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ZZ Top Gets Busy On First Album Since 200


Jahfin

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*Edit: that subject line should read "2003". Yep, it's been a long time since they turned in an album but not that long.

http://www.billboard.com/bbcom/news/articl...t_id=1003727816

zz_top_01l.gif

ZZ Top

Gary Graff, Austin

With a live DVD, a new album and some touring on the docket, ZZ Top is revving up for a busy year.

While he was hanging out at this year's South By Southwest Music + Media Conference in Austin, Texas -- where he performed at Rachael Ray's Feedback party and psychedelic rocker Roky Erickson's annual Ice Cream Social -- Gibbons told Billboard.com that bandmates Dusty Hill and Frank Beard were back in Dallas "in the studio, preparing a new series of sessions of new material" for ZZ Top's first studio set since 2003's "Mescalero."

Gibbons says the band hopes to finish the album before the summer. "The challenge of the studio is much different than live appearances," Gibbons says. "The live experience is hundreds of distracting events. The studio is one microphone. It's one event, so it raises our level of attention to a place where we can really come together as the band we started off as. It's almost a small club environment, so it's really fun."

Before we see the album, however, ZZ Top is planning to release a concert DVD taped Nov. 1, 2007, at the Nokia Theater in Grand Prairie, Texas, near Dallas. No date or title has been determined yet for the Eagle Rock release, but Gibbons says the final product is "untouched. It's full of mistakes, and that's the way we like it."

Gibbons also recently taped a guest appearance on the May 16 season finale for the Fox TV series "Bones" -- "I thought I was gonna be the blind date or the boyfriend but, no, I have to be the dad," he laments -- and says that in addition to the recording, ZZ Top is starting to line up its 2008 road schedule.

"Hopefully we'll be able to return to the road as early as June -- even, if we can pull it off, into May," Gibbons says. "The European window of weather you can get out in is very short. So they are ready to rock. And we might pick up a string of dates through the U.S., too."

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Considering it's been 1808 years since their last release, I'm sure all those mistakes can be forgiven.

You must have missed this part of my post:

*Edit: that subject line should read "2003". Yep, it's been a long time since they turned in an album but not that long.

I just hope the DVD is as good as side one of Fandango. That's a mighty tall order though.

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This is awesome news!!

I always loved the band, pre-Eliminator. The older the better. The debut album through Deguello are no-nonsense rock & boogie. I gave up after Afterburner.

Hopefully I'll find that they've got back to their roots. Anyone in the know of more recent stuff that isn't pop-friendly?

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Anyone in the know of more recent stuff that isn't pop-friendly?

I can't speak much to their newer studio albums but when I saw 'em on tour in support of Mescalero a few years ago they were still in fine form.

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Here is an awesome clip from 1980 on German TV...Top playing "Jesus Left Chicago", back when Billy was still using Pearly Gates on the road:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2MrK9-6LEpE

Yeah, and what's amazing about the German Video, is that you actually get to see the band perform in shots that last for more than 3 seconds! SO glad that the ingnorant MFs over at MTV did not get their hands on this video !!

Here's an ode to Blue Jeans and what's in 'em.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0gFBP9vyHVo

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ZZTOPGEORGETHOROGOODBILOXI97.jpg

ZZ Top with George Thorogood

Never seen a bad ZZ-TOP show look forward to the new stuff .Hope it sounds like the 70's material

ZZTOPWAREHOUSENEWORLEANS74.jpg

ZZ TOP Warehouse New Orleans 74 .The night they recorded Fandango's live side.

ZZ Top Alabama 74

ZZTOP4JUL74ALABAMA.jpg

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They're also putting out a remastered version of Eliminator, with the original version of Legs, and some live tracks at the end. There will also be a dvd with it that will have the videos and some more live performances. I'm there!

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If you're going to hold a grudge for that, then I feel sorry for you. Guess you haven't forgiven ol' Pagey for guesting with Puff Daddy?

No I haven't. I thought that was one of the more ludicrous things to happen in Rock history. Do I still love Jimmy? Sure, but it's hard to forget something like that.

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I'd love to see these guys, but the last couple times they were around, they were tossed in with 2 or 3 other bands they had no connection to (the Pretenders?). I'm not going to sit through that, just to see them do maybe a 40 minute set.

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I'd love to see these guys, but the last couple times they were around, they were tossed in with 2 or 3 other bands they had no connection to (the Pretenders?). I'm not going to sit through that, just to see them do maybe a 40 minute set.

I don't think there has to be any "connection". I mean, The Pretenders opened for Neil Young once here but that didn't lessen my concert experience any. When I saw ZZ Top, the Nuge and Kenny Wayne Shepherd (backed by Double Trouble) were also on the bill and it didn't lessen ZZ Top's stage time any. Well, except when they had to give Ted the hook when he tried to go over his allotted time. ZZ still turned in a full set though. If it's a three way bill like that (or larger) generally the concerts are started earlier.

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It seems like the indoor venues here in NY have a restriction on how long shows go on for, maybe a union thing I've heard. I haven't been to a show that went much over 2 1/2 hours, whether it was 1, 2 or 3 groups on the bill, in quite a few years. The Beacon theater, located in "the city that never sleeps", supposedly had some 11 pm curfew that didn't even allow Hot Tuna (a jam band famed for 4 hour + shows) to do a single encore. And, of course, the tickets are higher priced in this area than other regions.

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It seems like the indoor venues here in NY have a restriction on how long shows go on for, maybe a union thing I've heard. I haven't been to a show that went much over 2 1/2 hours, whether it was 1, 2 or 3 groups on the bill, in quite a few years. The Beacon theater, located in "the city that never sleeps", supposedly had some 11 pm curfew that didn't even allow Hot Tuna (a jam band famed for 4 hour + shows) to do a single encore. And, of course, the tickets are higher priced in this area than other regions.

Sad to day, but you'd have a better chance of "Jammin'" into the wee hours in Moscow, than you would in the Good ol' USA !

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No I haven't. I thought that was one of the more ludicrous things to happen in Rock history. Do I still love Jimmy? Sure, but it's hard to forget something like that.

My advice to you would be to get over it. Obviously Nickelback used Billy to up their cool status. Billy's awesome like that. You stand next to him and you get coolness. Besides, I hear he makes some exquisite margaritas.

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People are going to recommend their earliest stuff - it's more punch in the mouth blues, and may be quite different than the catchy songs you hear on the radio. You might want to start with their Greatest hits, and go from there?

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