ZZ Top's First Album ZZ Top

• 1[Somebody Else Been] Shaking Your Tree02:36
• 2Brown Sugar05:26
• 3Squank02:48
• 4Goin' Down To Mexico03:23
• 5Old Man03:27
• 6Neighbor, Neighbor02:21
• 7Certified Blues03:28
• 8Bedroom Thang04:40
• 9Just Got Back From Baby's04:10
• 10Backdoor Love Affair03:19
• Total Runtime35:38

Info for ZZ Top's First Album

While not their best-selling or most renowned album, ZZ Top's 1970 debut, ZZ TOP'S FIRST ALBUM, showed that the Texas trio had already nearly perfected their signature down n' dirty, blues-boogie-rock style. Like ZZ Top's other classic '70s albums, this one's an ass-kicker from beginning to end, especially on such standouts as the album-opening twang of 'Shaking Your Tree,' the vicious 'Brown Sugar,' the big rock of 'Goin' Down to Mexico,' and the fat blues groover 'Bedroom Thang.' Also of note is guitarist Billy Gibbons' supreme guitar tone and tasty playing; few other rock guitarists have sounded as confident on their debut as Gibbons does on ZZ TOP'S FIRST ALBUM.

'Retrospect is a powerful tool, because if I was reviewing this album in 1971, it would get a very low rating. Looking back almost 40 years, I can honestly say the Boys from Texas definitely laid down the tracks that would make them famous. Of course, they have fine tuned and changed their techniques over the years, but this album is a true representation of southern boogie and raw blues, and pays homage to all the blues players before them. They played the blues in its rawest form; Billy Gibbons, with his ’59 Les Paul he named “Pearly Gates”, could pick the blues in its’ most soulful form. Add the rhythm of Dusty Hill and Frank Beard, whom complimented Gibbon’s playing perfectly, and you have one of the best southern boogie, blues-rock bands to ever be recorded. As history would dictate, these 3 musicians have stuck together through four decades of Texas style boogie, and they have had the same producer, Bill Ham, all the way through to the last recorded album of 2004. What an incredible achievement!'

Billy Gibbons, vocals, guitar
Dusty Hill, vocals, bass
Frank 'Rube' Beard, drums

Produced by Bill Ham

Digitally remastered

ZZ Top
This sturdy American blues-rock trio from Texas consists of Billy Gibbons (guitar), Dusty Hill (bass), and Frank Beard (drums). They were formed in 1970 in and around Houston from rival bands the Moving Sidewalks (Gibbons) and American Blues (Hill and Beard). Their first two albums reflected the strong blues roots and Texas humor of the band. Their third album (Tres Hombres) gained them national attention with the hit "La Grange," a signature riff tune to this day, based on John Lee Hooker's "Boogie Chillen." Their success continued unabated throughout the '70s, culminating with the year-and-a-half-long Worldwide Texas Tour.

Exhausted from the overwhelming workload, they took a three-year break, then switched labels and returned to form with Deguello and El Loco, both harbingers of what was to come. By their next album, Eliminator, and its worldwide smash follow-up, Afterburner, they had successfully harnessed the potential of synthesizers to their patented grungy blues groove, giving their material a more contemporary edge while retaining their patented Texas style. Now sporting long beards, golf hats, and boiler suits, they met the emerging video age head-on, reducing their "message" to simple iconography. Becoming even more popular in the long run, they moved with the times while simultaneously bucking every trend that crossed their path. As genuine roots musicians, they have few peers; Gibbons is one of America's finest blues guitarists working in the arena rock idiom — both influenced by the originators of the form and British blues-rock guitarists like Peter Green — while Hill and Beard provide the ultimate rhythm section support.

The only rock & roll group that's out there with its original members still aboard after three decades (an anniversary celebrated on 1999's XXX), ZZ Top play music that is always instantly recognizable, eminently powerful, profoundly soulful, and 100-percent American in derivation. They have continued to support the blues through various means, perhaps most visibly when they were given a piece of wood from Muddy Waters' shack in Clarksdale, MS. The group members had it made into a guitar, dubbed the "Muddywood," then sent it out on tour to raise money for the Delta Blues Museum. ZZ Top's support and link to the blues remains as rock solid as the music they play. A concert CD and DVD, Live from Texas, recorded in Dallas in 2007 and featuring a still vital band, were both released in 2008. The Rick Rubin and Gibbons-produced La Futura, the band's 15th studio album, and the group's first new studio outing since 2003's Mescalero, appeared in 2012.

This album contains no booklet.