Re: R.I.P. Dusty Hill

Bringing to an end what might've been the longest standing unchanged band line-up.

Yeah, at least as American bands go. Apparently Golden Earring out of the Netherlands beat ZZ Top by a few years.

Looking at Golden Earring's Wikipedia page, it appears their line-up varied quite a bit over the decades. They have had a stable foursome of core members since 1970, but additional members have come and gone. Now, whether or not those additional players were considered official band members or just hired hands, I can't say.

I saw this news right as I pulled in to a bar where we were going to celebrate my Austin Chronicle music editor's retirement. Cast a bit of a pall for a little while. It's a real shock. The Top have always played their personal lives very close to the vest, so it's possible Hill has been sick for a long time and no one knew. Or it may have just been one of those things. We'll find out in the coming weeks, I'm sure.

I've always had an ambivalent relationship with ZZ Top. I'd never call myself a big fan - I tend to enjoy them in small doses, and then only after I haven't heard them in a long while. It probably goes without saying that their music has been ubiquitous for just about my entire life - if you live in Texas, they're inescapable, so my lack of real enthusiasm is a combination of burnout and taking them for granted. I never saw them live, alas (though, inexplicably, I have seen Billy Gibbons three times in other contexts).

And, apparently, the show must go on.

At first I was genuinely surprised by that. But after reading, it sounds like they may have been expecting this to happen.

[sorry, accidental duplicate post]



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/06/2021 10:43AM by Michael Toland.

In his autobiography, Pete Townsend explained why The Who had carried on with its 2002 tour, immediately following John Entwistle's death. The group had an insurance policy to cover the cost of cancelled shows, but it excluded cancellations caused by substance abuse. So when John died from a cocaine-related heart attack, Pete and Roger had a choice: either get a stand-in bassist and carry on with the tour (and get excoriated as greedy, heartless bastards) or go bankrupt paying the costs of an entirely cancelled concert schedule.

Perhaps ZZ Top had a similar clause in their insurance policy, and Dusty's death might have been narcotics-related (maybe due to pain relievers). Or perhaps, with the band members all over 70, they couldn't get coverage in the first place.

Yeeeesh….that truly saddens me to think they’d HAVE to go out on the road the same week he died. Akin to HAVING to remarry the same week your spouse passes.

I always liked ZZ Top, their songs were economical and tight. AND they had the guts to do that major synth retooling of their sound in the 80s; that was a risky move. Could’ve backfired, but wow what a payday for them.

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Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/06/2021 11:23PM by That One Guy.

The synth retooling was the result of one of the more unlikely musical friendships anyone could imagine. In 1980, ZZ Top's brand of Texas boogie looked to be on the way out when they were booked on The Old Grey Whistle Test. The other band on the show that night was the up-and-coming OMD. In the run-up to filming the show, the two bands hung out and got along surprisingly well. ZZ Top were very taken with OMD's material and played OMD's debut album over the pre-show PA on their subsequent tour. They then started investigating how to incorporate the electronics of their new buddies into their own sound, resulting in their surprising 80s second act, which made them more popular than they'd ever been in the 70s. One of the first bands to post a social media tribute upon Dusty Hill's passing was OMD.

That's curious and cool, Brad. Picturing the ZZ Top punters getting primed-up on OMD.

I've always admired the way they incorporated elements of New Wave and synthpop into their sound while remaining essentially themselves. Those Eliminator hits still hold up as well as any of their 70s classics. I would never have guessed OMD was an inspiration.

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Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/06/2021 11:24PM by That One Guy.

When I read this quickly, I initially thought ‘we’ll of course they’re partial to Texas’.

Would’ve NEVER guessed ZZ had an ear for bands like Telex or OMD. Which is kinda foolish on my part… if I could like a wide range of music, why is it so unlikely they would too? Maybe the guys in Slayer were Shalamar fans….is it THAT unfathomable?

This topic, in a nutshell, is what I love about music… put a few humans in a room, give them instruments, and see what they come up with. Our minds are all so different… who knows what they’ll create? Unlimited possibilities. That’s why ROCK WILL NEVER DIE!!

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Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/06/2021 11:24PM by That One Guy.

According to Wikipedia, there was also a synthesizer programmer and sound engineer named Linden Hudson who worked closely with Gibbons to craft the sound of Eliminator, with a few tracks performed solely by Gibbons and Hudson. Hudson later sued the band for credit and royalties, as he claimed he co-wrote some of the songs, including the AOR hit "Got Me Under Pressure." He eventually got the money, but not the credit.

Breno I never knew of that relationship. Two crazily different bands in 1980, to be sure. Love it that they got on like that.

Thanks for sharing… makes me like both bands more than I already did!

I remember reading about the OMD/ZZ Top linkup on the OGWT show and found it amusing. ZZ Top's volte face to synth rock was perhaps the most weirdly astonishing move in the 80s. Surpassing even Rush's similar move begun a year or two earlier. But while I was very down with Rush's turn to New Wave, I have to admit that little 'ol synth lovin' me prefers the greasier 70s ZZ Top to listen to. I do know that hardcore Top fans {I can't make that claim] split on the issue, not unlike Rush fans. Of course, the move for ZZ Top took them stratospheric in a way that few bands experience. To go from respectable sales to multi-platinum [diamond, currently] in one step is very unusual.

I had added the ZZ Top docu to our Netflix list a few months ago and my wife [who originally was surprised by my doing that] wanted to watch it last night after Hill's demise. I found it a more typical music docu that missed a lot and basically ended on "Eliminator." Sort of a huge pet peeve with the format for me. I'm spoiled after the approach that Edgar Wright took on 'The Sparks Brothers." The best part of the ZZ Top film was that it covered the early days very well. I had almost forgotten about the Moving Sidewalks "99th Floor" which I was conversant with via the Chesterfield Kings […or was it the Fuzztones…?!] early 80s cover. I was astonished that their manager [who died in 2017] was with them from the beginning and must have done well by them.

Former TP subscriber [81, 82, 83, 84]

[postpunkmonk.com]
For further rumination on the Fresh New Sound of Yesterday®

Bill Ham was...a character. You're correct in that he did right by them as far as making them superstars. But part of that was making them into a very exclusive proposition - you had to cross a certain financial threshold for performances, and he strongly discouraged (some say banned) extracurricular activities, like side bands or even jamming with other folks for fun. (Hence the reason the Top was never on our TV show, which was a source of endless frustration on the part of the producers.)

He was also notorious for signing up Texas guitar slingers, then sending them off to tour the backwaters, so they wouldn't pull focus from Billy Gibbons. He did this to Eric Johnson, who managed to grab the national spotlight anyway once he was out of Ham's control, and Van Wilks, a guitarist much beloved and respected in Texas, particularly Austin, but who never broke out of the regional circuit.

ZZ Top actually parted ways with Ham before Ham died. It's unclear to me if they fired him because of his restrictions (the rumor) or if Ham simply retired (the official story). Gibbons certainly started making more appearances with other musicians more regularly after that.

Having said all that, the Top themselves would probably have become a beloved Texas institution barely known outside of our borders if not for Ham's shrewd business moves.

I saw the Moving Sidewalks reunion at Austin Psych Fest (or Levitation - can't remember if that was the year they changed their name). Sadly, it was basically bland bar band blues rock, with way too many Hendrix covers and far too little of ZZ's panache. I waited until they played "99th Floor," then booked it outta there.

My experience with ZZ Top fans has been that, even if they are partial to those '70s records, they didn't really take very long to warm up to the band's '80s sound. Sure, records like Eliminator and Afterburner pile on the synthesizers and electronic percussion, but they still end up sounding recognizably like ZZ Top.

One of the people interviewed in that documentary said that "ZZ Top took the blues and turned it into party music." When I heard that, I thought, hey, that's pretty accurate. And it also explains why I've always loved ZZ Top, but always have been kind of meh about the blues.

I was totally indifferent to Blues [and Blues influenced music] as a youth. As I began to get older I saw the pull, finally. It took until I was about 25 to see merit in the Rolling Stones, for example. I never heard Howlin' Wolf until the "Cadillac Records" movie [2008!], if you can believe that! The weird thing was I had been reading about him since 12 or so, but that music never reached my ears in the Pop sphere I existed in. My response was to immediately buy the Howlin' Wolf Chess boxed set! But the maddeningly symmetrical flip side to this tale was that to date, that film has been my only exposure to Beyoncé Knowles.

Former TP subscriber [81, 82, 83, 84]

[postpunkmonk.com]
For further rumination on the Fresh New Sound of Yesterday®



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 08/03/2021 10:29AM by Post-Punk Monk.

Listening to ‘Sleeping Bag’ by ZZ Top right now. Sounds good to my medically induced marijuana ears and Heineken laden tongue.