make the guitar do things that it wasn't necessarily originally designed for. A case in point: At the time, I was also playing a Fender Stratocaster, which he took note of. I remember in Dallas, I was rooming directly across the hall in the hotel. My door was open, as was his. He had ordered up a console stereo record player so he could listen to the Jeff Beck group. Their first one, I think it was "Truth.' He said, "Man, this is some stuff.'
"He was very dedicated to not only contributing but being willing to learn. That's what endeared him to so many musicians.
"He called me in the room and said, "Watch this.' He was juggling the pickup selector switch, which had three positions - back, middle, forward. I said, "Yeah, it's a three-position toggle switch.' He said, "No, it's five.' I said, "How do you figure?' He very carefully found that by tricking the mechanism into a middle spot between back and middle and front, you had five positions. Well, the designer of the switch never in their wildest dreams expected somebody discovering this unexpected anomaly. But, lo and behold, that was one of the things his dedication and curiosity fueled, which drove us all crazy - even to this day."
On opening for Janis Joplin and her coming to the band's rescue.
"It was down in San Antonio. We had a song that had some raunchy lyrics. Somebody took offense and called the police. They walked onstage, yanked us off and into the back. Janis said, "What happened to ZZ Top?' She had a favorite song, and it was toward the end of our set. She said, "Why are they quitting?' Somebody told her: "They're not. The cops hauled them off.' She said, "What?'
"It turned into this brouhaha. She stormed out (of her dressing room) and said, "This is absurd. It's just rock and roll! And unless you put 'em back onstage and let 'em complete the show, I ain't gonna go (on.)' Well then, pandemonium broke loose backstage - "Well, I guess it wasn't that bad.' To tell you the truth, I can't even remember the song that caused the big stir in the first place.
"Since then, rock and roll has become a cornerstone of popular Western culture. . . . If you ain't liftin' some eyebrows and creatin' some nervousness, you ain't playing rock and roll."
On the epochal success of "Eliminator."
"No one expected it to hit to the extent that it did. It was certainly a turning point. There was something appealing about it. There was a magnetism. It's been my experience, many artists don't really listen to their own stuff that much. You create it. You enjoy it. You might enjoy hearing it on the radio or watching it on TV. Very few artists that I know sit for hours on end listening to their own music - unless it's for the purpose of making improvements.
"That project really zeroed in on the importance of good time. Even though the dance craze was starting to wane, people had finally found safety (with it) on the dance floor. That was because of our attention to good timing, not throwing them a curve ball and making them lose their balance while they were trying to impress their girlfriends (huge laugh)."
On the notable conflict between the lyrics of ZZ Top songs and the production sophistication.
(After a pause) "Early on, our songwriting efforts indicated we might not be as crafty as Bob Dylan." (Chuckle).
On whether he'd sound like Billy F. Gibbons on just any old electric guitar rather than his favorite "Pearly Gates."
"I've been told I do. . . . (Just recently) I picked up a rather unwanted reject - basically a bad instrument. . . . I couldn't wait. I plugged it up, and people came running around the corner and said, "Man, it's Gibbons.' A lot of it's in the hands. You develop muscle memory. That's the fun part. When you get an instrument to play the stuff you want to hear."
On induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
"We'd always been fascinated that our heroes were being recognized in this really prestigious fashion. We still thought of ourselves - still do - as the little old band from Texas. When the call came in it was, "By the way, you guys are going to have to go to New York. You've been inducted into the Hall of Fame.'
"It happened so fast we didn't have time to think about it. When we went backstage to make our little speeches, we got revved up with Keith Richards. I said, "This is the way to do it.' He's still the consummate rock star. In my book, he's still the great musician with the greatest of images. I wouldn't be surprised to see him sailing on a schooner as a barbarian pirate some day."
On younger bands that turn him on.
"Dude, I was in Santa Fe, N.M. And I saw the Black Keys, a duet with just drums and guitar. They're kind of on the peripheral side of things, but the sounds that they deliver! Their talents had perfected a delivery that was just as rich - better even - than some five-, six-piece bands."
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