ZZ Top - The Complete Studio Albums 1970-1990 (2013)

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ZZ Top - The Complete Studio Albums 1970-1990 (2013)

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Warner's 2013 box set The Complete Studio Albums 1970-1990 rounds up the ten albums ZZ Top recorded for Warner Bros over the course of 20 years: 1971's ZZ Top's First Album, 1972's Rio Grande Mud, 1973's Tres Hombres, 1975's Fandango!, 1976's Tejas, 1979's Deguello, 1981's El Loco, 1983's Eliminator, 1985's Afterburner, and 1990's Recycler. Each album is packaged as a mini LP containing the original artwork, but the real news is that the original LP mixes for ZZ Top's First Album, Rio Grande Mud, and Tejas are presented on CD for the first time, a move that will please all hardcore fans.

by Stephen Thomas Erlewine

Back in 1987, at the dawn of the CD era, ZZ Top released a three-disc box set called ‘Six Pack’ that included the band’s first five albums plus their seventh. Still flush from the mega-success of 1983’s ‘Eliminator,’ and its 1985 follow-up ‘Afterburner,’ someone decided to take the original recordings from the ‘70s and remix them with added ‘80s-style percussion. It wasn’t long before every ZZ Top CD for sale came with the newly recorded mechanized drums that helped make ‘Eliminator’ a hit. One thing ‘Tres Hombres’ didn’t need was robotic percussion.

The 10-disc ‘ZZ Top: The Complete Studio Albums (1970-1990)’ rights these quarter-century wrongs by reissuing the LPs in their original mixes. And if that means some of them – like 1971’s ‘ZZ Top’s First Album’ – sound a bit sludgy, and others — like 1975’s part-live ‘Fandango!’ – aren’t as crisp or as clear as you once thought, at least the heavily processed mixes that have plagued the records for years are no longer around.

That leaves you with the music itself. And, as you’ll quickly figure out as you plow through this hefty box, ZZ Top were a spotty band during their first 20 years. The first two albums especially (‘ZZ Top’s First Album’ and 1972’s ‘Rio Grande Mud’) are loose, hazy and scattered. The trio didn’t really find focus until their terrific third outing, 1973’s ‘Tres Hombres,’ which sounds big, full and powerful in the remastered version here. So do most of the immediate follow-ups to that breakthrough album.

By the time ZZ Top entered the ‘80s, they were ready for a change. You can hear the seeds of it taking root on 1981’s ‘El Loco,’ but 1983’s ‘Eliminator’ is the record that turned the dust-covered boogie band from Texas into global pop stars. It still sounds like a monster today, charging forward with some of the era’s most inventive blend of synth-pop hooks and old-school rock. ‘Afterburner’ and 1990’s ‘Recycler’ are more of the same, but without the initial knockout punch.

The set is aimed at collectors, with all 10 albums packaged in reproductions of their original sleeves (i.e. the ones that came in gatefolds include gatefolds). Several of the records received aural upgrades over the years restoring their original mixes, so the most devoted fans probably already own them. But this is the first time a handful of them have been available like this and the first time they’ve all been gathered in one place. ‘The Complete Studio Albums’ is the most definitive collection of the band’s first 20 years. You just have to decide if it’s worth purchasing again.

by Michael Gallucci

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ZZ Top - The Complete Studio Albums 1970-1990 (2013)

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ZZ Top's First Album may not be perfectly polished, but it does establish their sound, attitude, and quirks. Simply put, it's a dirty little blues-rock record, filled with fuzzy guitars, barrelhouse rhythms, dirty jokes, and Texan slang. They have a good, ballsy sound that hits at gut level, and if the record's not entirely satisfying, it's because they're still learning how to craft records – which means that they're still learning pacing as much as they're learning how to assemble a set of indelible material. Too much of this record glides by on its sound, without offering any true substance, but the tracks that really work – "(Somebody Else Been) Shaking Your Tree," "Backdoor Love Affair," "Brown Sugar," and "Goin' Down to Mexico," among them – show that from their very first record on, ZZ Top was that lil' ol' blues band from Texas.

by Stephen Thomas Erlewine

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ZZ Top - The Complete Studio Albums 1970-1990 (2013)

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With their second album, Rio Grande Mud, ZZ Top uses the sound they sketched out on their debut as a blueprint, yet they tweak it in slight but important ways. The first difference is the heavier, more powerful sound, turning the boogie guitars into a locomotive force. There are slight production flares that date this as a 1972 record, but for the most part, this is a straight-ahead, dirty blues-rock difference. Essentially like the first album, then. That's where the second difference comes in – they have a much better set of songs this time around, highlighted by the swaggering shuffle "Just Got Paid," the pile-driving boogie "Bar-B-Q," the slide guitar workout "Apologies to Pearly," and two Dusty Hill-sung numbers, "Francine" and "Chevrolet." There are still a couple of tracks that don't quite gel and their fuzz-blues still can sound a little one-dimensional at times, but Rio Grande Mud is the first flowering of ZZ Top as a great, down-n-dirty blooze rock band.

by Stephen Thomas Erlewine

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ZZ Top - The Complete Studio Albums 1970-1990 (2013)

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Tres Hombres is the record that brought ZZ Top their first Top Ten record, making them stars in the process. It couldn't have happened to a better record. ZZ Top finally got their low-down, cheerfully sleazy blooze-n-boogie right on this, their third album. As their sound gelled, producer Bill Ham discovered how to record the trio so simply that they sound indestructible, and the group brought the best set of songs they'd ever have to the table. On the surface, there's nothing really special about the record, since it's just a driving blues-rock album from a Texas bar band, but that's what's special about it. It has a filthy groove and an infectious feel, thanks to Billy Gibbons' growling guitars and the steady propulsion of Dusty Hill and Frank Beard's rhythm section. They get the blend of bluesy shuffles, gut-bucket rocking, and off-beat humor just right. ZZ Top's very identity comes from this earthy sound and songs as utterly infectious as "Waitin' for the Bus," "Jesus Just Left Chicago," "Move Me on Down the Line," and the John Lee Hooker boogie "La Grange." In a sense, they kept trying to remake this record from this point on – what is Eliminator if not Tres Hombres with sequencers and synthesizers? – but they never got it better than they did here.

by Stephen Thomas Erlewine

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ZZ Top - The Complete Studio Albums 1970-1990 (2013)

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Blessed with their first full-fledged hit album, ZZ Top followed it up with Fandango!, a record split between a side of live tracks and a side of new studio cuts. In a way, this might have made sense, since they were a kick-ass live band, and they do sound good here, but it's hard not to see this as a bit of a wasted opportunity in retrospect. Why? Because the studio side is a worthy successor to the all-fine Tres Hombres, driven by "Tush" and "Heard It on the X," two of their greatest songs that build on that album by consolidating their sound and amplifying their humor. If they had sustained this energy and quality throughout a full studio album, it would have been their greatest, but instead the mood is broken by the live cuts. Now, these are really good live cuts – and "Backdoor Medley" and "Jailhouse Rock" were fine interpretations, making familiar songs sound utterly comfortable in their signature sound – and Fandango! remains one of their better albums, but it's hard not to think that it could have been even better.

by Stephen Thomas Erlewine

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ZZ Top - The Complete Studio Albums 1970-1990 (2013)

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ZZ Top was riding high in the mid-'70s on the strength of Tres Hombres and Fandango, but they were starting to run out of steam by 1977's Tejas. Its predecessor was padded with a live side, but even if it was close to padding, it was still enjoyable. Tejas, despite sounding pretty good, is just forgettable. It has the patented, propulsive ZZ boogie, but none of the songs are particularly memorable, even if the whole thing sounds pretty good as it's playing. ZZ Top and their label, London, must have noticed this too, since even though the album went gold, they followed it months later with The Best of ZZ Top, which contained none of the songs from this album.

by Stephen Thomas Erlewine

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ZZ Top - The Complete Studio Albums 1970-1990 (2013)

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ZZ Top returned after an extended layoff in late 1979 with Degüello, their best album since 1973's Tres Hombres. During their time off, ZZ Top didn't change much – hell, their sound never really changed during their entire career – but it did harden, in a way. The grooves became harder, sleeker, and their off-kilter sensibility and humor began to dominate, as "Cheap Sunglasses" and "Fool for Your Stockings" illustrate. Ironically, this, their wildest album lyrically, doesn't have the unhinged rawness of their early blooze rockers, but the streamlined production makes it feel sleazier all the same, since its slickness lets the perversity slide forth. And, forget not, the trio is in fine shape here, knocking out a great set of rockers and sounding stylish all the time. Undoubtedly one of their strong suits.

by Stephen Thomas Erlewine

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ZZ Top - The Complete Studio Albums 1970-1990 (2013)

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El Loco follows through on the streamlined, jet-engine boogie rock of Degüello, but kicking all the ingredients up a notch. That means that the grooves are getting a little slicker, while the jokes are getting a little sillier, a little raunchier. The double entendres on "Tube Snake Boogie" and "Pearl Necklace" are barely disguised, while much of the record plays as flat-out goofy party rock. Not necessarily a bad thing, but much of it is a little too obvious to be totally winning. Still, the most telling thing about El Loco may be the rhythm of "Pearl Necklace," its biggest single and best song, which clearly points the way to the new wave blues-rock of Eliminator.

by Stephen Thomas Erlewine

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ZZ Top - The Complete Studio Albums 1970-1990 (2013)

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ZZ Top had reached the top of the charts before, but that didn't make their sudden popularity in 1983 any more predictable. It wasn't that they were just popular – they were hip, for God's sake, since they were one of the only AOR favorites to figure out to harness the stylish, synthesized grooves of new wave, and then figure out how to sell it on MTV. Of course, it helped that they had songs that deserved to be hits. With "Gimme All Your Lovin'," "Sharp Dressed Man," and "Legs," they had their greatest set of singles since the heady days of Tres Hombres, and the songs that surrounded them weren't bad either – they would have been singles on El Loco, as a matter of fact. The songs alone would have made Eliminator one of ZZ Top's three greatest albums, but their embrace of synths and sequencers made it a blockbuster hit, since it was the sound of the times. Years later, the sound of the times winds up sounding a bit stiff. It's still an excellent ZZ Top album, one of their best, yet it sounds like a mechanized ZZ Top thanks to the unflaggingly accurate grooves. Then again, that's part of the album's charm – this is new wave blues-rock, glossed up for the video, looking as good as the omnipresent convertible on the cover and sounding as irresistible as Reaganomics. Not the sort the old-school fans or blues-rock purists will love, but ZZ Top never sounded as much like a band of its time as they did here.

by Stephen Thomas Erlewine

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Well, if you just had your biggest hit ever, you'd probably try to replicate it, too. And if you were praised for being visionary because you played all your blues grooves to a slightly sequenced beat, you'd probably be tempted to not just continue in that direction, but to tighten the sequencer and graft on synthesizers, since it'll all signal how futuristic you are. While you're at it, you might visualize how space age this all is by turning your signature car in to a space shuttle. If you look at things that way, then Afterburner, ZZ Top's follow-up to their blockbuster Eliminator, makes sense – they're just giving the people more of what they want. Problem is, no matter how much you dress ZZ Top up, they're still ZZ Top. Sometimes they can trick you into thinking they're a little flashier than usual, but they're still a lil' ol' blues band from Texas, kicking out blues-rockers. And blues-rock just doesn't kick when it's synthesized, even if ZZ Top's grooves always bordered on robotic. So, Afterburner, their most synthetic album, will not please most ZZ Top fans, even if it did go platinum several time over and reached number four. That's all just a sign of the times, when even hard rock bands had to sound as slick as synth pop, complete with clanging DX-7s and cavernous drums. As an artifact of that time, Afterburner is pretty good – never has a hard rock album sounded so artificial, nor has a nominal blues-rock album sounded so devoid of blues. Apart from the chugging "Sleeping Bag," not even the singles sound like ZZ Top (though "Dipping Low (In the Lap of Luxury" is a blatant "Gimme All Your Lovin'" rewrite): the terrific post-new wave rocker "Stages" is the poppiest thing they ever cut, the ballad "Rough Boy" is far removed from slow blues, and the full-fledged synth dance of "Velcro Fly" is a true mind-bender. All this means that Afterburner is merely a product of its time – the only record ZZ Top could have made at the time, but it hardly exists out of that time.

by Stephen Thomas Erlewine

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ZZ Top - The Complete Studio Albums 1970-1990 (2013)

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The continuation of Eliminator's synthesized blues boogie made sense on Afterburner, since it arrived two years after its predecessor. ZZ Top's choice to pursue that direction on Recycler is puzzling, since a full five years separates this from Afterburner. It's not just that they continue to follow this path; it's that they embalm it, creating a record that may be marginally ballsier than its predecessor, but lacking the sense of goofy fun and warped ambition that made Afterburner fascinating. Here, there's just a steady, relentless beat (Frank Beard is still chained to the sequencer, as he has been for a decade), topped off by processed guitars turning out licks that fall short of being true riffs. Put it this way, apart from "Doubleback," a continuation of the arena pop of "Stages," the other number that really works here is "My Head's in Mississippi," the closest they'd come to the greasy boogie of "La Grange" since Degüello. When it arrives halfway through Recycler, it not only sounds refreshing; it puts the rest of the album in perspective, showing how tired the once-bracing synth-blooze-boogie has become. And the worst thing about it all, it doesn't seem like the band realizes how uncomfortably ironic the title of Recycler is.

by Stephen Thomas Erlewine

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